WAIKIKI SAND REPLENISHMENT PROJECT

Thank you to all who have taken the time to read my first blog!!  Sorry for the delay in getting another one posted.  I needed my tech savvy kid to show me how to post another one, duh!

WAIKIKI SAND REPLENISHMENT PROJECT

It’s the elephant in the room.  Or should I say, it’s the herd of elephants on the beach!  It’s the absolutely one thing that has me so completely outraged and stultified that I see red every time I walk even close to the world famous and widely beloved Kuhio Beach.  I hate to be so negative (especially with first real blog out of the shoot) and usually I’m much more laid back, but this is so completely absurd that I just can’t “let it go”.  Yes, I’m talking about the Waikiki Beach Sand Maintenance Project of 2012.  The nifty idea to restore the Waikiki beaches of the Royal Hawaiian Hotel, Outrigger, Moana Surfrider and Diamond Head all the way to the Duke Statue, to their original glory.  In other words, there’s simply not enough room for all of our beloved, sunscreen drenched, economy supporting visitors to lay out there pasty white bodies and get, in short, what they paid for. 

OK, I get it, and I even admit that it makes perfect sense.  The beaches are eroding and they do need to be widened.  So the city called together all the smart people who know about tides and beaches and erosion and economics so they could assemble a plan.  And a plan they concocted.  In fact, they figured out a way to expand the beaches by up to 30 feet, get the hotels to help chip in and accomplish this within a reasonable timeframe and budget. The problem was solved, the idea was sold to the powers that be and everything was headed toward a fairy tale ending.  

Whoops, that is right up until the point that they literally destroyed the entire pond in front of the Marriott Hotel in order to make it their pumping and dumping site.  Then for good measure, they roped off a generous portion of the second pond just Ewa of the Prince Kuhio Statue.  They completely destroyed the one beach by creating an enormous water filled hole then loaded the beaches with enormous machinery and generators that create an ear shattering amount of noise.  Don’t forget the tractors and dozers to push the newly acquired sand that is being pumped in from an off shore barge.  They installed a ridiculously long and obviously to narrow pipe under the sand running the entire beach and simply believed that this would simply do the trick.  Sure, this had never been done before, but what the heck, it ought to work. 

This whole project reminds me of my Alaskan past.  Anchorage, the largest city in Alaska, needed a new performing arts center.  It needed to be fabulous and reflect a Native Alaskan Culture.  Who better to design the geographically relevant building then a mainland architecture firm.  Sure, they designed a beautiful building filled with Alaskan art but they failed to take into consideration one small detail.  Parking.  They built a parking garage 2 blocks away.  Now that might not sound like a big deal for a place like Hawaii with fantastic weather year round.  But for a city that has 8 ½ months of winter, icy streets, snow, hail and below freezing weather, it was the blunder of the century.  Women would be dressed to the hilt to attend the opera or a play, high heels and all, and then have to tackle a nail biting 2 block walk in the freezing cold clutching the arms of their dates to keep from slipping and sliding to the ground on ice.  If it was snowing, their hair would be ruined, there expensive shoes soaked.  Many a silk dress, dress slacks, tie or pricey new shoes were and still are, victim to the Alaska Center For The Performing Arts.  It kind of took all the fun out of a night out on the town. Besides the obvious weather differences, it’s deja vous here in Hawaii.

Yes, there are local people working on this project and that’s a really good thing.  But mainland companies are doing the majority of the engineering.  I understand that this is a unique project and outside professionals had valid input, but who on earth really decided that this was the best route to go?  It’s wrong in so many ways that I hardly know where to start.

1.                The project completely alleviates one of the main protected, family beaches for over 3 months! 

2.                The project invades a portion of the second protected beach as well forcing beachgoers to lie and park themselves uncomfortably close to complete strangers.

3.                The over crowding of the beach that is open is creating disgustingly dirty conditions in the pond with trash, sunscreen, and God knows what else (OK, we know, but don’t want to put it in words).

4.                The NOISE!  Hello, visitors come here for rest, relaxation to unwind from their already noisy lives.  There is no peace at the beach while this insanity is going on.

5.                The view, or should I say, the lack of the view, while the beaches are littered with heavy machinery, mountains of sand, cloudy water and orange faux fences.  Eww.

6.                The stupidly extended time frame that this project is taking. 

7.                The project is plagued with breakdowns!  Generators dying, pumps not pumping and did I mention, deafening noises.  There was the hose that sprung an underground leak and created a sand volcano on the beach that literally had innocent tourists running for cover.  And then the overall design that was very simply flawed and the pipes just can’t handle any kind of capacity that would make this whole thing efficient. 

I know there’s much more.  This is only what my husband I gleaned by speaking with disgruntled workman on the scene, who speak freely about their frustrations, and simply observing the rest with the naked eye.  All of which has put them weeks behind schedule.  What a surprise.

OK, they have to do the work, but 3+ months to do it?  Really?  Are you really telling me that there isn’t a better a way?  Spend a half hour at the beach, any time of day, and you’ll hear 10 different ideas buy visitors and residents alike. 

Pumping the sand onto one beach and then having to somehow move it hundreds of yards to another beach.  And now that the pipe method of moving the sand wasn’t working at great distances, they have to pump the sand to the Moana Surfrider and then move it again down to the Royal Hawaiian.  How efficient is this?  Plus, it closes off more of the beach!  Oh, by the way, did I mention that the sand is all an ugly dark gray and littered with small pieces of sharp coral.  Hmmm.  I’ll save that for another rant.

My husband and I are in the ocean several days a week.  We have been listening intently to the tourists who are literally so fed up with this whole thing.  Many are here to escape the cold winters of Canada and the East Coast.  Others have traveled great distances from foreign countries.  Everyone has an opinion but the overwhelming sentiment that we are hearing is that they are not coming back.  Can you blame them?  You save and save to come to paradise and when you finally arrive you get torn up beaches, noise and over crowding.  If it was only for a few weeks, Waikiki could take the hit.  But creating a project like this that disrupts the main commodity here for over 3 months is ludicrous.  Sure it’s coming in on budget, but what will the ultimate price that Hawaii will have to pay for this “plan” actually turn out to be? 

I don’t pretend to know the answer.  After all, I’m not an expert on beach erosion or a member of the Army Corpse of Engineers (the keepers of our beaches), but I do have a modicum of common sense.  Truck the sand in from another part of the island.  Do it at night.  Pull it off of Sand Island or a host of other fairly unused beaches.  Replenish that sand with the whole barge deal and pump it directly on the beach where it was taken from.  Duh!  This would keep the Waikiki beaches mostly in tact during this project and provide, clean, white sand as visitors expect and pay for.

If all else fails, go with my husband’s idea.  Eliminate the pipe under the sand and the lengthy process of pumping it down the beach.  Require each resident and tourist using the beach to participate in an old-fashioned bucket brigade.  Reward each participant with an old style Mai Tai from the famed Royal Hawaiian Mai Tai bar (Shirley Temples for kids, of course) and move that sand in record time.