The City Council Zoning and Planning Committee on Thursday night backed Bill 48, a rezoning measure that allows Castle & Cooke Hawai‘i to build up to 3,500 housing units, a commercial area, a hospital and possibly an inn between Waipio and Mililani.
The Koa Ridge project is planned for 576 acres of former pineapple land directly north of Ka Uka Boulevard now being farmed by Aloun Farms. The bill will go to the full Council for the second of three required votes.
The 5-0 approval came Thursday just before 11 p.m. after nearly five hours of testimony and debate.
Council members Ann Kobayashi and Ron Menor voted “yes” with reservations. The others voting yes were Zoning Chairman Ikaika Anderson and members Breene Harimoto and Kymberly Pine.
Menor, who represents the area from Waipahu to Mililani, pointed out that the Koa Ridge traffic report had not yet been approved by state Department of Transportation officials, who recently told him they continue to have concerns about the project’s impact on H-2, Ka Uka Boulevard and Kamehameha Highway.
“It seems to me that it would be incumbent on us as City Council members to ensure that the concerns of the state Department of Transportation are fully addressed and resolved before we take final action,” Menor said.
Deputy Planning Director Art Challacombe said an agreement with the developer requires that the traffic plan be reviewed and updated after 1,000 units are built or every three years, whichever comes first. “Things will change as we get more information,” he said.
Kobayashi said she has lingering concerns about the loss of agricultural lands.
Harimoto said he’s watched communities sprout beyond his native Pearl City as Oahu’s population has grown, bringing with them worsening traffic. “But we deal with it because people need places to live. I don’t believe I have the right to say, ‘I have my house, so nobody else can.’”
Anderson said the Central Oahu-West Oahu region was designed as Oahu’s “second city” by state and city planners more than three decades ago and “the time has come to move forward” on that goal.
City Planning Director George Atta told committee members that his agency is talking to the city Department of Transportation Services about establishing a “bus rapid transit route” along the two miles from Koa Ridge to the planned Pearl Highlands rail transit station to help ease congestion. Bus rapid transit typically involves a series of buses running along a dedicated route.
Both Pine and Anderson applauded the idea of a plan to tie Koa Ridge to the rail line with TheBus.
Pine also urged the developer and government officials to continue to work on traffic improvements and asked Castle & Cooke to market the homes to existing Mililani families who may be living in multigenerational housing situations.
