Finally WHT publishes a fairly balanced article on the status of the Queen Kaahumanu Highway Phase I widening project. Up until this point I strongly feel that WHT has given Hawaiian Dredging and the HDOT an unwarranted bum rap. Most of the delays encountered with this project perfectly legitimate.Especially since this was the first design-build roadway project in the State of Hawaii.

It should be interesting to see if these armchair engineers will continue to criticize this project after the mauka lanes are opened in the near future. When those lanes between the harbor and the Palani Road intersection is opened, 45% of this project will have been completed.

After that milestone is reached, Hawaiian Dredging can focus on working on the makai lanes.Which I’ve been assured will be done a lot faster than the mauka lanes. The Makala Blvd to the harbor segment simply needs a final layer of asphalt. The Palani Road intersection to Makala Blvd will have to be torn up.But the latter should be done very quickly.

The only aspect that will be complicated will be redoing the Palani Road/ Queen Kaahumanu intersection.I would ask everyone to contact the HDOT and urge them to do the bulk of this construction work at night. If they do it during the day, it will give another black eye to Hawaiian Dredging and the HDOT.

I got word today that the Hawaiian Dredging representative misspoke at that monthly status meeting on the Queen Kaahumanu Phase I widening project. This critical roadway improvement project is still on schedule for completion in December 2008.

I also found out that Kiewit Pacific Company was the third finalist along with Goodfellow Brothers and Hawaiian Dredging Construction Company in the bidding for the Queen Kaahumanu Phase II widening project.

Kiewit has done some roadway projects locally. Specifically they built Phase I of the Hokulia bypass and the grading work for the Saddle Road re-alignment project between m.m 28 and m.m 35 and m.m 37-40. Goodfellow is currently working on the Manawalea Street extension and on the Saddle Road re-alignment project between m.m 19 and m.m 35.

It should be interesting to see who ultimately won the bidding for Phase II. All I know is if Hawaiian Dredging won the Phase II bidding there will be a lot of people rioting in the streets. Despite HDCC’s stellar reputation they’ve gotten bum rap for the multiple delays in Phase I from the Kona community. So hopefully another contractor was selected for Phase II. We should be knowing who that is any day now.

In regards to the Saddle Road re-alignment project Goodfellow Brothers should be completing the 6(4) phase grading work between m.m 35 and m.m 41.5 this fall. The 6(5) phase is still on track to be put out to bid on July 30, 2008. The bid opening for the 6(5) phase will be on September 4, 2008.

Hopefully former State Senator and Councilwoman Virginia Isbell will reconsider running against current State Representative Josh Green for former State Senator Paul Whalen’s seat. Rep. Green has raised $157,915.97 for his Senate run. Which is extremely critical since he is been targeted for defeat by HMSA,off island residents and entities that want to shaft West Hawaii.

Its good to see that Matson Navigation has reached an agreement with three unions on Monday.This will avoid a potentially crippling strike that could’ve been potentially disastrous to Hawaii’s economy.

Lastly, I’m very concerned about the financial condition our local hospital system.Despite assurances to the contrary, I believe these cuts will affect patient care ultimately. The frustrating thing is the fact the legislature has been asleep while Rome is burning.

We should be knowing any day now which contractor won the bidding for the Queen Kaahumanu Highway Phase II widening. I asked Brennon Morioka to send me the press release that will announce this significant milestone for this important roadway improvement project.

I did some searching online to find more information about this. It seems Goodfellow Brothers and Hawaiian Dredging Construction Company were among the top three bidders for this project. I found these notices placed here and here placed by Goodfellow Brothers and Hawaiian Dredging seeking sub contractors for this project.

SUB-BIDS REQUESTED

QUEEN KAAHUMANU HIGHWAY WIDENING, PHASE 2 KEALAKEHE PARKWAY TO KEAHOLE AIRPORT ROAD

DISTRICT OF KONA, ISLAND OF HAWAII

Bid Date: May 27, 2008

HAWAIIAN DREDGING CONSTRUCTION COMPANY, INC.
Contractors License No. ABC-24018
P. O. Box 4088, Honolulu, Hawaii 96812
Phone: 735-3211 Fax: 735-3232

Contact: Steven Sakagawa

We are an Equal Opportunity Employer and request sub-bids from all interested firms, including
minorities, small business, small disadvantaged business, andwomen business enterprises.Plans and specifications may be viewed in our office at 201 Merchant Street, 10th Floor,

(call Nancy Miyashiro at 735-3352 to make an appointment to view documents).

