Posted on: Thursday, December 9, 2004

BUREAUCRACY BUSTER

By Robbie Dingeman
Advertiser Staff Writer

Q. Why did the city pave Pi'ikoi Street up to King Street and then stop? The four blocks up to Lunalilo Street have been the roughest and "potholiest," so why weren't they paved?

A. The city isn't finished yet with the paving project that you point out, according to Marvin Char, chief of the city Department of Design and Construction's civil division.

Char said contractor Grace Pacific will continue with the paving from King to Matlock after the beginning of the year. He said construction of curb ramps, traffic signal modifications and drainage improvements had to be done before the paving could be scheduled.

Now that work is done, but the city figures that paving this month would disrupt the already heavy holiday traffic and prompt even more complaints.

Q. Why is it necessary to require vehicle owners to put the safety inspection sticker on the bumper of the vehicle? Out-of-state plate owners are required to put an even larger out-of-state sticker on their bumpers in addition to the safety stickers.These stickers ruin the paint on the bumper. Could these stickers be made small enough to fit on the license plate? Or could the safety check expire with the registration to do away with the inspection stickers?

A. State regulations require the stickers to be on the right rear bumpers, according to Dennis Kamimura, city motor vehicle and licensing administrator. Kamimura said the reasoning behind the requirement is so that law enforcement can see the sticker within 50 feet of the rear of the vehicle.

Kamimura said some states allow smog and safety inspection stickers to go inside windows, but he said law enforcement officials don't like to have to go up close to the vehicle to check the expiration dates.

He said license plates are made to nationwide standards on size and width of letters, so an additional sticker wouldn't fit onto the plates now. However, he is looking at recommending to the state Department of Transportation that the sticker be redesigned in a way that cuts the size of the decal in half.

Dumping update

Remember the problems with illegal dumping into a canal behind the apartment building at 1330 Wilder Ave.? The Makiki resident who first raised the question reports that the Department of Land and Natural Resources has repaired a broken wall and fenced the area.

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