EDITORIAL
Time is now to end battle over Irwin Park

In the years to come, the operators of the Aloha Tower Marketplace as well as the state will come to appreciate an important ruling by Circuit Judge Gary Chang.

Chang ruled that the 22,000-square-foot oasis of greenery known as Irwin Park at the front of the Aloha Tower complex cannot be converted into a multilevel parking garage.

Let's hope this is the end of the legal and procedural struggle over the park.

The site was given to the then-Territory of Hawai'i in 1930 by Helene Irwin Fagan, accompanied by a provision that the property be used in perpetuity as a park.

Although that condition has been modified more than once, the underlying restriction remains. Chang's ruling said, effectively, that the original deed restriction controls.

This is an important ruling for the future of downtown Honolulu. In time, everyone will come to appreciate that patch of mature trees and greenery in a heavily urbanized downtown.

There may be a temptation to appeal this ruling. The state and the Aloha Tower Development Corp. should resist that temptation.

This court case was carried primarily on the backs of local nonprofit preservation groups, particularly Scenic Hawai'i, which spent a good chunk of its endowment on legal costs.

It would be unfair to force those groups to dig back into their pockets for additional money to fight an appeal against the almost unlimited treasury of the state.

Time to leave Irwin Park alone and move ahead now with alternative solutions to the legitimate parking problems that have held back the Aloha Tower Marketplace's obvious potential.