SUB-BIDS REQUESTED QUEEN KAAHUMANU HIGHWAY WIDENING PHASE 2 DESIGN-BUILD KEALAKEHE PARKWAY TO KEAHOLE AIRPORT ROAD NORTH KONA, HAWAII BID DATE: MAY 27, 2008 GOODFELLOW BROS., INC. 381 HUKU LI`I PLACE KIHEI, MAUI, HAWAII 96753 PH: (879-5205 FAX: 879-3674 CONTACT: JODI ALCONCEL We are an Equal Opportunity Employer and request quotes from all interested subcontractors and suppliers including all women-owned businesses, state and federally certified DBEs, HUB zone, minority and/or other forms of small disadvantaged businesses. Please call for more information. (Hon. Adv.: May 9, 13 (A-477774) Updated on 05/09/2008.

It is good see that the bidding to resurface Queen Kaahumanu Highway between Lako Street and Henry Street has been completed. Grace Pacific Corporation was the successful bidder for this important project.

Lastly, I got word from my employer that our pay will be direct deposited on July 3rd, 2008. Hopefully due to this I’ll be getting paid on time this week.

It seems the pro development factions are coming out of the woodwork to fight the Kona Community Development Plan.At least that is how I view this op-ed published by WHT today by Ken Obenski Below is a e-mail I response I sent to Mr. Obenski via a local mailing list about his op-ed.

Ken,

I read your op-ed in the Hawaii Free Press and WHT today. It seems you have ulterior motive and ax to grind big time.It also made me wonder if you are affiliated with one of these local extreme right wing groups like the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. I tried doing a Google search on the latter and didn’t get far. Nonetheless you are listed as contributing writer to Hawaii Free Press (whom is affiliated with Hawaii Reporter, whom is affiliated with GIH).

Below is one of the many examples of your extreme right wing views:

“Hawaii already has the worst business climate in America, primarily because of an excess of rigid planning. Nothing can happen until countless bureaucrats have had their hand in it, and their hand moves with the speed of a glacier, often in the wrong direction. Hawai’i’s lack of progress is not due to a lack of planning, but rather to, more than anything else, an excess.”

I’ve lived in Kona 32 years. Paving over paradise is not an acceptable option at this point. Simply put it is very unsustainable to continue to give entitlements to all these multi million McMansion subdivisions. Especially if oil prices continue to go through the roof. We need to start diversifying Hawaii’s economy away from tourism,construction/real estate,and the military.

Another aspect of your op-ed that irritated me was the citation of projects supposedly stalled by Hilo.

“What’s more, the things we lack in West Hawaii (Hokulia bypass, Saddle road, Parks, Civic center) are not due to a lack of planning, they are due to a lack of will to spend county money on anything that does not directly benefit Hilo.”

I agree that Hilo has great infrastructure and has shafted the rest of the island with poor infrastructure over the years. But the projects you cite, except the Civic Center and Parks are not funded by the County. The Hokulia bypass is being built by Oceanside 1250. It currently held up by the selfish actions of the the Coupe family. As for Saddle Road, the FHWA is currently improving large sections of that road.Hawaii County is not involved in that project for the most part. However they are going to resurface Saddle Road between m.m 35 and m.m 47.

I haven’t had chance to read the KCDP. But I do know if gas prices continue to rise we won’t be able to continue with our business as usual attitude. The KCDP may not be perfect.But it is better than nothing, in my opinion.

Aaron Stene

WHT published the last article in the three part series on Geothermal energy on the Big Island. It should be very interesting if Kristine Kubat writes yet another op-ed slamming the use of Geothermal energy here on the Big Island.In my view, since Kubat hates Geothermal so much she needs to come up with alternatives to wean our island’s dependence on foreign oil.

My current employer pays us on Fridays every two weeks. But this coming up Friday is a holiday. Which could be very problematic for me. Especially since my current bank, CU Hawaii,still manually inputs any direct deposits to their customer accounts.I’ve spoken to my employer about this. It didn’t seem they were going to be depositing my paycheck early this week because of the holiday. So it is very likely I may not get paid until Monday

I’m curious if there is any other local banks stuck in the dark ages and still have to manually input direct deposits to customer accounts. It would be good to know so I can avoid possibly switching over them
and avoiding this problem once again.

