Monitors of intersections may issue tickets
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By Mike Gordon
Advertiser Staff Writer
City traffic engineers feel that strike-challenged commuters are driving with aloha, but unless they start driving with more common sense, they're going to get a ticket.
Eugene Tanner • The Honolulu Advertiser
Since the bus strike began last week, more drivers have been blocking intersections, slowing progress on clogged downtown streets when stoplights change, said Ty Fukumitsu, one of the city's traffic signal engineers.
Honolulu Police Department officer Adam Campbell watches over the intersection of Alapai Street and South King Street as police consider monitoring major city intersections to make sure drivers do not block the flow.
Honolulu police may start handing out $77 tickets to those drivers.
"It's been getting worse and worse each day," said Fukumitsu, who watches over and winces at commuters from the Traffic Control Center. He has 135 cameras to choose from.
"Please don't block the intersections," he said.
Morning commuters have shifted their arrival times about an hour earlier, ending rush-hour an hour earlier as well. But while afternoon drivers also are leaving an hour earlier — about 3:30 p.m. — rush hour continues to last until 6:30 p.m., he said.
People are adjusting, but there are just too many of them, he said.
"Because there are so many more cars in the downtown area, the roadways are congested. There is not gridlock, but they are not moving at a fast pace."
Honolulu police are concentrating on monitoring traffic at the city's busiest intersections.
Lt. Jerry Inouye said officers started a monitoring program Friday at the intersection of Alapai and King Street. He said officers would issue citations if there was a "creative way to do it" without disrupting the flow of traffic.
Inouye said the Traffic Control Center has gotten complaints from motorists year round, and the bus strike is "only aggravating the problem."
He said the traffic monitoring program will continue until the strike ends.
The ideal plan, he said, would be to have officers monitor busy intersections from 4:30 to 6:30 p.m., when traffic is at its worst.
Fukumitsu said predicting traffic patterns has been difficult, with no two days of the strike the same.
"We adjust it one day, and it is totally different the next day," he said. "There is a lot of traffic on the roadways, but everyone is driving with aloha."
He said he sees this on his monitors. "They are being very courteous. They are allowing people to cut in and to merge. We want to encourage that."
Advertiser staff writer Kalani Wilhelm contributed to this report. Reach Mike Gordon at mgordon@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8012.
