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Many Honolulu residents are salivating over the first Chick-fil-A restaurants slated to open soon on Oahu, but some neighbors are worried about their first taste of the fast-food chain known for its chicken sandwiches.
For over a year, residents in a condominium tower next to a planned Chick-fil-A in Makiki have expressed concern that the restaurant’s popularity will result in customer vehicles backing up onto South Beretania Street and creating a traffic safety hazard on the one-way thoroughfare with five lanes.
Only about 40 feet separate an exit-only driveway of the Queen Victoria Residences condo from the entry to the Chick-fil-A under construction. Also, the entry for the condo tower is not much farther away, and could present difficulties for residents trying to navigate through a queue of cars on the street waiting to order sandwiches, waffle fries and more.
“It will be a challenge
because we’re right next door,” said Michael Shatz, resident manager of the 16-story tower with 51 units.
Chick-fil-A representatives have kept in close contact with tower representatives and expressed a commitment not to create problems in the neighborhood, according to Shatz. “The relationship has been very constructive,” he said. “They want to be good neighbors.”
But Shatz also said he hasn’t seen a traffic management plan, and doesn’t know what will happen later this year or early next year when the store is slated to open. “We are hoping for the best,” he said. “Traffic could be lined up all the way to Pensacola (Street). It remains to be seen what actually happens when they open.”
Some of the concern is based on existing traffic overflow onto Beretania from a McDonald’s restaurant across from the Chick-fil-A site, and traffic issues with a Chick-fil-A in California that prompted a city council to consider declaring the restaurant a public nuisance earlier this year.
”We can well anticipate, based on the experience of other openings by Chick-fil-A alone, significant problems there,” Tom Heinrich said at a June meeting of the Makiki-Tantalus Neighborhood Board.
A Chick-fil-A representative said the company has put a lot of work into the design and operating plan for the Makiki restaurant to manage customer volume and avoid traffic problems on the site, which was previously home to a Burger King. For one, the new restaurant will offer only takeout service with a drive-thru, three walk-up order windows, seven parking stalls and future third-party delivery service.
The drive-thru layout features two continuous lanes for customers, and can accommodate 30 vehicles. That compares with an original design accommodating 22 vehicles, and the former Burger King drive-thru that had space for about 13 vehicles, according to Chick-fil-A.
Another strategy to serve customers faster is having two to three employees per drive-thru lane taking orders in person, using a tablet and collecting payment. Other employees will distribute orders on foot instead of through a window.
“We are excited to share that our restaurant will feature a dual-lane drive-thru focused on expediting and elevating the experience for guests with innovation, speed and hospitality,” Zane Dydasco, franchisee operator of the Makiki restaurant, said in a statement.
Dydasco, a U.S. Air Force veteran and graduate of Kamehameha Schools who grew up 10 minutes from the store site, added, “We want to be good neighbors and look forward to continuing to partner with members of our community as we prepare for our grand opening.”
To help ensure a smooth grand opening, which could attract a big crowd, Chick-fil-A has told city officials that it will have top experienced employees from other restaurants and supervisors with an expertise in opening new restaurants working. It is also traditional for Chick-fil-A to hire police officers to control traffic if necessary, the company said.
Calvin Say, a Honolulu City Council member who represents the area, said he’s met with Dydasco and believes the outcome will be fine. “I have full confidence they will address concerns of our neighborhood,” he said.
In another city recently, government officials had
a very different view of Chick-fil-A.
The City Council of Santa Barbara, Calif., earlier this year considered branding the only Chick-fil-A in that city as a public nuisance after years of traffic safety problems that included customer vehicles interfering with driveways to nearby businesses, the sidewalk, city buses, a bicycle lane and emergency vehicles, according to a Los Angeles Times report in March.
The article cited a city traffic report that said peak blockages from the restaurant’s drive-thru line could last up to 90 minutes on weekdays and 155 minutes on Saturdays. Chick-fil-A restaurants are typically closed Sundays.
In July, the Santa Barbara City Council approved a resolution plan by Chick-fil-A to mitigate the problem with improvements that include adding a third drive-thru lane, according to a report from KEYT-TV.
Chick-fil-A has about 2,700 restaurants in 47 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico and Canada. The company previously anticipated that the Makiki restaurant would be its first to open in Hawaii, but the first one opened last week on Maui. A second location to open should be at Ala Moana Center later this year. After Makiki, a fourth location is projected to open in Kapolei next year followed by more over the next five years.
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