Enough is enough: Cut losses, end rail project

According to the June 23, 2006, Honolulu Advertiser, rail’s estimated cost had just gone up substantially … to a shockingly high $3 billion.

At that time, Mayor Mufi Hannemann suggested that any overrun could be paid by private developers. City Council Chairman Donovan Dela Cruz echoed that line of thinking.

Eleven years later, the estimated cost of today’s rail line to Ala Moana Center is $10 billion. Also new is the city’s acknowledgement that the net cost of operating and maintaining rail will exceed $100 million each year.

Back in 2006, Hannemann repeatedly implied that rail would alleviate the current level of traffic congestion. For example: “The people of Oahu are tired of being stuck in traffic. They want action and they want it now.”

In 2010, the final environmental impact statement revealed that traffic congestion is expected to be 21 percent worse in 2030 if rail is built, and 23 percent worse if nothing is done to reduce traffic.

The chairman of the University of Hawaii’s Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, Panos Prevedouros, says the current level of traffic congestion could be reduced significantly if rail money could be redirected. Proven strategies include adding new traffic lanes to existing roads; installing flyovers and bypasses in chokepoint areas like the Middle Street merge; and adding new contraflow and bus-on-shoulder options.

About jobs, Hannemann and his point-person for rail then, Kirk Caldwell, predicted that rail would create 10,000 jobs during each year of construction. The actual number thus far has been much smaller.

Even more troubling: After considering the impact of increasing business taxes, the net impact of rail has been a net loss of 1,000 jobs, according to Jim Roumasset, an economist for the University of Hawaii Economic Research Organization (UHERO).

Hannemann and Caldwell — Honolulu’s mayor today — also claimed that rail would save energy. But recent data from the U.S. Department of Transportation makes clear that rail on Oahu would consume more energy per passenger mile than is currently being consumed by individuals who drive to work.

To portray rail as an energy saver, Hannemann and Caldwell had to assume that rail on Oahu would consume per-passenger energy on a par with New York City, where ridership levels are dramatically high. Rail on Oahu would run 20 hours a day but be busy only during rush hours.

Further, the basic idea of transit-oriented development is that a reliable transit line will catalyze development around the access points. But it requires large numbers of people wanting to live close to rail stations, and businesses wanting to locate there.

Rail stations tend to be noisy and attract undesirable activities. Getting people to live next to them has not been an easy sell elsewhere, at least not without substantial government subsidies.

As best I can tell, no developer has offered anything for the right to build near or above a train station on Oahu.

The moral of the story?

To err is human. To keep on erring is stupid.

It’s time to cut our losses.

Let’s use the existing guideway for something other than rail, and spend the savings on traffic-relief measures.

Randall Roth is a University of Hawaii-Manoa law professor.