Mayor’s race is important, but rail transit is more so

On the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation’s web page at Honolulu Transit.org, there is a “transit time calculator.”

Plug in a start at the east Kapolei station and end at Ala Moana, you will discover that the rail trip will take 42 minutes.

After last Thursday’s announcement by Council Chairman Ernie Martin and Mayor Kirk Caldwell urging rail construction to stop at Middle Street, the new transit time calculation should say “probably never.”

“I wish we could continue all the way to Aa Moana now, but that is a challenge that cannot be addressed until additional funding becomes available,” Caldwell told the HART board.

Rail’s critics were not joyful, but they did say “told you so.”

“A month ago, even with an $8.1 billion price tag on rail, Mayor Caldwell vowed to build rail to Ala Moana. Why did he flip flop and now agrees with Charles Djou to stop rail at Middle Street? Because his and other polls reveal he is trailing Charles Djou badly, said Ben Cayetano, the former governor and unsuccessful candidate for mayor in 2012.

City Hall has been buzzing with rumors of several political polls showing Caldwell losing his mayor’s race re-election to former U.S. Rep. and Councilman Djou. If that is conjecture, there is also a publicly released Hawaii Poll from January showing Caldwell losing to former GOP Lt. Gov. James “Duke” Aiona 43 percent to 38 percent, with Martin getting just 11 percent.

So Caldwell isn’t going into this race with sails filled with a strong wind.

Despite that, before he blinked at the rail overages and asked to pull the plug, Caldwell looked like a solid bet to return, because Djou had little campaign money and was just last week assembling a campaign staff. Djou, however, was able to immediately get support from a trio of well-known Democrats who are also rail critics: former federal judge, councilman and Office of Hawaii Affairs trustee Walter Heen, who will be Djou campaign chairman, plus Councilwoman Ann Kobayashi and Cayetano.

While the mayor’s race is important, Honolulu’s more important question is: What do you do with a 15-mile hideously costly rail line that doesn’t go where it needs to go? Rail may be a turkey, but it is proving to be both an expensive and uneaten turkey.

Honolulu Star-Advertiser transportation reporter Marcel Honore reported last week that HART has already spent $96.6 million in design work and property acquisition for those four final and mostly-likely-never-to-be-built rail miles.

“This screws it up royally,” said Speaker of the House Joe Souki, one of the Legislature’s biggest rail supporters.

“For both mayor and Council, it shows that both don’t have the bravado to be a leader,” said Souki, who offered this advice: “Find the money, the money is there.”

The money Souki eyes is contained in either another tax increase, or a new tax. While Caldwell said he would not entertain a property tax increase to pay for the rail line — now estimated to be $1.5 billion over budget — Souki said Hawaii property tax rates are the lowest in the nation and could be tapped for the rail line.

Starting up the debate on how to pay for rail would also launch another debate over the rail route. Should it just go to the University of Hawaii at Manoa? What about Waikiki?

Rail may be ending at Middle Street, but we haven’t heard the last of rail.

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Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.