HAWAI'I GARDENS
Architect's signature works include freeway planters
By Heidi Bornhorst
Q. You asked in a recent column about who designed the hanging planters that grow allamanda, kolomona, false kou and other drought- and wind-tolerant flowering plants along the freeway near Ward Avenue. Val Ossipoff, the famed architect who designed many of Honolulu's signature buildings, was involved with this design.
— Evanita Midkiff, Kahala
A. We received an e-mail that suggested we contact Tetsuo Harano, former state highways chief, about the hanging planters.
I gave Harano a call, and he was very generous with his knowledge.
Harano said in the "old days," the state Department of Transportation would hire architects and landscape architects as consultants in highway design.
The downtown portion of the freeway was completed around 1969. Ossipoff was a consultant for the H-1 design. The wall was so high in the area near Ward that Ossipoff felt something should be provided to break up the monotony.
Thus, we got this design, which can be likened to the famous hanging gardens of Babylon, an early horticulture- and landscape-design marvel of the world.
Various landscape architects also worked in conjunction with the architects and highway designer and builders.
Richard Kapololu came on board in the 1980s and retired a few years ago. I remember him telling me he thought "weeds" were the way to go with highway landscaping. "Find what's tough and grows naturally and plan this into your design," he said.
Harano said the area of Moanalua Freeway near Fort Shafter needed special design.
"Notice the circular planters with areca palms?" he asked. "They are a very nice design element."
Paul Weissich, landscape architect and former director of the Honolulu Botanical Gardens, also provided input on the freeway design.
The area makai of the circle palm planters has a grove of erythrina, or coral trees.
One of them is the native Hawaiian wiliwili, Erythrina sandwicensis. Weissich was always happy to see these pretty and tough flowering trees thriving so well and making for a more aesthetic commute.
The Nimitz and airport viaduct section of the freeway was designed in part by famed architect Pete Wimberly.
This is one of my favorite sections of well-planned freeway design. The palms and gold trees look like a nice rain forest from below. The entire grove of gold trees were recently recognized as "exceptional trees," and are thus protected by law.
"You are probably too young to remember Bob Thompson," said Harano, "but he helped with freeway landscape design also."
Thompson's wife, Catherine, also was a landscape architect. They did many outstanding designs such as Irwin Park, but all their landscape plans and documents were washed out to sea by the catastrophic tsunami of 1946.
Heidi Bornhorst is a sustainable-landscape consultant. Send questions to: Island Life, The Honolulu Advertiser, P.O. Box 3110, Honolulu, HI 96802; or islandlife@honoluluadvertiser.com. Letters may be published or distributed in print, electronic or other forms.
