Placement of barriers, crosswalks at Laniakea Beach is criticized

As he drove past Laniakea Beach on Friday, state Sen. Gil Riviere checked out the new crosswalks, roadside barriers and signage added by the state Department of Transportation to the stretch of Kamehameha Highway, where the community has long complained of traffic bottlenecks.

The parking area on the mauka side of the highway is now closed pending completion of safety measures designed to deal with the constant influx of cars carrying sightseers who dart across the roadway to the popular North Shore turtle-viewing and surfing beach.

Although he acknowledged the work was still in progress, Riviere said in a phone interview his first reaction to the new array was confusion and continued concern about public safety.

“It doesn’t look like what I was told,” he said, referring to an interim settlement agreement between the state, the City and County of Honolulu and Save Laniakea Coalition, a community group that, along with individual surfers, brought a lawsuit seeking public parking and safer beach access at Laniakea.

“They’ve added two crosswalks, and one would logically think they’d put one by the lifeguard tower (at the Haleiwa side of the beach) and one by the turtles (at the Waimea side),” Riviere said, “but they’ve put the crosswalks in the middle, about 50 yards from each other.”

The crosswalks, he said, lead not to the roadside sands of Laniakea but end at thick bushes on the makai side, requiring pedestrians to “shimmy down the makai shoulder to reach the beach.”

Bill Saunders, attorney for the plaintiffs, said he agreed with Riviere and had expressed his concerns in a status conference with First Circuit Judge Jeffrey Crabtree on Wednesday.

Saunders said he asked that, in conformance with the interim settlement agreement, the crosswalks should be placed closer to the vehicle entrance and exit driveways, and that the driveways should themselves be moved closer to the Haleiwa and Waimea ends of the parking area.

According to a DOT diagram, the parking area is approximately 277 feet wide, and the distance between its entrance and exit is 227.5 feet.

“I also expressed concern about the crosswalks leading to the very narrow highway shoulder, requiring pedestrians to walk along that shoulder to one of the safer beach access points on either end,” Saunders said.

He said the parties agreed the purpose of the 20-foot-long concrete barriers, which block off about 160 feet of the road, and the large yellow barrels that stretch from the ends of the barriers to the Haleiwa and Waimea ends of the parking area, was to promote safety and more regular traffic flow by corralling pedestrians into two designated crossings.

But as of Friday, Riviere said, pedestrians could avoid the crosswalks and dart through gaps between the barrels.

Saunders said DOT’s design differs from what was established in the parties’ most recent, interim agreement.

“This plan does not seem to be in line with the configuration we agreed upon recently, the one which was the subject of our emergency stipulation and order lifting the injunction, as well as the order enforcing and expediting settlement,” he said; in 2015, the court issued an injunction requiring the state to remove a previous set of barriers aimed at preventing parking.

“But much more important than the legal points is the danger to pedestrians using the crosswalks to get to the beach, particularly those with strollers and wheelchairs, and those carrying children, coolers, surfboards and beach chairs,” Saunders said.

After taking the crosswalks, “they will be forced to traverse a long, narrow stretch of eroding highway shoulder to the safe access points at either end of the beach,” he said, “and drivers will be forced to slow down again and again, just like they do now, to avoid them.”

Of additional concern was that the current “very small” parking space may not accommodate the approximately 50 parking spaces called for under the settlement, and “may cause drivers to circle, sit, wait, backtrack and jockey for parking stalls, causing backups onto the highway.”

Slowdowns could also be exacerbated, Riviere said, by the “sharp, 90-degree turn to get in or out of the parking place,” which was “really tight.”

In response, “the State has conformed to all requirements of the court, highway safety standards, and best practice in performing this interim work,” DOT spokeswoman Shelly Kunishige said in an email.

Citing item 6 of the interim agreement, she said the state found no indication of required distance of entrance and exit, nor specific locations of crosswalks.

Stressing that safety was the paramount concern, she said that, “as the entrance and exit areas of the parking will be restricted to right turns only, the crosswalks were placed on the non-turning sides of the access points to minimize conflicts between vehicles and pedestrians.”

The access points to the parking area conform to the space determined for the parking area, Kunishige added.

She noted the barriers were temporary, and “will be improved upon or replaced when the City (which owns the land mauka of the highway) obtains the permits needed for the planned improvements.”

The temporary measure would be replaced starting in the fall of 2022, she said, when DOT anticipated it would begin realigning Kamehameha Highway 50 to 60 feet mauka, “to protect the highway from erosion and wave action, and to provide space on the makai side of the highway for potential parking.”

The current work was scheduled for completion Friday, Kunishige added.

As of Saturday, however, the parking area was still closed, Blake McElheny, a North Shore resident and spokesman for Save Lani­akea Coalition, said in a text message.

“Everyone should see how it goes once it is opened up and operational,” he added, noting the community was “relying on DOT’s traffic engineering expertise and good faith.”

Saunders said he also hoped for the best and looked forward to the parties’ next status conference, scheduled to be held at the site later this month.