Some businesses and residents are anxious about rail construction in Kalihi-­to-Ala Moana area

Some business operators and residents who attended a Monday night briefing on the arrival of rail construction in the Kalihi-­to-Ala Moana region left feeling anxious about the future.

Don Murphy, owner of Murphy’s Bar and Grill, said he liked that representatives from the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation and contractor Nan Inc. promised to be more attentive to the community.

“I’m glad they’re being pro-active and letting everybody know what’s going on,” Murphy said.

But Murphy said there is still too much uncertainty about what’s ahead and how it will affect his longtime Merchant Street pub.

”When they start shutting off water and electricity, it’s going to hurt business,” he said. “But it’s coming whether we like it or not.”

Murphy said it’s unsettling that it’s still unclear when actual construction — and the traffic headaches that it will cause — will take place. Just imagining road closures along Nimitz Highway is bothersome, he said.

After several years of site work and construction on the west end of the 20-mile rail line, HART is commencing with the Middle Street-to-Ala Moana phase of the $8 billion project.

First up is a utilities relocation project that began recently along Kamehameha Highway between Middle Street and Puuhale Road in front of the Oahu Community Correctional Center.

Nan Inc. was awarded the $400 million final utilities relocation contract which is expected to run 47 months into 2022.

The work will run through the path of the final eight rail stations along the Dillingham Boulevard corridor past the Kalihi, Kapalama and Iwilei stations, head onto Nimitz Highway to the Chinatown and Downtown stations, then veer to Halekauwila Street through the Civic Center and Ward Center stations, and finally along Kona Street to the final station fronting Ala Moana.

In need of relocation are about 4,000 linear feet of drainage, 6,000 feet of sewer, 9,000 feet of water, 40,000 feet of electrical and 67,000 feet of electrical lines “all underground or above ground,” HART communications director Bill Brennan said.

HART had one key message for the roughly 100 people in attendance at Aloha Tower. “We’re coming.”

Brennan described utility relocation as “some of the most disruptive work that’s going to happen on the project.”

A number of businesses along the Waipahu and Pearl City-Aiea segments complained that business dropped dramatically when rail construction tore up Farrington and Kamehameha highway. Some said they were forced to shut down.

Brennan said “we learned some lessons and we learned them the hard way” during construction of the west segment and HART will try to be more attentive to the needs of residents and businesses that inevitably will be disrupted.

One way HART is hoping will help blunt the construction impacts: Work on several smaller chunks of property along the route simultaneously instead of taking out and working one large segment of ground at a time, Brennan said. That is expected to eliminate the need to close down a big portion of road for months, he said. For example, Nan may be doing work in smaller segments at both Kalihi and Kakaako simultaneously, he said.

“We go in, we do the work, we cover it up, we get out and then we move to another smaller section of Dillingham and do that work so that we’re only impacting a smaller section at a time.”

Justin Barfield, Nan public involvement manager for the utilities relocation project, said next up is a section of Nimitz from Aawa Street (near Floradec) to Bishop Street starting Monday that is expected to take about a month. Preliminary “pot-holing,” the technical term for identifying the precise locations of water, sewer, gas and drain lines that need to be relocated, will run from 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. daily. Lanes will be closed off two blocks at a time, he said.

There will be added noise with saw-cutting, the noisiest part of the work, taking place mostly between 7 p.m. and 10 p.m., Barfield said. The residential towers along Nimitz have been notified, he said.

After that, Nan is expected to do pot-holing along a section of Queen Street between Ward Avenue and Kamakee Street. No start date, hours of work or traffic control measures have been determined for that segment, Barfield said.

Pot-holing already has been done along a segment of Dillingham between Ala­kawa and Kaahi streets, as well as Kaahi itself, and Nan is waiting for the go-ahead from HART to do actual utility relocation, he said.

David Marabella, chief operating officer for Garden and Valley Isle Seafood on Nimitz, said his business is being forced to relocate after 25 years. Like Murphy, he’s bothered by the uncertainty of the timeline which makes it more difficult to obtain bank financing for the impending move, he said.

He’s been in talks with HART officials about his relocation situation and believes “they’re dragging their feet.”

Estimates show it may cost the seafood distributor and wholesaler between $1 million and $1.5 million to relocate and Marabella said he’s been told “they might give me a quarter of that.”

Sam Teague, a Kukui Plaza resident, said he has been an opponent of the project since its inception.

Teague said he’s monitoring the project closely “just to make sure it doesn’t get any more out of control than it already is.”

He remained skeptical after the meeting. Nothing against the people who represented the logistical points of the project, he said, but “I believe very little of what the politicos have to say.”

But not everyone is worried about the project’s arrival.

Charlie and Diana Lorenz, assistant pastors at Word of Life Christian Center on Queen Street near Kawaiahao Church, said they’re excited about the arrival of the project.

“When it’s all done, it’s going to be phenomenal,” Charlie Lorenz said. “More people can come into Kaka­ako and it will be a good way for people to come in and go out of there.”

While the couple recognizes it may be a while before the project is done, “it’s a needed thing,” Diana Lorenz said. “And I like the way they’re listening.”

To report an issue regarding the utilities relocation work, call HART’s 24-hour hotline at 566-2299 or email info@honolulutransit.org. For more on the project, go to the HART website at honolulutransit.org.

HART is expected to decide soon on whether to proceed with a public-­private partnership model of financing or the traditional design-build mode for the remaining guideways, pillars and stations between Middle Street and Ala Moana. That contract likely won’t be awarded for at least a year, Brennan said.

The long-delayed project is now expected to be fully complete and operational by the end of 2025. HART projects that the East Kapolei-to-Aloha Stadium segment will be operational in 2020.