1964 vision for Honolulu filled Oahu with fake parks

This week’s column is about the 1964 Honolulu City and County General Plan. Sounds like a real snoozer, doesn’t it? But wait. There are some amazing — some might even say bizarre — things in that plan.

For instance, the Second City, now growing in Kapolei, was planned in 1964 for Kahaluu!

Eight huge, offshore "Magic Island" type parks were envisioned for Heeia, Waikane, Waimanalo, Honolulu Harbor and Keehi Lagoon.

Waikiki was seen as too congested, and resort areas were planned at several places on Oahu, including the North Shore, Makaha, Hawaii Kai and Heeia.

In 1964, the world was profoundly different than it is today. We had recovered from World War II, but had not gotten overly involved in Vietnam yet.

The baby boomers had not yet turned on, tuned in and dropped out. The environmental movement was still seven years away from launching the first Earth Day.

Hawaii’s population was around 700,000, half what we have today.

Color was just beginning to come to television, and one show we all seemed to watch on Sunday nights was the "Wonderful World of Disney." Most of us received only four television channels.

Disneyland had just opened nine years earlier in Anaheim, and one part of the Magic Kingdom — Tomorrowland — was inspiring many of us to imagine what the future could bring.

I suspect city planners had taken trips to Disneyland and saw what Oahu could become with some of Walt Disney’s magic.

In 1964, the city and state were considering Henry Kaiser’s proposed Magic Island at Ala Moana. His idea was to create two, huge, artificial islands between the peninsula we call Magic Island and Kewalo Basin.

Bridges would connect them to the shore and each other. Sailboats could pass under them.

Kaiser offered to pay for the whole thing, if he could put up six hotels on the property. Government officials wrestled with the idea for nearly 10 years and finally decided a scaled-down version — just the peninsula — would be built.

The 1964 General Plan showed what one version of Magic Island could look like. Several more were considered.

"The plan was to develop artificial islands for park use around Oahu," said Art Challacombe, deputy director of the City Department of Planning and Permitting.

"There were going to be eight Magic Island-type parks off Waimanalo, Heeia, Waikane, Honolulu Harbor, and Keehi Lagoon."

The Waimanalo island park would be barely 100 yards offshore but well over a mile long. It would create a protected place for people to play and featured three coves or harbors for boats.

Ala Moana Beach Park would have the peninsula we call Magic Island today, but it also would have a larger peninsula on the Kewalo Basin side. A long island would stretch between the two.

Sand Island would be enlarged and much of Keehi Lagoon would be filled in with two large islands.

Three artificial island parks were envisioned for the Windward side off Waikane and Waiahole.

In 1964, tourism was our third largest industry behind federal and military spending, and agriculture. Around 700,000 visitors came to our shores yearly back then, but planners knew it would grow.

The plan said that "if Waikiki is to continue to attract an increasingly greater number of visitors each year, more emphasis should be placed on planted open space, underground utilities, building height limitations, improved vehicular and pedestrian circulation, and widened and improved beaches."

The plan suggested relieving Waikiki by developing resort areas in Hawaii Kai, on Queen’s Beach, Haleiwa, Heeia and Turtle Bay. Eight years later, Turtle Bay, then known as Del Webb’s Kuilima Resort Hotel and Country Club, did open. No resorts were envisioned in Ko Olina in 1964.

The Ka Iwi Coast, also called Queen’s Beach, between Makapuu and Sandy Beach was Alan Davis’ estate, called Wawamalu, from 1932 until 1946, when the April 1 tsunami wiped it out.

"That area was proposed for a resort until the 1990s spawned the Save Sandy Beach movement," Challacombe said.

With the population increasing and sugar still thriving on the Ewa plain, city planners looked to Windward Oahu to handle that growth. "They used the term ‘Directed Development’ in 1964, rather than a second city," Challacombe said.

"Heeia Marsh was going to be a golf course and marina surrounded by multifamily and single family homes. Heeia Marsh is the second largest freshwater wetlands in the state behind Kawainui Marsh."

The Heeia Fishpond, developed by Native Hawaiians some 800 years ago, would be filled in and developed for housing. A new resort would flank it on one side and a 70-acre, artificial island would be on the other. Nearby Coconut Island would be turned into a resort as well.

Hawaiian Electric Co. planned a nuclear power plant in Heeia, said Department of Planning and Permitting Director George Atta. Back then, we thought nuclear energy might cleanly power our future. Kaneohe Bay also would have a deep draft harbor.

Contractor Rick Towill said in the 1960s: "Wendell Carlsmith bought several hundred acres of what had been the Hygienic Dairy with the idea of building the Chevron Refinery in the area. When that fell through, it became the Ahuimanu Hills housing development."

What became Valley of the Temples Memorial Park was considered a possible industrial zone. "It was in competition with Campbell Industrial Park," Towill said. "Alexander and Baldwin, Lewers & Cooke and many others bought land in Kahuluu with that kind of development in mind."

As you know, none of these things ended up happening. The community resisted, sugar cane peaked and development shifted to the Leeward side. But imagine if we had built eight island parks …

I asked Mayor Kirk Caldwell about this idea and he said it’s an excellent example of why the general plan is routinely revised, and shows the power of community input in shaping our island’s future.

"Provisions in the 1964 plan would have made irreparable changes, taking away forever several of Oahu’s most precious environmental and cultural treasures," he said.

"Today’s strategy is to create a dense urban core by building greatly needed affordable housing and mixed-use development along the rail alignment so we can have a city that thrives well into the future and keep the country green and open in perpetuity."

Bob Sigall, author of “The Companies We Keep” books, looks through his collection of old photos to tell stories each Friday of Hawaii people, places and companies. Email him at Sigall@yahoo.com.