Projects at Punchbowl will cause commotion

The biggest construction and renovation projects at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific since 1966 have the Department of Veterans Affairs warning visitors to Punchbowl that things will be bumpy — and noisy and somewhat unsightly — for some time at the usually serene cemetery.

Those efforts include the continuation of the $25.1 million construction of new administrative offices and a visitor center on Puowaina Drive outside the crater; demolition of the existing offices; and completion of 6,800 new colum­­barium “niche” spaces for ashes, according to officials.

Also under the consolidated contract with Nan Inc., an approximately 105-foot-long memorial wall will be built for those whose ashes are scattered at Punchbowl; concrete caps will be replaced on columbarium courts 1-5; and the road heading up to the cemetery will be repaired.

“There’s going to be a lot of equipment, heavy equipment, in here, so that’s going to delay people coming in and out,” said Punchbowl spokesman Gene Maestas.

Concrete, steel and rebar will be stored on one of the loop drives, limiting some parking.

“We apologize for all the inconvenience to all the family members and loved ones that want to come up and pay tribute to their veterans,” Maestas said. “That’s the first message. But this is all necessary in order for us to be able to continue to serve the veterans here in Hawaii.”

The new work comes with the 112-acre cemetery at the very end of a more than $4.5 million grave marker stabilization and grass replacement project, the VA said. Later on, some major road repairs are expected.

“The driver for the (new) project was the need for additional burial space in the cemetery proper, and the old office was way past the end of its useful life,” said Jim Higginbotham, senior resident engineer for the VA, who is in Hawaii to oversee the contract.

A total of 32,758 caskets are buried in Punchbowl, which opened in 1949, along with 8,344 in-ground cremated remains, the VA said. Urns in columbarium niches total 15,869.

By 1947, Congress and veterans organizations were pressing the military to find a permanent burial site in Hawaii for the remains of thousands of World War II servicemen on Guam, the VA said. The Army began planning Punchbowl cemetery, and in February 1948, Congress approved funding and construction began.

The cemetery is largely full for in-ground burials except for disinterments — creating an open grave — that occur with efforts to identify “unknowns” from the Korean War and battleship USS Oklahoma from Dec. 7, 1941.

Maestas said space for about 700 urns remains, and that is expected to be used in the next year.

Another 6,800 columbarium urn niches will be created where the cemetery offices are now located, just inside the cemetery entrance on the right, “to continue to serve (veterans) for at least up to 10 years more,” he said.

The VA broke ground on the 7-acre Puowaina Drive offices and visitor center in January. That work is expected to be done in March 2017.

“Aesthetically, it will improve the area,” Higginbotham said. “It will be beautifully landscaped. It will increase the width of the driveway, the road to Puowaina Drive, by a full lane so there will be a lane for parking for the residents and still two lanes for two-way bus traffic going up to the cemetery and back.”

Taking off and replacing the eroding concrete caps on columbarium courts 1-5 will begin Wednesday with Court 1 and then proceed to the others, with the project predicted to run through December, Maestas said.

The top two rows of nameplates will be removed temporarily, but “none of the urns will be touched or disturbed,” Maestas said.

The VA is asking that families not visit individual courts while renovation is underway on each, but if necessary, escorted visits can be made by checking in at the office, he said.

Work is expected to take two to three weeks on Court 1, and then crews will move to the next court.

Temporary trailers should arrive in mid-November, and demolition could begin in December on the existing administration building and visitor center, Maestas said.

Work on the 105-foot memorial wall for the names of veterans whose ashes are scattered at Punchbowl already has begun to the left after entering the cemetery, just downhill from a maintenance building.

Higginbotham said Puowaina Drive road repairs are expected over the next calendar year. Major road repairs within the cemetery are planned in the future.

Maestas said the projects are the biggest at Punchbowl since work on the Hono­lulu Memorial, which was dedicated in 1966.

The memorial, with its “grand stairs” topped by Lady Columbia, was established by the American Battle Monuments Commission to honor American armed forces in the Pacific during World War II and the Korean War. The memorial grew in 1980 to honor those missing from the Vietnam War.