Posted on: Friday, May 2, 2003

Complaints prompt state to lower Pali rumble strips

By Mike Leidemann
Advertiser Staff Writer

After just two days on the job, the new rumble strips on the Pali Highway are being replaced.

State transportation officials yesterday said they will tear out the newly installed raised polymer strips on the highway and put lower ones in their place. The new strips also will have gaps to allow motorcyclists to travel through without disruption.

The moves were taken in response to numerous complaints from drivers, but surprised Nu'uanu residents who have been lobbying for years for devices to slow traffic in the area.

"The rumble strips were doing their job in slowing traffic down ... maybe too good of a job," said Department of Transportation spokesman Scott Ishikawa.

DOT contractors began installing the strips in the Kailua-bound lanes this week as part of a $400,000 highway safety project, the result of years-long concern over traffic accidents where the four-lane commuter highway passes through one of Honolulu's oldest residential neighborhoods.

Yesterday, several Nu'uanu residents who had been involved in the effort to install the traffic-calming devices said they were shocked by the DOT plans to reduce the height of the strips from one-half inch to one-quarter inch.

"One-quarter inch? That's nothing. I don't think that's going to slow anybody down," said Joe Magaldi, head of the Nu'uanu-Punchbowl Neighborhood Board. "We waited a long time for these improvements, and the board is not going to be happy to hear about these changes."

Ishikawa said the department was trying to balance resident concerns about safety with driver worries about their vehicles.

"We're trying to find a middle ground to make this work for everybody," he said.

The lower strips were installed in the town-bound lanes near Waokanaka Street yesterday. The higher strips already put down in the Kailua-bound lanes near Wyllie Street will be replaced by the middle of next week, Ishikawa said. The cost of the changes was not known, he said.

The rumble strips are part of a larger effort to improve safety in the area. Measures to remind drivers they are approaching a residential area include closing some cross-over spots on the highway, and adding new landscaping and speed indicator signs.

Police statistics show that in the past 10 years, more than half a dozen people have been killed and hundreds injured in the 1.3-mile stretch of highway between Waokanaka and Wyllie streets. National studies have shown that rumble strips placed on highways can reduce accident rates by 20 percent to 30 percent, transportation officials said.

Reach Mike Leidemann at mleidemann@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-5466.