Elders Facing Rocky Road In Daily Travel
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Blanche McMillan points out pukas in the mauka
shoulder of Kalanianaole Highway between Nakini
and Oluolu streets, which she says is hazardous
travel for pedestrians young and old. Repairs are
months away, according to state highway officials.
Photo by Nathalie Walker, staff photographer.
Waimanalo’s been given a rough shoulder - between Nakini and Oluolu streets - that needs attention, and village elders are determined get it fixed before someone is badly hurt.
“I raised this issue a year ago, and nothing’s been done,” said Rosalie Amanda Hermanson, 66, a resident of the Kupuna housing project on Nakini Street. Tenants like herself who no longer drive must negotiate a short, rough stretch of Kalanianaole Highway’s shoulder by foot in order to reach the beach park, stores and post office on the makai side.
“It’s all coral gravel with big holes in it and leftover paving on the side,” Hermanson said, noting her many calls and letters to the city and state, plus a presentation in August at the neighborhood board.
People with walkers, canes and wheel-chairs have a shaky time, she explained, but children on bicycles are also at risk. “If the angle of their wheel hits the coral, they fall off, and they could fall right into the street.”
Kailua High School student Kamuela McMillan, who uses a wheelchair, is proof of that. He was negotiating the ragged strip in order to cross to Waimanalo Beach Park for the Sept. 9-10 Sunset on the Beach.
“It’s hard because I almost fell,” recalled McMillan, 16.“It tipped forward from the rocks. They’re big and my wheels are small. There’s also a ditch over there.”
McMillan’s mishap was the last straw for his mother, Blanche McMillan, who is a member of the Waimanalo Neighborhood Board. “No more!, I said. This is the last straw. “
She too began calling and asking that the area be repaired “from the edge of the highway six feet in to make a paved walkway.
“I kept on calling and stayed on the phone until I got the answers from them.”
‘Them’ is the state Department of Transportation. According to DOT spokesman Scott Ishikawa, the main artery through Waimanalo is being improved in phases by a contractor, and the stretch from Nakini to Oluolu is part of the last project on the list.
“We are hoping to repave the highway sometime early next year,” he said last week, citing budget and scheduling issues.
“It’s at least three months away,” he pointed out. “But we may try to get a crew to patch (that area) up first. I’ll put in a request to take care of the shoulder there.”
“I would like it faster,” added Blanche McMillan. “And I hope they make it good.”
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