Often when the Honoapiilani Highway across the Pali is closed it’s due to an accident that is serious enough to close the Highway for hours on end. Whale watching during the winter is usually responsible for the traffic slowing down to a snail’s pace while everyone is trying to look for Whales and drive. (Hint to Visitors: For your safety and the safety of those around you, like me and my family for one, please take a few minutes to pull over carefully and do your Whale watching. You are here to relax and sitting on the side of the road parked, with a cool drink and watching for Whales is MUCH more relaxing that trying to stay on a winding road with heavy traffic, and a steep plunge to the ocean, all the while hoping to see a glimpse of a whale spouting.)
The other fairly common road closure is due to our almost yearly wildfires that come along once the grass and brush that has been fed by winter rains succumbs to a long hot summer. As seen on September 1st , 2006 we had a wildfire that at the time of writing this 9-3-06, had burned well over 2000 acres and is still being brought under control. The road was closed for many hours at a time and many visitors, as well as locals, were caught in the traffic jams that extended for miles. It took me almost 90 minutes to drive home to Kihei from Kahului. Normally it’s only about a 15 to 20 minute drive. This was a result of everyone that was turned away from Lahaina or thought they could sneak around another way, only to get caught again.
I took pictures that evening from Kihei of both the fire and the lights of all the cars that extended from the road block just prior to Maalaea, back towards Wailuku and along north Kihei road all the way back into Kihei. I have to wonder, since the headlights and tail-lights were on, was everyone sitting with there engines running? I can just imagine how much gas was wasted and how many people either came close to running out gas or had their engines overheat. I did see some cars the next day on the side of the road from accidents that probably resulted from watching the fire and not the road.
Another thought I had was with so many people lining the roads for hours in their cars, there must have been more than a few that were in need of restrooms. What did these poor souls do? I’m sure many were not prepared with any food or drink. Maybe when these things happen there should be a combination lunch wagon/porta-potty sent to the scene. Just a thought.
I would like to say that one of the keys to helping life on Maui run a bit smoother, would have to be communications. In these days of automation we have a mixed bag of blessings. We have e-mail, cell phones, blackberries, (maybe the Maui version should be a Guava) and quite a few radio stations on Maui. Getting the word out to people early can make a big difference and allow them to make a choice. Sit in traffic and hope for the best or go to a movie, grab some dinner, relax on the beach or just visit some old friends in the area while you are stranded. For my part sitting in an air conditioned movie theater far outweighs sitting in my truck for hours.
The County of Maui through their website at http://www.co.maui.hi.us/ provides up to the minute info on a variety of issues, including, but not limited to road closures and other disaster situations. You can even sign up to receive automatic e-mail notifications and choose the category you would like. Be careful though. You would be surprised at just how many notices can get sent out for raod closures and weather related problems. They are really on top of updating you, but it could almost be more information than you need.
Maui County has a number of commercial Radio Stations on island. Most of them are owned by two companies. Many are running less than live shows. I did hear some updates from most of these stations about the wildfire, but considering the impact on everyone and the almost constant flow of people just hearing about it and looking for answers and more information, I think making updates more frequent might really help. Heck, they give more coverage on some loony that confesses to killing Jon Benet Ramsey, even though he didn’t, than they do on an active news case like the Maui Pali Fire. Go figure.....
I do have to praise to of our local Non-Profit Low Power Radio Stations for providing coverage of the fire and road conditions. Manao Radio 91.5 Mhz provided a nearly constant update to their listening audience. The Dj’s were right on top of the faxes, emails and phone calls that came in throughout the day and night. They made every effort to keep us all informed. The other (Biggest Little Station) broadcasting out of Paia at the Paia Youth and Cultural Center (PYCC), known as RadiOpio KOPO-LP at 89.5 Mhz was able to get in some live updates on the fire and road conditions. RadiOpio is operated pretty much by the kids and while they do have live Dj’s as the kids want to step up to the mike, they don’t normally do newscasts. In this case the Program director Laura Civitello, who nearly lives in the studio these days, took it on to provide some updates. My hat’s off to you people at Manao and RadiOpio for devoting your time and energy to making Maui the kind of place we all would like it to be.
