Alexander & Baldwin Inc.’s The Collection is one of several residential projects underway in Kamehameha Schools’ ‘Our Kakaako’ plan

As Kamehameha Schools enters its sixth year in its 15-year “Our Kakaako” master plan, which covers nine blocks mauka of Ala Moana Boulevard in Honolulu, there may be some parts of the development that will be utilized for “interim uses,” the chair of the trust’s board of trustees told PBN.

Lance Wilhelm, chairman of Kamehameha Schools’ Board of Trustees, said that interim uses describes the trust’s leasing activities within the blocks not yet under construction.

He noted that in those circumstances, as it has done with some of the retail frontage in what will eventually become “Salt at Our Kakaako,” Kamehameha Schools was able to find small businesses that needed flexible space either to incubate an idea or launch a new concept.

“Those uses, while relatively short term, help create excitement and bring new energy to a space that might otherwise sit dormant for an extended period of time,” Wilhelm, the former Kiewit Hawaii executive who is now managing principal for California developer Irongate, told PBN in an email. “Ultimately, it will be the market that dictates the exact nature and timing of any development activity in Our Kakaako, and that market remains very strong today.”

The projects currently underway include Alexander & Baldwin Inc.’s The Collection, Castle & Cooke Hawaii’s 400 Keawe project and Kamehameha Schools’ restaurant and retail center, Salt at Our Kakaako.

“[These] are examples of the active developments we expect to help bring life to Our Kakaako and support Kamehameha’s educational mission,” Wilhelm said. “All nine blocks continue to be planned for development in conformance with the entitlements that are in place, and most of them are already under active construction or in preparation for same.”

Duane Shimogawa Reporter – Pacific Business News

A rendering of one of several “Our Kakaako” residential projects in the growing Honolulu neighborhood.

Kamehameha Schools, Hawaii’s largest private landowner, and one of the major developers of the growing Honolulu neighborhood of Kakaako, probably won’t develop all of the parcels in its “Our Kakaako” plan — at least during this current economic cycle — the chairman of the $9.2 billion trust’s board recently said at a construction industry event.

“These [remaining] blocks will be [utilized] for interim uses,” said Lance Wilhelm, managing member of California-based Irongate and chairman of the board of trustees for Kamehameha Schools.

Thus far, the trust, which is one of the larger landowners in Kakaako, has contracted with some of the state’s most well-known developers, including Alexander & Baldwin, Castle & Cooke Homes Hawaii, Stanford Carr Development, The MacNaughton Group and Kobayashi Group, to build housing projects on those parcels.

Our Kakaako consists of nearly 30 acres on nine city blocks, seven residential towers that include 2,750 units and 300,000 square feet of commercial space.

It’s not quite clear which blocks won’t be developed.

The Howard Hughes Corp., the single entity that owns the most land in Kakaako, is conducting a different approach to developing its parcels.

The Texas-based developer is developing its own master-planned community, which is being dubbed, “Ward Village.”

It has development rights to some 20 high-rise towers in the area.

PBN reached out to Kamehameha Schools and Wilhelm for comment on Tuesday.

Duane Shimogawa Reporter – Pacific Business News