Upgrades, limits planned for popular Lanikai Pillbox Trail

With easy access to spectacular views of the Kailua coastline, the Kaiwa Ridge Trail — more commonly known as the Lanikai Pillbox Trail — has become an internet sensation, drawing tens of thousands of tourists each year.

But with popularity comes problems. Lots of problems.

The surrounding neighborhood is under siege from traffic, visitors jockeying for parking, noise and trespassing. Erosion on the ridge is so bad that rain creates muddy rivers that flow to the ocean. Helicopter and other emergency rescues from the steep, eroded terrain are a weekly occurrence.

In the words of former Mid-Pacific Country Club General Manager Jim Swie­ter, “This trail has ballooned into an enormous headache for everyone.”

But the state Department of Land and Natural Resources is working on a plan to help remedy the situation.

A newly released 987-page draft environmental assessment describes proposed trail improvements and a management plan that includes capping the number of hikers through a permit or reservation system.

Physical improvements for the trail corridor include a combination of surface treatments, erosion control measures, fencing and other barriers.

Thomas Cestare, president of the Lanikai Association, said the neighborhood welcomes anything that will improve the situation. At the same time, he’s worried that upgrading the trail experience will make it a more attractive nuisance.

“Will even more people come?” he said.

The nearly mile-long hiking path leads to two coast artillery observation stations, more commonly known as pillboxes, that were constructed during World War II to function as a command center to direct gun batteries.

The trail leading to the pillboxes was originally an access road for moving military personnel and equipment. Once the stations were decommissioned after the war, the parcel with the observation stations and the access road went into private hands.

Community members and conservationists lobbied for decades to save the ridge from residential development — and won when the parcel was transferred to the state in the early 1990s.

Cestare said he remembers the days when he would hike the trail and hardly see anyone at all. A decade ago, he said, you might see 10 or 20 people on the trail.

“Now, if you go up there, you will see 20 people in five minutes at some points,” he said.

State Rep. Lisa Marten (D, Kailua-Lanikai-Waimanalo) said the trail and its pillboxes have become “Instagram famous” as a spot to view the sunrise. What that means is that scores of tourists arrive in the neighborhood in the dark and trudge up the hill.

“Those people chose to get up early in the morning,” she said. “The people who live around there, they deserve to sleep.”

In preparing the draft environmental assessment, consultant PBR Hawaii and Associates asked neighbors about their experiences.

Residents complained not only about early morning noise, but hikers hopping their fences, relieving themselves on their property and flying noisy drones, among other things.

The Bluestone condominiums are on the front lines near the trailhead on Kaele­pulu Drive. Volunteers from the condos have taken informal counts of the hikers taking the trail.

During busy weekends and holidays, more than 1,500 hikers per day walked up the street and entered the trailhead during daylight hours.

That’s not counting the ones who arrive before sunrise. On a Saturday in June 2018, 116 people were counted entering the trail between 5 and 5:45 a.m. for sunrise at 5:49 a.m.

Some hikers moving down the ridge head for the Bluestone buildings in search of water or a bathroom.

“Others simply make their own trails when descending from the ridgeline, get lost and end up on Bluestone property by accident. In both instances, these trailblazing hikers scale fences or climb over walls before continuing their trespass across lawns and private roadways,” according to Bluestone officials quoted in the draft environmental assessment.

Swieter, formerly of the neighboring Mid-Pacific Country Club, said hikers constantly trespass on club property.

“Each day they enter our clubhouse to use the rest­rooms, park in our parking lot and congregate at our entrance waiting for their taxi or shuttle to pick them up after dropping them off,” he said.

The country club has spent hundreds of dollars on new signs in both Japanese and English, Swieter said, and a security guard must watch the entrance to make sure tourists don’t park on the property and use the club’s facilities.

“In my opinion, instead of making improvements that will encourage tourists coming to Lanikai to hike the trail, it should be closed to avoid the negative impact it is having on the residents of Lanikai and members of Mid-Pac,” he said.

On a typical day hikers are seen swarming across the landscape, forging their own trails and contributing to the erosion problem. When it rains, muddy water cascades down the hill and flows out to sea, threatening the coral reefs. Recent studies have connected the trail to increased sediment in nearshore waters.

The erosion has also helped to make the trail more slippery and treacherous in places, prompting a growing number of trail emergencies.

Data from the Honolulu Fire Department indicates that annual rescues along the pillbox trail have increased significantly since 2013, according to the draft assessment.

Rescues in the decade from 2001 to 2012 never exceeded four a year, while 2004 registered no rescues. In 2013 there were five rescues, and the number steadily increased from there, hitting a high of 26 rescues in 2017.

The draft assessment proposes physical improvements that include a combination of surface treatments along the length of the footpath, including course gravel, synthetic materials and stairs at steep inclines. Permanent erosion control measures include perforated pipes and vegetation.

The project is also proposed to include signs along hazardous points in the pathway and some physical barriers along the edges of the trail corridor.

DLNR is also considering a proposal to limit the number of hikers on the trail through a permit or reservation system. After conducting a carrying-capacity study, officials are targeting a limit of 945 hikers a day.

One proposal would try to distribute trail use throughout daylight hours by issuing hiking passes every 10 or 15 minutes.

Marten, the lawmaker who in 2021 helped secure $900,000 for the trail improvement plan, said she’d like to see nonresidents pay a fee to help fund ongoing maintenance and oversight during restricted daylight hours.

“The last thing we want to do is to attract more people,” she said.