So I guess besides being prepared at home for Hurricanes, on Maui we should be prepared by carrying some essentials in our cars, just in case the next road closure is in between you and your destination.
About the Author:
Jim Hall was raised on Maui. He currently works as an
Electronic Communications Technician. He has been researching and learning about
all aspects of websites and online Home Based Business. A father of three grown
Children and one Grandson, he devotes as many hours as he can enjoying his 4 yr
old Grandson and new granddaughter.
Olowalu Town.
The battle that is taking place this week involves a battle between Fire personnel and a runaway brush fire. At this point the Fire fighters seem to have it under control, but not before burning off many acres and some homes.
For many years the Olowalu area had very few homes and was cultivated with sugar cane and brush fires were rare. Now that the surrounding area is being heavily developed into mini estates and communities, fires are breaking out more often.
When the land was mostly sugar cane and controlled burning was the preferred method of harvesting, there were few runaway fires. Keeping the area green and preventing major brush fires because it was burned off in a controlled manner. Except on those occasions when the arsonists decided to set a cane fire. Now with million dollar estates growing all around and above Olowalu there is no real control over the adjoining properties. The estates themselves are often nice and green and landscaped, but all around them are fields that are either full of green grass in the winter or tall dried grass and trees in the summer.
I can only imagine what these home owners are feeling after investing a million dollars or more into their estates and then watching a wild brush fire sweep by.
Personally I don’t think that area should have been developed and instead turned into open views and some parks and recreation areas with the lowest impact. If you have spent your life on Maui, then you know how likely it is that that would have happened. The developers managed to get all these developments through permitting in spite of the fact that we still can’t even get a decent highway into the Westside. In fact the entire west side was cutoff from the outside world when the fiber optics cable running through the area melted and severed the communications between the west-side and the world. Hawaiian Telcom managed to get the phones reconfigured so they could at least call each other within the west-side of the island and to the local Police station, since 911 was also cut off.
The building up of the area from the Pali to Lahaina town continues on during the fire and even while the fire continues to smolder. I will be curious to see what the cost comes in at to fight this fire. As the area grows and is saturated with million dollar plus estates I am sure the cost to government and the tax payers will soar. After all we can’t let all these expensive homes go up in flames just because they decided to build in an area that isn’t the most hospitable for humans to live in.
If you would like to see some of the area I have pictures located on my Chic Photo Gallery page under Olowalu Fire.
KimoHall
June 30, 2007
Gas prices have been raising pretty steadily. This is not really anything new. The breaking news today is a big story about passing along expenses and appears in the Maui News and was taken from the Associated Press’s reporter Bruce Schreiner relating to the cost of Pizza.
While the story talks a lot about the cost of Cheese going up and affecting the price of a pizza pie, it doesn’t say much about the underlying reason for that price increase.
Well that’s what brings me to write about Pizza and Gas in the same story.
The price of a gallon of gas has gone up and pretty much stayed up with little hope of dropping anytime soon. This means that the price difference between alternative fuels and petroleum fuels is continuing to shrink.
With the shrinking price difference it makes more financial sense to develop alternative fuels such as Ethanol and BioDiesel.
These types of fuels are made from many of the plants and grains that are also used for food or feedstock for farm animals. The demand for raw materials to produce energy often means that the farmer can sell his crop to energy producers for more money than he can to food producers or to other farmers to use as feed for their animals.
The cost then for Dairy Farmers to feed their cows goes up. This in turn drives the cost of milk up too. The cheese producers will have to pay more for their milk and will no doubt pass that cost on to the customer. In fact the demand in places like China and Russia has increased for cheeses. This further causes the price to rise on cheese.
So high cheese prices hit the pizza producers who use millions of pounds per year and now the price of pizza is driven to an extreme. Like gas what seems like an extreme price today will probably seem pretty cheap a year from now.
So as the continued pressure to produce energy from what has been traditionally a source of food for animals and people cause the demand and ultimately the prices for crops to continue to climb, we as the consumer will feel the pinch one way or another.
Now don’t even get me started on how this all relates to the price of a box of cereal…….
KimoHall
June 23, 2007
