Letter: Rail tunnel won’t work on Oahu

In response to Michael Lilly’s suggestion of boring a tunnel for the rail project (“Tunnel boring shows the way for Oahu rail,” Star-Advertiser, Letters, Dec. 23): Honolulu, Chicago and Los Angeles are three completely different places.

The water table here on Oahu is just feet below the street surface through downtown and flooding would be constant. A tunnel would not be feasible as the cost to continuously pump water out of the system would add to the cost of the project, not to mention the additional cost to do studies about boring.

If the tunnel was put in a proper area, the whole rail system would need to be put at a higher elevation and away from the ocean and the areas it was meant to service.

Stewart Chun

Mililani

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