The 'Mauka Shift' Could Solve Rail's Utility Woes. Why Did It Happen So Late?

Utility relocation along Dillingham Boulevard has vexed rail officials for years. They still haven’t finished the full designs or gotten the proper approvals to do the work, even though it’s been known for decades that the crowded Kalihi corridor would pose huge challenges to any rail line.

The consequences of that failure have been severe.

In fact, the two private teams that competed last year to finish rail each added about half of a billion dollars to their bids to cover the risks and uncertainties surrounding utility relocation, according to the Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation. Those high prices helped cancel the procurement, and the cancellation, in turn, threatens to sink Honolulu rail’s last four miles and eight stations altogether.

Regardless, HART is proceeding with a strategy that its new leaders believe will finally solve the Dillingham puzzle.

They call it “the mauka shift,” and it would slightly realign the elevated guideway inland just east of the Kapalama Canal. In doing so, they hope to avoid relocating some of the major high-voltage Hawaiian Electric Co. power lines that hang overhead and some of the lines that run down the center of the road.

Read more: https://www.civilbeat.org/2021/04/the-mauka-shift-could-solve-rails-utility-woes-why-did-it-happen-so-late/