WHT had a follow-up article on the continued delays on completing the Kealaka’a Street/Palani Road intersection re-alignment.

As far as I understand, the root cause for the delay is because Hawaii County’s consultant failed to obtain a large enough land easement so HELCO could move their utility poles.Thus Hawaii County had to go back to DHHL to obtain the needed land easement.

The second delay is actually due to the fact Hawaii County requested a different height utility pole. Which has forced HELCO to go back to drawing board to relocate these poles. As far as I understand the poles should be moved by July 2008. After this is accomplished Jas Glover can resume construction on this much needed safety improvement for Palani Road.

I find these pro east Hawaii articles published by the Big Island Weekly very frustrating. Especially when they report things like this :

“When he was a councilor, Holschuh said people would tell him that the county should be split in two. “They’d come up to me and say things like, ‘Kona pays more taxes and this kine stuff and they don’t get the roads but Hilo got the brand new Mohouli Extension and it’s beautiful and why aren’t we getting that?’”

Holschuh explains that road project, and many others, were planned 40 years ago when Kona was “kind of a sleepy little fishing town.”

It’s natural for East Hawai`i to have more infrastructure like parks and gyms, he says, because the sugar plantations built and maintained them.

“A lot of newcomers to the Kona side were grumbling about (former Councilor James) Arakaki and me and all of us. But interestingly, Stacy Higa probably has done more to build roads and put money, along with Jimmy Arakaki and Aaron Chung, than the council members from West Hawai`i.”

There is “no problem” with Hilo being the seat of government, said Holschuh.”

Where are these roads Fred ? Hawaii County hasn’t built a major road in West Hawaii ever as far as I recall.So your comment that these East Hawaii council members did all these great things for West Hawaii is a bunch of bull.

Overall, it seems like you are trying to justify Hilo having all this great infrastructure. All the while the rest of the island is being shafted with poor roads and infrastructure and few parks and recreational opportunities. I for one am very happy that the constituents of Hamakua did not re-elect you back to the county council. Your pro east Hawaii thinking is huge detriment to this island in my opinion.

Until there is equal distribution of infrastructure islandwide, there will be people grumbling about Hilo being the county seat.

The ground breaking for the planned Target store at Kona Commons happened yesterday(here,here, and here).

The Honolulu Advertiser article was particularly interesting. Especially the part detailing the other tenants whom are going to occupy this shopping center. I’m really looking forward to Circuit City and Office Max opening especially.

On a related note, it seems the developer of Kona Commons was a bit more upbeat in building Phase III of this this shopping center compared to about a year ago.

From this WHT article:

“However, Kona Commons will likely not immediately usurp the Prince Kuhio Plaza as the largest shopping center on the Big Island. When it was first announced, Kona Commons was planned at 685,000 square feet of retailing space, making it more than 25 percent larger than the 505,000-square-foot Prince Kuhio Plaza in Hilo.”

“Dinsmore said that may not be out of the question in the future, but he added that current market conditions are not conducive to such a large mall. “It will be dictated by the retailers,” said Dinsmore. “If there is a demand, then we’ll expand (makai, toward the old Kona Airport).”

As for Target opening a store here, I strongly feel that this will give the Big Kmart a run for its money. Sears was planning on renovating our Big Kmart about 1.5 years ago. But ultimately decided to scuttle those plans. With Target opening, if Big Kmart wants to remain competitive, they really need to re-examine those renovation plans.

I found this CNN Money article on a on a class action lawsuit filed against Matson Navigation very interesting. Allegedly Matson conspired with Horizon Lines to raise their fuel surcharge at a much higher rate than the actual increase in fuel prices since 1999. If this proves to be true hopefully the DOJ will throw the book at these companies for making excessive profits at the expense of the residents and businesses here in Hawaii.

I came home from work this morning and checked the Konaweb forums.To my utter shock I saw this posting here about the Queen Kaahumanu Highway Phase I widening.According to this person,there will be more delays in completing this project. Apparently the contract amendments had been funded, but not signed off on yet.She got this information directly from the Hawaiian Dredging representatives. Whom were at the monthly Queen Kaahumanu widening update meeting at the Kona mayor’s office.

After I saw this posting I called up one of the Metcalf & Eddy Pacific engineers handling this project.He wasn’t aware of any further delays.According to this engineer it seemed things are moving a long quite well. The mauka lanes from the harbor to Palani Road should be opened by July 10, 2008 (baring if they don’t have anymore asphalt supply issues).

