University of Hawaii jockeys for parking at medical school

The University of Hawaii is facing a parking crunch at its medical school in Kakaako, where a parking structure planned years ago was never built.

UH’s John A. Burns School of Medicine and the adjacent Cancer Center recently lost roughly 100 parking stalls for students, faculty and staff.

University officials Wednesday secured approval from the state board that oversees development in the area to use 45 parking stalls at neighboring Kakaako Waterfront Park. They had sought to use 95 stalls at the park.

The board of the Hawaii Community Development Authority voted 4-1 to approve UH’s proposal to use 50 HCDA-owned stalls at the park along with 45 stalls on a nearby lot next to the Children’s Discovery Center on Ohe Street. But with four of the board’s nine members absent, there weren’t enough votes for at least a five-member majority. The board later voted 5-0 to allow UH to use just the 45 stalls on Ohe Street.

The university had wanted to rent all 95 stalls for $100 a month per stall for five years.

UH claimed its plan wouldn’t interfere with the public’s use of the stalls in either lot because so few of those stalls were occupied during the hours UH sought to use them, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. weekdays.

On average, 245 of the park’s 302 parking stalls are empty during the times of proposed use, according to a UH survey. The survey also found that on average 39 of the 45 stalls in the Ohe Street lot are vacant during the same time period.

“So even with (using) the Kakaako waterfront parking area, we would clearly not exceed the need by the public for access to the park,” Dr. Jerris Hedges, dean of the medical school, told the board.

UH has been using parking on state land in Kakaako since building its $150 million medical school in 2005 and the $120 million Cancer Center in 2013. UH had envisioned a parking garage with 700 to 800 stalls, as part of the Cancer Center development, but parking was ultimately cut from the plan.

Last year UH lost the use of about 50 stalls when HCDA developed a high- technology business incubation center on a portion of a parking lot it owns where the school had rented 325 stalls. UH also lost use of the Ohe Street lot, which some users felt was unsafe because of homeless encampments in the area.

Hedges said students, faculty and staff have struggled with parking. “It’s been an ongoing challenge,” he told the board.

Currently, many medical students are working in clinical settings off campus, but an incoming class in July will create more parking tension, Hedges added.

Elanore Chuang, a postdoctoral researcher at the medical school, said students had difficulty with parking even before the recent reductions. “In extreme circumstances, some park a mile away and then walk,” she said.

Others urged HCDA to reject the university’s proposal.

“We believe park space should be park space and shouldn’t be transferred to the University of Hawaii,” said Wayne Takamine, a member of a community advisory committee that helped HCDA develop a master plan to improve the park.

That master plan involves converting the existing parking area into new park space and redistributing parking to other spots to promote better access and use of the 39-acre waterfront park.

Hedges said that if the master plan is developed within five years, HCDA could terminate a parking agreement with UH early.

Michelle Matson, another park supporter involved in the master plan, worried a temporary agreement with UH could become permanent. She cited parking spaces in Irwin Park near Aloha Tower that have remained decades after an emergency temporary use was granted during World War II.

HCDA board members John Whalen, David Rodriguez, Mark Anderson and Jason Okuhama voted to accept UH’s plan. Member Wei Fang, who expressed concern about a “slippery slope” of temporary use, voted no after suggesting the school be allowed to use only the Ohe Street lot.

The board then voted unanimously to rent only the Ohe Street lot to UH.

UH could have an opportunity to seek another approval for its broader parking proposal if the city follows through with a plan announced a year ago to acquire the waterfront park and other land, including the Ohe Street lot, from HCDA. Mayor Kirk Caldwell’s administration supports UH’s request.