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She aims to simplify it - but she also plans to get more input from within HART on that effort first, she said.ĭespite being a semi-autonomous agency, HART will operate as an extension of Mayor Rick Blangiardi’s administration, she said. The existing organization “seems very confusing to me,” Kahikina told the board.

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Kahikina told HART board members Thursday that she’s evaluating every position at the agency, plus the project’s consultants and its contractors, in an effort to “streamline” the agency.

Kahikina said her recollection is that rail’s environmental approvals encompass an area that is “maybe a block or two” from the current alignment, so the mauka shift being discussed might not require a supplemental environmental impact statement.Īny changes that would require such environmental approvals might still be worth it, compared to the current approach on Dillingham, she added after the meeting. Kahikina said she’s even floated the idea in staff meetings of building the line underground.ĭuring Thursday’s meeting HART Project Director Stephen Cayetano said HART is considering a “mauka shift” in route along Dillingham but he didn’t offer specifics.Īny drastic changes in the rail alignment would likely trigger new environmental impact reviews that could add more delays and costs to the project, HART board member Jon Nouchi cautioned during the meeting. “I don’t know what that is,” Kahikina added, referring to the alternative approach. HART must now seek an alternative approach to “avoid shoving (utility relocations) down the city’s throat,” she said. “We’re not going to get them,” Kahikina said of the clearance variances. That includes clearances from the Department of Environmental Services, which Kahikina oversaw under former Mayor Kirk Caldwell before moving to HART this month. On Thursday, Kahikina told Civil Beat that under her leadership HART would no longer pursue the clearance variances for utilities along Dillingham that the rail agency had previously sought from its counterpart agencies at the city.

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The utility conundrum has stalled rail’s progress, drastically driving up costs and delaying the full system’s opening by at least another several years to late 2027 or 2028 at the earliest. Meanwhile, construction of the rail system’s pillars and elevated pathway have nearly caught up to the area.

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Still, HART officials remain unsure of how to best complete the daunting utility relocations that would need to happen on Dillingham first to make way for rail. Her predecessors at the agency considered several alternative routes before concluding the line should run along that crowded corridor. HART Interim Executive Director Lori Kahikina is soliciting new ideas to get the rail line past Dillingham. Some 10,000 residents live around that crowded Kalihi corridor, city leaders have estimated. The Nimitz alternative is one that Kahikina’s predecessors at the rail agency considered but later scrapped when they concluded that Dillingham was an essential part of the future transit route. That could involve avoiding Dillingham altogether and shifting rail elsewhere, such as along Nimitz Highway, Kahikina said in an interview after Thursday’s Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation board meeting, her first as the agency’s new top executive. Honolulu rail’s new interim executive director, Lori Kahikina, says she’s asked the project’s staff for “any out-of-the-box idea” - however “hare-brained” it might sound - to help get the transit line past Dillingham Boulevard and to Ala Moana.

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