Best Buy to limit store height
By Suzanne Roig
Advertiser East Honolulu Writer
'AIEA — Consumer electronics giant Best Buy is moving ahead with plans for its first Hawai'i store and expects to have its permits by April.
The company is seeking a zoning change and has filed applications for permits for a 50,000-square-foot store that would be built on the site of the former Tony Honda and Nissan dealership on Kamehameha Highway.
Best Buy estimates that once permits are approved, it will take a year to build the store at the intersection of Kamehameha Highway and Kanuku Street, just blocks from a rival Circuit City store at Pearlridge Center.
A Jan. 16 public hearing has been set for the retailer's application for a special management area use permit, which is needed because the land is near the coastline, an area under special protection.
The Minneapolis-based retailer has been before the area's neighborhood boards, which approved the firm's plans while expressing a few concerns, mostly on the height of the building and its proximity to the Pearl Harbor Historic Trail.
• What: The city department of Planning and Permitting will hold a public hearing on Best Buy's request for a special management area use permit for its proposed 50,000-square-foot store at the former Tony Honda site on Kamehameha Highway in 'Aiea. • When: 10:30 a.m. Jan. 16. • Where: 'Aiea Recreation Center, 'Aiea District Park, 99-350 'Aiea Heights Drive.
The community also was concerned about an increase in traffic in the busy area. Kamehameha Highway is congested throughout, and many residents use Kanuku Street as a main artery into upper Waimalu and Royal Summit and Ka'ahumanu Street into Waiau and 'Aiea.
Hearing set
Keith Kurahashi, with the Honolulu planning firm of Kusao & Kurahashi Inc. that is preparing the paperwork for city approval, said that after meeting with the community, Best Buy agreed to lower the height of its building to 40 feet in the front, facing the roadway, and to landscape the side of the building facing the trail.
"We agreed with the community and will keep it lower," Kurahashi said. "We will put in some roof embellishments, design features and equipment on top of the roof, so from the back of the building it will be higher than the 40 feet."
Reach Suzanne Roig at sroig@honoluluadvertiser.com or 395-8831.