This will allow the contractor to work on the makai lanes.Which should be completed a lot faster than the mauka lanes. The harbor to Makala Blvd stretch only needs a final layer of asphalt. The Makala Blvd to Palani Road intersection will have to be torn up. But it seemed the most time consuming aspect of this project now is the Queen Kaahumanu/Palani Road intersection.

On a related note, I e-mailed Brennon Morioka about this alleged delay also. He was not aware of any additional delays in completing this project. I called him up and left a message to call me tomorrow.
Hopefully either way I can get to the bottom of this.

Hat tip to Hunter Bishop for blogging about this Big Island Weekly op-ed by Kristine Kubat.Kubat criticizes WHT’s series of articles on Geothermal energry on the Big Island. I’m frankly not suprised by her position on this. She was a ardent opponent of Geothermal development in Puna during the early 1990s.But considering the rapid increase in oil prices the Big Island needs to become more energy self sufficient. Geothermal is the most reliable alternative energy resource the Big Island has.

Speaking of self sufficiency, Richard Ha has a interesting blog posting on the future of the Big Island.Since energy prices may eventually kill off our golden goose, tourism, Richard is advocating expansion of astronomy on Mauna Kea. Which I strongly support. Hawaii needs to move away from its current unsustainable economy.

Below is a couple updates on a number of local roadway projects:

The resurfacing of Saddle Road between m.m 35 and 47 is still on schedule for the month of July.

There is still nothing new to report in regards to the Hokulia Bypass (at least from Hawaii County).

The activation of the stop light below Malulani Gardens and Lowes is still being worked on. The roadway striping still needs to be completed.

Grace Church is still trying to obtain the two land easements needed to move the utility poles. When those easements are obtained the upper portion of Palani Road can be re-aligned.

I found out it may be up to 2 years before the Kamaka’eha Avenue/Palani Road turn pocket construction may be able to proceed. Apparently this project involves moving the HELCO 69KV utility poles. Which requires Hawaii PUC approval and public hearings.I find it perplexing this issue was not addressed sooner. Especially since this project was in design phase since September 2004 ?

I got word that the bids for the Queen Kaahumanu Highway Phase II widening have been opened.It should be any day now that we should be hearing who will be the contractor for this project. Which will widen Queen Kaahumanu Highway from Kealakehe Parkway to Kona Int’l Airport.

I find it strange that I can get really great DSL speeds from these servers. But I can’t get squat from these DSL Reports speed test servers. Unless proven otherwise, I’ll just chalk it up to that these DSL Reports speed test servers are incapable of gauging high speed circuits like what I have.

I found this reader comment in regards to this WHT geothermal energy article very interesting.

kibitzor wrote on Jun 16, 2008 9:05 AM:
“Also not mentioned: the resource has drastically dwindled (now less steam and more brine), which has limited production. “

I e-mailed PGV about this. It seems this reader comment is right on.Back in 1993 PGV had two wells which produced 90% steam/10% brine. But over the years PGV has drilled more wells (five production wells/four injection wells). and the ratio has changed. It is currently 25% steam/75% brine. Since this has occurred PGV is exploring the use of the brine byproduct to produce power.

Lastly, I found this comment from one of the Hawaii Tribune Herald editors very frustrating. He was responding to a reader criticism of the Hawaii Tribune Herald’s reporting the Sen. Dwight Takamine campaign donation violation story.This is another example of why the Big Island needs another alternative paper to counter the biased reporting of the Stephens Media cabal of papers.

WHT published a second article on Geothermal energy usage in Hawaii. With oil prices soaring we need to make better use of this truly reliable alternative energy resource. But nonetheless I figure the fringe element will stall further expansion.Which is real shame especially since this resource can truly reduce our huge dependence on foreign oil.

I can see both arguments for against local governments here borrowing more money . I certainly agree with Governor Lingle and Mayor Kim’s assessment that government spending on capital improvement projects is good thing to jump start the economy. But on the flip side both the state and counties  need to be more financially prudent if the economy gets worse.

I don’t feel sorry for these folks who spent big bucks on SUV and big trucks. Whom are getting squeezed by high oil prices and finding that trade in value of their vehicle has dropped. I bought light duty 2005 Ford Ranger XL in 2005. Fuel increases have hurt me. But at least I get about 20-24mpg with my truck.So I usually don’t have to go the gas station more than once a week.