Making over Honolulu's underutilized areas

By Mike Leidemann
Advertiser Staff Writer

This King Street park at Kaheka is one of the sites the one-day planners' workshop may use as an example. Participants will be asked to offer redesign ideas for such spots. Deborah Booker • The Honolulu Advertiser

That's the starting point for an all-day workshop set for July 21 at the Hawai'i Convention Center.

"We want to focus on some of Honolulu's most important but underutilized areas and find ways to give them new uses and meaning," said David Kaahaaina, who is spearheading the ambitious design "charette," or planning session, which is expected to include more than 100 professionals and community people.

The areas planned for discussion are some of Honolulu's most familiar yet overlooked spots, including major intersections that thousands of people see every day without really noticing.

"They're really prime real estate, pivotal sites, but for whatever reason, they are thoroughly underused," Kaahaaina said. "Maybe you've seen the same old dirt pile or parking lot there for years. For whatever reason, they defy logical or reasonable utilization."

At the workshop, teams of professionals and community people will try to come up with simple design solutions — "healing aids or appliques" — to celebrate the nature of each site. The solutions could include anything from new plantings and sculptures to larger developments.

So far, that's pretty standard stuff for such design charettes.

The next step, however, would take the group into relatively uncharted territory. Once the proposed changes are made, the group proposes to start an annual roving parade that would snake its way from one area to another. At each stop along the way, music, food and other familiar festival features would contribute to the festivities.

The idea is based upon a similar moveable festival proposed, but never instituted, several years ago for areas of Los Angeles as it recovered from the race riots of 1995. In Honolulu, where each of the sites is associated with a nearby volcanic or geological feature, the festival would be called Ring of Fire. The group has proposed joining forces with the King Kamehameha Festivals committee to generate interest and revenue for both events.

"Right now, we've been talking to a lot of different people, and they're digesting the proposal," Kaahaaina said. "It's coming along."

Planners also hope to take some ground-breaking steps in the use of new technology at the charette. Instead of the familiar flip charts and felt-tipped markers, laptop computers using brand-new software will allow participants to project and overlay their ideas for all participants to see in "real time."

"We'll be able to draw new plans right on top of existing photos of the area, see them in 3-D, and if we don't like what we see, redo it or undo it right there and then," Kaahaaina said. The technology also will allow real-time participation of interested professionals on the Mainland or Neighbor Islands.

The charette is part of the Architecture Week activities sponsored by the American Institute of Architects, Honolulu chapter. Other events include:

• Thursday: Film screening and lecture. "Visioning for the Rebirth of A City," a movie and talk about design changes in Berlin, at the Honolulu Academy of Arts.
• July 26: Design awards banquet. Honors the best of Hawai'i architectural work in the last year, at the Hawai'i Prince hotel.
• July 28: Chat with an architect. An opportunity for people to meet individually with an architect to learn more about solutions to residential, commercial or community design problems, at the Kahala Mall.

Sites under consideration

Eight sites that may be discussed during the American Institute of Architects' Ring of Fire design charette:

• North King Street at Kalihi Shopping Center
• North King Street at Liliha
• Queen Emma Street at Vineyard Boulevard
• South King Street at Pawa'a, site of a new, unnamed park
• Wai'alae Avenue and Kapi'olani Boulevard interchange
• Ala Wai at Kapahulu Avenue
• Kapi'olani Boulevard at Kalakaua Avenue
• Corner of Pensacola and Kapi'olani Boulevard