Mayor Mufi Hannemann is a staunch supporter of some form of transit system as the only hope for easing Honolulu's worsening gridlock.

The council vote is likely to be the same as for the previous two tallies, with seven members in support and two against. If the measure wins final approval, Hannemann said, he will quickly sign it into law.

"The sooner we can get this going, the better off we're all going to be," Hannemann said Friday. "It is going to be a time-consuming project."

After that, the city is poised to sign a $10 million contract with an engineering consulting firm to prepare an alternatives analysis and draft environmental impact statement, said Hannemann spokesman Bill Brennan.

The analysis, the next critical step in the long march toward a transit system, is expected to take 15 to 18 months, Brennan said. He said the administration is ready to sign a contract because the city earlier put out a request for interested firms to present their qualifications for the project. It received two replies.

He would not name the firm selected.

If all goes according to schedule, Hannemann has said, construction on a transit system could begin as early as 2009.

Council members Charles Djou and Barbara Marshall have maintained their opposition to the tax increase throughout the process. And others still question whether rail is a good idea.

Djou says the tax increase — which would boost the general excise tax from 4 percent to 4.5 percent to pay for transportation projects — is too high. It would cost the average Honolulu household about $450 a year, according to government estimates.

Marshall has said the process seems reversed to her. She said she would have preferred to see the alternatives analyzed before a tax to pay for the system would be finalized.

The cost of a transit system has been estimated at $2.6 billion and up. Pressure is building for officials to find some way to ease rush-hour traffic congestion.

Hannemann said the yet-to-be-determined form of transit would run from Kapolei to downtown and to the University of Hawai'i-Manoa. He said the system would help all of the island, easing traffic overall because "there'll be less cars on the road."

Dave Rolf, executive director of the Hawaii Auto Dealers Association, has been urging the council and public officials to slow down on the drive for rail and analyze alternatives first. "Don't rush to tax and rail," he said.

Rolf said his association first approached the debate two years ago, trying to figure the best way to reduce traffic. "We didn't object to a train," he said. "We objected to something that didn't take traffic off the road."

But, he said, the idea of forcing each household to pay about $450 a year for a system that hasn't been chosen is illogical. He said the amount equates to what some people spend on Christmas gifts. "They're going to end up with a train under the tree that won't work," he said, one that will take more than a decade to build.

The group has been placing ads in Honolulu newspapers, calling council members and writing letters to editors trying to get its views as much exposure as possible.

Rolf said he worries that Honolulu will have problems like those of Seattle's monorail, which he said was sold to the people as a $2 billion project but with costs now projected at $11 billion. He said he has found no example of a city that successfully planned transit this way.

"What will happen if no one rides the transit?" he asked. "It involves a great deal of risk."