Posted on: Sunday, May 29, 2005
Diamond Head rim upgrade coming
By Suzanne Roig
Advertiser East Honolulu Writer
DIAMOND HEAD — Along the outer rim of famous Diamond Head crater, runners, joggers and walkers have to search for a sidewalk hidden by waist-high brown grass.
Stairways — the only remnant of former military housing that once surrounded the crater on the townside of Diamond Head Road — lead off a footpath that is barely wide enough for one person. Not the safest or well-preserved vista for the state's third-most-visited state park, proponents for improvements say.
But that will change over the next several years; the state is ready to take the first baby step in completing a multi-million dollar plan to upgrade one of its most visible landmarks.
The work can't come soon enough for pedestrians, and will go a long way toward providing safety as well as a more manicured look for the state monument.
Shirley Mamlolo, a Riverside, Calif., resident, said the natural beauty of Diamond Head was breathtaking, but some amenities would make the experience that much better: more drinking fountains, a larger restroom and benches along the hiking trail.
Her daughter, Lorraine, however, would like to tell planners to keep in mind the natural aspects of the crater and not to cover it up with too much pavement.
"There's a fine line between preserving the natural beauty and making it too comfortable," she said.
The plan for Diamond Head includes opening up more hiking trails, installing a people mover from the Kapahulu Tunnel into the crater, putting in an interpretive center between the two tunnel entrances, and adding restrooms, a picnic area, reforestation and landscaping.
If the state were to build everything outlined in the master plan, it would cost more than $25 million.
Instead, officials say the state will take the plan one step at a time. The first would be to put in wider and more consistent sidewalks on the crater side of Diamond Head Road running from the old Cannon Club to 22nd Avenue.
The area would be planted with dry land plants. The state plans also include the restoration of the Na La'au arboretum, an area behind La Pietra School that has been closed since the 1980s.
The work and other improvements to state parks is being paid for, in part, with money earmarked for park maintenance from the transient accommodations tax and given to the state Department of Land and Natural Resources, which oversees Hawai'i's 52 state parks.
The state is in the middle of a $15 million park renovation program, the likes of which have not been seen since the parks system was established 40 years ago. About $1.7 million of the work is being paid by hotel room tax money.
For the Diamond Head sidewalk improvements, $260,000 in hotel room tax money will be used to plan and design the work, said Yara Lamadrid-Rose, coordinator of Diamond Head State Park, a division of the state Department of Land and Natural Resources. An additional $500,000 from the state parks portion of the hotel room tax will be earmarked for construction, if the measure is signed by Gov. Linda Lingle, Lamadrid-Rose said.
"We definitely support improvements like this, especially when it makes the area safer and beautifies it," said Jeff Mikulina, Sierra Club of Hawai'i chapter director. "Our state parks are in total disrepair, the result of inadequate funding."
For about three years now at Diamond Head, all visitors have paid an admission fee upon entering the park, whether they make the 1.4-mile hike 560 feet above the crater floor or not. Every individual entering the crater on foot pays $1. People who drive a car in, pay $5, and $40 is charged for 26-passenger buses.
These fees, the state has said, are a necessary source of alternative revenues for park maintenance. But they aren't enough to pay for improvements, said Peter Young, state Department of Land and Natural Resources chairman.
The upkeep of parks is an expensive business, Young said.
Lights were recently installed in the tunnels between the two sets of steep stairways, new restrooms are being built and a parking lot was paved. The state recently signed a deal with mobile food concessions — upscale lunchwagons — to sell food and drinks at Diamond Head, Young said. More may be forthcoming from the $50,000 donation that the Diamond Head International Music Festival and Conference promoter Ron Gibson has promised for holding the festival in the crater in April 2006.
"It's just another step in the ongoing process to accomplish the master plan," Young said. "Diamond Head is the most heavily used state park on O'ahu. It is important to us."
Just last week Lamadrid-Rose, the park staff and the consultant walked the area and discussed issues and concerns. Now it's up to the consultant to draw up a plan, meet with the state, which will then present it to the community for approval. Ultimately the plan will be before the City Council for approval.
Parks and public areas are very important to the image of O'ahu and its tourism, said Rex Johnson, Hawai'i Tourism Authority executive director.
"Visitors go to these places," Johnson said. "The money is a drop in the bucket for the needs of the state parks, but it helps move the project forward."
Reach Suzanne Roig at sroig@honoluluadvertiser.com or 395-8831.
