Letter: Tourism crowds out space for locals

A front-page story has the Hana Highway being “overwhelmed” by hordes of tourist- driven cars (“Visitors overwhelm Maui’s Hana Highway, residents who live along remote route,” Star-Advertiser, Sept. 9).

Welcome to Hawaii 2018: Our island home as a world- renowned theme park.

Indeed, why do we have the uneasy feeling these days that wherever we venture, whether to Leonard’s Bakery, Kailua Beach, Manoa Falls, or to Kihei and Kona, that space has become “touristic,” not local, space? What used to be the Waikiki scene now gets played out all over the islands.

Ten million tourists are projected for this year. And if Hana’s infrastructure cannot accommodate this inflow, neither can our state as a whole. Let’s effectively tax private tourism rentals and deeply cut the number of these permitted to function.

But we must also consider legislation to reduce tourist numbers. The tourism industry, of course, would fight this tooth and nail and it has powerful, well-funded lobbies to protect its interests — which means protecting the special quality of our life in Hawaii from being “overwhelmed” by tourism may well require organizing a Hawaii Residents Association.

Noel Kent

Manoa

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