Lessons for Hawaii from International Conference Held In Honolulu

The 2nd International Symposium in Freeway and Tollway Operations was held in Honolulu, Hawaii from June 21-24, 2009. More than 200 experts specializing in freeway and tollway operations gathered from around the world to share their research knowledge and experiences. These series of articles summarize some of the major presentations with useful lessons for Hawaii. Our thanks to Hawaii Reporter for publishing these articles.

1. Challenges of Hawaii’s Private Transportation Companies, James K. Tokishi, 10/20/2009, LINK

2. Maintaining and Increasing the Benefits of Managed Lanes, Alireza Abrishamkar, 10/21/2009, LINK

3. Experiences with Managed Lanes in the United States, Lambros K. Mitropoulos, 10/22/2009, LINK

4. Public Private Partnerships for Highway Projects, Laxman KC, 10/29/2009, LINK

5. Intelligence for Smarter Roadways, Alyx (Xin) Yu, 10/31/2009, LINK

6. Intelligent Highway Systems for Rural Roads, Natasha Soriano, 11/10/2009,
LINK

7. Green Travel for Highways, Lambros K. Mitropoulos, 11/3/2009, LINK

8. Sensing the Future of Traffic Detection, Alyx (Xin) Yu, 11/4/2009, LINK

9. Lane Control with Active Traffic Management for Congestion Reduction, Laxman KC, 11/12/2009, LINK

The Irrelevance of Transit—A Brief Translation from Portland to Oahu

Randall O’Toole is one of the most knowledgeable people when it comes to government subsidized transportation and transit systems in particular. He is an analyst at CATO Institute in Oregon and he dubs himself the AntiPlanner who is “an active cyclist and avid rail fan who nonetheless recognizes that the automobile is the greatest invention of the last 200 years.”

His recent article is titled “The Importance of Cars; The Irrelevance of Transit” A which summarizes a new study published by the Cascade Policy Institute authored by Randall Pozdena, one Oregon’s most respected economists. The study is titled Driving the Economy: Automotive Travel, Economic Growth and the Risks of Global Warming Regulations.

The study’s primary findings may be actually summarized on one line only: People in wealthy economies drive more; people who drive more live in wealthier economies. In other words, in any way you wish to look at it, the auto is the key to prosperity.

In the same article I also found a paragraph about Portland’s transit agency, the TriMet, and I could not help myself from translating into the Oahuan Rail Language because it precisely paints the picture of Oahu with rail in 2030.

Here is the Portland version:

Even as it loses hundreds of thousands of dollars a month on this Toonerville trolley, TriMet is cutting bus service — again. “The purposeful degradation of downtown-centered bus service in favor of goofball streetcars and trains to nowhere marks a real decline in mass transit in Portland,” comments Portland blogger Bojack. “How the people responsible for this — people like [Representative] Earl the Pearl [Blumenauer] and [TriMet General Manager] Crocodile Fred Hansen — pass themselves off as champions of transit is beyond me. Champions of pork and condos is what they are.”

Here is the Oahu Rail version:

Even as it will be losing hundreds of thousands of dollars a month on the heavy rail, Oahu Rail is cutting TheBus — again. “The purposeful degradation of downtown-centered bus service in favor of goofball rail cars to nowhere marks a real decline in mass transit in Honolulu. How the people responsible for this — people like [Senator] Espero Earl of Ewa and [Rail Plan Manager] Barracuda Toru Hamayasu — pass themselves off as champions of transit is beyond me. Champions of pork and condos is what they are.”

In all seriousness, time and again rail transit outside megalopolis is irrelevant. When Hannemann, Caldwell and Apo talk about Transit Oriented Developments or TOD they literally talk about Taxes Offered to Developers. Who is really behind Mufi’s train? Developers, contractors, banks and construction unions.

Is Modern Oahu Like Ancient Greece?

As appeared in the Honolulu Star Bulletin and the Hawaii Reporter

Full of tyrants and myths? At least when it comes to rail, yes!

Only a tyrant would tax people for a rail project years before the proposal has been found to be environmentally acceptable and federally funded.

Only a tyrant would award contracts unlawfully for a project that has neither state nor federal environmental and other approvals.

Only a tyrant would manipulate the process in order to ignore superior and lower cost alternatives such as bus rapid transit and true light rail.

It is a myth that heavy rail is useful, green, can be built with current taxes or will ease congestion.

Fact is that this train will be least useful to families with kids, schoolchildren, the elderly, and the handicapped. It will serve less than 3% of the trips conducted daily on Oahu.

If New York City's rail network is excluded, because it alone carries 60% of all rail passengers in the nation, then the remainder of the U.S. rail systems are worse green house gas generators than cars. Much worse than hybrid cars.

There are fewer than five miles of elevated freeways in urban Oahu. The rail will be a 36 mile continuously elevated superstructure. And it will destroy what’s left of prime agricultural land.

Zeus would be proud of Oahu's tyrants and their myths. Fact is that Zeus never existed. This train should not exist either.

Panos D. Prevedouros, PhD
Professor of Civil Engineering