Waikiki residents fed up with unsafe sidewalk covered with protruding plywood boards

Doris Dowdy recently saw a surfer’s toe get cut open on a loose screw protruding from a plywood board in front of the Wailana condominium in Waikiki.

The plywood covered repair work that has long gone uncompleted on a stretch of heavily trafficked sidewalk.

Dowdy, who lives in Wailana and is on its board, said the surfer was injured in March, about five months after she first contacted the state to complain about the condition of the plywood board and the sidewalk. It’s also about 10 years since the state first started covering the sidewalk with plywood boards instead of repairing the sidewalk and the drain box underneath it, Dowdy said.

“They just keep replacing the boards instead of repairing the sidewalk,” she said. “The one the surfer got hurt on was fairly new. They had just put it out on Feb. 8. Prior to that, the old one had been so (dilapidated) that I thought someone would fall through.”

Dowdy and other Wailana residents are so fed up with the state’s repair timeline that they have sought assistance from the Waikiki Neighborhood Board. Kathryn Henski, a Waikiki Neighborhood Board member, said she visited the sidewalk, determined “it was dangerous,” and started calling the state to create a sense of urgency.

“I’ve called every day for several weeks. They rarely pick up,” Henski said.

Tim Sakahara, state Department of Transportation spokesman, said last week that the state is working on the issue. The bidding window for the procurement process closed May 4 to repair the drain box under the sidewalk, which needs to be completed before crews can move on to the sidewalk repair, Sakahara said.

“In the meantime, our crews are changing out the board covering the sidewalk and beveling the edges to reduce the tripping hazard,” he said. “The board was replaced last month and will continue to be monitored as we work on the permanent repairs.”

Sakahara said DOT anticipates starting the drain box repairs sometime in June.

Waikiki Neighborhood Board member Jeff Merz, who is an urban planner, said he hopes the state acts swiftly, as “plywood is certainly not a long-term solution; it rots, it can crack and it’s unsafe.”

Merz said the status quo “cannot be acceptable under state highway design codes” and might not comply with the federal Americans with Disabilities Act or Complete Streets policy geared to ensuring “safe, convenient and comfortable travel and access for users.”

Right now, the sidewalk couldn’t be called safe or accessible, said Wailana owner Albert Franz, who has seen people stumble at the well-trafficked site near several busy Waikiki intersections.

“If someone falls and breaks a leg or worse, they’ll sue. We don’t want our owners’ association to get dragged into something that is the state’s responsibility. This isn’t our sidewalk,” said Franz, who has lived in the Wailana for about 20 years.

Ann Dankulich, a Wailana owner since the 1970s, said she frequently sees pedestrians disrupting traffic patterns by attempting to go around the damaged spot.

“It’s a danger. I just don’t want anyone to get hurt,” Dankulich said.

In the interim, Henski said she wants the state to install a barricade around the structure, like the city did last October. Henski said the barricades were up for a week before the city determined the site was under state jurisdiction and removed them.

“This is simply unacceptable. Someone could trip, fall through or worse,” Henski said as she surveyed the damaged area and the heavy volume of tourist and residential pedestrian traffic around it. “It’s got to be a liability issue.”

Wailana owner Kay Kolt-Bowersox said the state’s lagging indicates Waikiki residents are a lower priority than business interests in Hawaii’s No. 1 visitor destination.

“If this were across the street in front of the Hilton Hawaiian Village, this would have been fixed over a year ago and we’ve been looking at it for almost 10 years,” Kolt-Bowersox said.