Protect highway, improve access to shoreline

Lawmakers have seized an opportunity to deal with the North Shore erosion problem in a way that makes sense: by pairing the goals of protecting the highway and improving public use of the shoreline.

State Sen. Clayton Hee has introduced Senate Bill 3035, in response to the traffic jam caused by visitors crossing busy Kamehameha Highway to glimpse the turtles near Laniakea Beach. Especially during the high-surf season of the winter months, the additional traffic mess is hard to stand. Barriers erected to prevent parking by highway-crossers have had some modest success, but it’s only a stopgap solution.

The real answer, as Hee has concluded, is to accommodate people and their cars on the makai side of the highway, which is where they want to end up, anyway. If the state can do that while moving the highway inland and away from the surf that’s been undercutting the roadbed, so much the better.

The original version of Senate Bill 3035 specified the creation of a Laniakea state wayside park and directed the state Department of Land and Natural Resources to spend whatever general obligation bond money was set aside for that purpose. It also directed the Department of Transportation to realign the highway mauka of the park.

Hee, who does not sit on the deciding committees, said he felt the DOT has been "negligent" in responding to the problem, letting an earlier appropriation for the realignment lapse. The idea was to put DLNR in the driver’s seat, he added.

However, the Senate committees hearing the bill (Water and Land, Transportation and International Affairs) apparently decided that a wider conversation on the best way to handle the park development was needed. Its draft eliminates the language about the park and makes SB 3035 strictly a highway bill.

The committee report indicated that the first order of business was to protect the highway, and urged DOT officials to put the highway back onto the Hawaii Statewide Transportation Improvement Program, enhancing its priority status. It endorsed the DOT testimony that favored, once highway realignment is initiated, a discussion among agencies about the best ways "to enhance protection of the Hawaii green sea turtle and service the public in its desire to view and experience this popular species."

What matters more than the sequence of events is that there’s some kind of coordination here to make the best use of public land and money, addressing the twin issues of erosion and beach access. If that’s managed successfully here, the plan can serve as a template for many more coastal areas where these issues arise.

To that point, Hee is also pressing for another piece of legislation to expand the area where comprehensive shoreline management planning can take place. SB 3036 would allot an unspecified amount of money for the Sea Grant College to create a North Shore beach management plan covering the area from Sunset Beach to Waimea Bay.

The focus would be on dealing with erosion and other threats of sea-level rise, but smart planning would produce coastal road adjustments that mesh well with recreation, too.

These bills should pass, sending a clear message that further delay is simply intolerable. Government may drag its heels on a highway project, but erosion won’t wait forever. The end result we don’t want is for the sea to claim Kamehameha Highway.