Auahi Street, an important route through the growing Honolulu neighborhood of Kakaako that currently separates The Howard Hughes Corp.’s 60-acre Ward Village master-planned community from Kamehameha Schools’ properties, is getting connected.
Anthony Ching, executive director of the Hawaii Community Development Authority, the state agency regulating the redevelopment of Kakaako, said this week at its regularly scheduled meeting that the plan to open up Auahi Street should gain some traction during the first quarter of this year.
Currently, Auahi Street, which starts and ends on Queen and South streets, is cut off almost in the middle from Kamani to Koula streets by the City and County of Honolulu’s Department of Facility Management’s sidewalk-nuisance ordinance and stored property ordinance program and coning unit branch.
The connection of Auahi Street from Kamani and Koula streets would prove useful to both Kamehameha Schools and The Howard Hughes Corp. (NYSE: HHC) — and would connect the two developers’ mixed-use communities, providing pedestrian, bicycle and vehicular circulation.
But the HCDA has proposed moving the city’s coning unit branch to the state agency’s former Look Lab Facility in Kakaako Makai, which consists of an 18,000-square-foot warehouse and 29,560-square-foot open yard space.
Ching said that this property, which was previously leased by the University of Hawaii until 2003 and has since been vacant except for short-term tenants, would be a perfect fit for the branch because it would provide the city with a needed facility and enforcement of the sidewalk-nuisance ordinance program in the Kakaako Makai area.
“The proximity of the branch will impact the homeless population in the area,” he said, noting that opening up Auahi Street would be a full-service effort, painting lines to show bike and pedestrian lanes.
Duane Shimogawa Reporter – Pacific Business News