Academic Critical of Overblown Budget on Hawaii Rail Project

Interviewed by Radio New Zealand:

"We should have put aside monies, which is really trivial given the overall scope, and a couple of million dollars at most would have done it, for a national forensic expert on transit systems to come and look at what is really happening here and how come our transit system is two to three times more expensive than other comparable US systems," Panos Prevedouros said.

Waves Eat Away Part of Kamehameha Hwy.

Allyson Blair reports on the worsening erosion along Kamehameha Hwy.

Traffic engineering expert Panos Prevedouros agrees.

"It's a major risk. The pavement is undermined so it can collapse in a small or large degree, to which I don't know, at any time," said Prevedouros.

Prevedouros says the road needs immediate repair. In the meantime drivers shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the undermined asphalt.

"Everything in that area seems to be completely eroded. Therefore even the crash guard that looks to be okay, although it has some rust on the backside, it may be structurally compromised," said Prevedouros.

Tourists to Help Pay for Beleaguered Honolulu Rail

Quoted in this article in Travel Pulse. I had no idea but Google found it for me...

The Flooding in Mapunapuna?

Quoted in Alexander Zane's story on KHON about the repeated flooding in Mapunapuna.

Several years ago, the city installed a duckbill drainage system to get storm water out and keep ocean water from coming in.

But according to Panos Prevedouros, chair of the UH Manoa Dept. Of Civil and Environmental Engineering, anything more would come with a hefty price.

“Basically you’d need to have a storage system and a pump system to pump the storm water out of it. Essentially close the connection. You have to cut the cord with the ocean so the ocean never comes in,” Prevedouros explains.

As for the option of installing a pump system to get water out of the area, Panos Prevedouros says it probably won’t happen.

“I’m pretty sure that the area does not generate significant county taxes to justify a huge investment. That’s probably what the problem has been all this time. If the area was upgraded with more expensive real estate so that the county can collect more taxes than a more sophisticated solution could be put in place, so it’s a trade-off kind of thing,” Prevedouros said.

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A couple more things to add here:

Duckbills can get clogged by debris and then they remain open allowing ocean water to intrude. In all likelihood they do not work as City claims because the area flooded during king tides in July this year.

Given the relatively low property value of this area, it makes sense to provide incentives for small businesses to relocate and return this large parcel to nature. That is, treat this area as a small estuary:  The Mapunapuna pond.

In addition, Charles Hunt saw this story and contacted me with the following important perspective and information:

An added perspective that occurs to me is that such systems will become increasingly necessary, what with progressive sea-level rise, so the City will eventually have to start installing some. Mapunapuna could be an early prototype for the City to gain experience with system designs, learning which systems and consultants have “proven out” in other locales, which systems offer best cost/reliability characteristics, etc. Or – if tax-base is an overriding consideration – perhaps another locale like Waikiki or Downtown will become the first prototype.

Here’s a link to the gateway page for my report, there’s a full PDF of the report available at the page. We installed some instrumentation to record water levels and the pump on-off duty cycle and were able to tell a few stories about drainage from the watershed and how the pump-out system operated during a couple of rain storms over the year of study:

Hunt, Charles D., Jr.; De Carlo, Eric H., Water-Resources Investigations Report 99-4171: Hydrology and Water and Sediment Quality at James Campbell National Wildlife Refuge near Kahuku, Island of Oahu, Hawaii, 2000.

Hunt also suggested that a camera system can be used to monitor the operation of the duckbills.

Rail Project Audit Needs to Be Comprehensive, Independent

"Incredibly, the people now asking for another $3 billion without accounting for the first $7 billion, say independent forensic auditors with special expertise in rail engineering and construction would cost too much."

Honolulu Star Advertiser
Island Voices

Rail Project Audit Needs to Be Comprehensive, Independent

By Panos Prevedouros, Randy Roth and Cliff Slater
August 24, 2017