The Destruction of Oahu by Heavy Rail

Waipahu Now


Waipahu in 2020 with Rail



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Tampa Expressway Spurs Tons of Development

Let me first quickly remind the reader about our Kapiolani Boulevard re-development lesson which I first posted in 2008, and then we will go to the pictorial tour of the 10 mile, $320 Million, 60% elevated on single posts Tampa Expressway.

Does Rail Stimulate Long Term Redevelopment? We do not need rail for development and opportunities to flourish. We need a robust economy, a well-paid populous, low taxes, good quality products and services (tourism, education, local products, etc.), steady and smart leadership, and reliable infrastructure and government operations. Rail is simply a scheme to rob a million people (through taxes) in order to benefit a few hundred insiders and a few thousand workers, most of them temporary.

On to Tampa now... Dr. Martin Stone, Planning Director for the Tampa-Hillsborough County Expressway Authority estimates that about $1 billion in new development at its urban end has occurred since the opening of the Tampa Expressway.

Unlike regular Transit Oriented Development (TOD) which are highly subsidized, no tax incentives were needed for these developments.

2052 Streetscape showing the Grand Central (residential, parking, multiple floors of office and commercial on first floor) development, the Slade (residential and commercial on first floor) development and the Towers of Channelside (residential, parking and commercial on first floor at the far end of photo)

2053 Grand Central and Ventana (3 separate buildings - Madison Street view)

2054 Grand Central and Ventana (3 separate buildings - Kennedy Blvd view)

2055 The Slade on Meridian

2057 The Slade with Grand Central in background

2060 Towers with retail on first floor and Cruise ship parking garage in background

2061 New History Museum (on left) with Towers on right

2062 New History Museum

Tourism Industry: Fact, Action, and Possible Destruction

Fact: Tourism is important to all of us on Oahu but the grim reality is that since the 1996-1998 high, tourism has been at a fairly constant slide, as DBEDT monthly statistics since 1990 show.


The graph above of international arrivals shows that 9/11 and SARS and Iraq war had strong negative impacts. Add to this the weak national economy since 2008 and domestic arrivals also have dropped sharply. See below.


Today's visitors observe a congested, aging and increasingly unappealing Oahu with potholed roads, tired looking parks, and hordes of homeless.

Action is needed now. My vision is to restore the postcard image of Oahu as a great tourist destination by focusing on fixing the infrastructure and maintaining our parks, beaches and tourist attractions. That is real value to the tourist industry and all of us.

The more attractive we are as a visitor destination, the more the hotels can get higher rates and higher quality jobs in the hospitality industry can be had.

Destruction. My opponents in the mayor race will significantly harm Oahu's tourist industry in three ways:

(1) Both advocate rail which is a giant project that will involve 10 years of messy construction to deliver a system that very few will use, according to the city's forecasts. The construction mess and the very ugly all-elevated rail line will be tourism killers for Oahu.

(2) The rail is gigantically expensive so other needs such as dilapidated parks and beaches, homelessness and potholed roads will be under-funded. Thus they will get worse and Oahu's tourist appeal will worsen.

(3) The taxes needed to construct and maintain rail and the sewers add up to $10 billion which means heavy extra taxes. How heavy? The typical sewer bill 15 years from now will be about $2,500 per year plus another $1,000 for rail for each taxpayer.

People in the hospitality industry will find it increasingly difficult to afford to live in Hawaii. Hotels may increase wages and will have to pay higher city taxes. So hotels will have to charge much more for their rooms to offset the costs, thus making a visitation to Hawaii more costly and less competitive.

My competitors' model for "rail jobs" is a long term disaster.

Hawaii's Energy Options

Status quo, Part 1: oil and coal -- Coal will remain affordable for decades (excluding made up carbon taxes). Oil prices will reach $150/barrel again in the future and at anything over $200/barrel using 2010 as a base (barrel under $80) will stress transportation budgets on Oahu, cost of goods, and price of flights.

Status quo, Part 2: burn trash is profitable now and probably still doable at $150 per barrel of oil. Oil is essential to mix with trash for the incineration process. The downside is that about 20% of the trash volume is converted into trash so every five years the pile that needs to be land-filled is as big as one year's worth of land-filled trash.

Other energy from trash: Collect methane from decommissioned trash land fills. This is a remote possibility for the Waimanalo Gulch and the power gain will likely be small.

Geothermal is a great option, very clean, but for the Big Island only. With all the volcanic activity, it makes little sense to burn oil on the Big Island for electricity generation or for other renewable energy installations.

Then there is a host of renewable energy technologies some of which have known risks, costs, reliability and effectiveness. Others are heavily dependent on subsidies to make their cost per mega-Watt (MW) competitive when oil costs less than $150/barrel. The mix that is worth investigating for feasibility, planning and costing in producing electric power includes:

• photovoltaic (PV) or solar,
• wind, various technologies,
• wave, various technologies,
• biomass, various technologies,
• nuclear, various sizes, configurations and location options,
• other less known technologies, some of which appropriate for small scale deployments.
  

The state needs a detailed 20 and 50 year plan for the four main islands completed by 2012.

Nuclear Power in Oahu's Future?

My statement at a recent mayoral debate that Hawaii should consider a nuclear plant for electricity stirred up some interest and apprehension.

Nuclear power for electricity in Oahu's future?

The likely answer is yes in order to sustain one million people and six million annual visitors 2,000 miles away from most resources, given that over 90% of the electricity is now fueled by oil. Planning for it, including a senate vote by over 2/3 in the affirmative, will take well over 10 years. So nuclear power is possible perhaps in 20 years, about 20 miles off-shore, for one 1,000 MW power plant.

The fact is that at the present time Oahu has nuclear reactors totaling over 1,000 MW just 6 miles from Aloha Tower. See picture below.

• 15 nuclear submarines are home-ported in Pearl Harbor
• 440 nuclear power plants are on the planet now

Earlier this year,

1. Bill Gates proposed mini nuclear reactors as the essential means for the future of the human race on the planet.
2. President Obama released over $8 Billion in loan guarantees for a new nuclear power plant in Georgia.
3. Hawaii Legislature proposed a bill to study nuclear power for Hawaii.
   

I wrote this in January...

The scarcity and cost of fossil fuels makes the development of expensive nuclear energy a cost-effective if not essential proposition. France and Japan are leading examples of reliance on nuclear power with minimal ill effects. At the first oil crisis in 1973, only 1% of Japan’s electricity was produced by nuclear energy. By the second oil crisis of 1979, 4% was from nuclear; in 2000 the ratio was up to 12% and the 2010 goal is 15%.

As of 2005, Japan had 52 operating nuclear plants, 3 in construction and 8 in planning and design. France is even more ahead: Its 59 nuclear plants produce 88% of the country’s electric power. There are about 440 nuclear power plants on the globe. France, Japan and the U.S. combined produce over 55% of the nuclear power energy on the globe.

Click link to READ MORE and see the list of our Pearl Harbor nuclear submarines.