Maui Planning Commission Regular Minutes November 24, 2015
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
MAUI PLANNING COMMISSION REGULAR MINUTES NOVEMBER 24, 2015 A. CALL TO ORDER The regular meeting of the Maui Planning Commission was called to order by Chairperson Keone Ball at approximately 9:11 a.m., Tuesday, November 24, 2015, Planning Conference Room, First Floor, Kalana Pakui Building, 250 South High Street, Wailuku, Maui. A quorum of the Commission was present. (See Record of Attendance.) Chair Ball: Good morning everyone. We’ll call this meeting to order of November 24, 2015. We are waiting for another member that’s driving around in circles. B. PUBLIC TESTIMONY - At the discretion of the Chair, public testimony may also be taken when each agenda item is discussed, except for contested cases under Chapter 91, HRS. Individuals who cannot be present when the agenda item is discussed may testify at the beginning of the meeting instead and will not be allowed to testify again when the agenda item is discussed. Chair Ball: At this time, we will have public testimony. Anyone that would like to testify at this time may do so. However, if you testify now, you wouldn’t be able to testify later. If you wanna wait and testify when your item comes up on the agenda you can do that too, no problem. So we do have a list. Mike Moran? Wait? The following individuals testified at the beginning of the meeting: Patricia Hoskin - Item D1, Chapter 2.80B Mark Hyde - Item D1, Chapter 2.80B Diane Wakamatsu - Item D1, Chapter 2.80B Tamara Paltin - Item D1, Chapter 2.80B and Item C2, A&B Properties, Inc., CPA, CIZ, PH1 Debra Greene - Item D1, Chapter 2.80B John Gelert - Item C2, A&B Properties, Inc., CPA, CIZ, PH1 Trinette Furtado - Item D1, Chapter 2.80B and Item C2, A&B Properties, Inc., CPA, CIZ, PH1 Pamela Tumpap - Item C1, Dept. of Public Works, SMA and Item D1, Chapter 2.80B Their testimony can be found under the item on which they testified on. Chair Ball: Anyone else like to testify at this time? Seeing none, public testimony is closed. We’ll start with Item C-1, Public Hearing. Director? Mr. Spence: Good morning Commissioners. Chair Ball: Good morning. Mr. Spence: Your first public hearing item is Mr. David Goode, the Director of Department of Public Works requesting an SMA Permit for the Kahana Nui Bridge Replacement Project, and our Staff Planner this morning is Mr. Keith Scott. Maui Planning Commission Minutes - November 24, 2015 Page 2 C. PUBLIC HEARING (Action to be taken after public hearing.) 1. MR. DAVID GOODE, Director, DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC WORKS requesting a Special Management Area Use Permit for the Kahana Nui Bridge Replacement project to replace and widen the bridge from 29 feet to 41 feet 4 inches to provide a wider roadway section with shoulders and a sidewalk between Hua Nui Place and Omaikai Place at TMK: 4-3-005: 029 (por.)and 083 (por.) and 4-3-019: 028 (por.) and 049 (por.), Kahana, Island of Maui. (SM1 2015/0007) (K. Scott) Plans call for replacing the existing bridge with a new bridge and associated public improvements. Roadway improvements to the north and south of the bridge will be constructed to provide for a smooth transition to the bridge. Mr. Keith Scott: Good morning, Commissioners and Happy Thanksgiving coming up. The replacement of Kahana Nui Bridge on Lower Honoapiilani Road will provide for safer bicycle, pedestrian, and vehicular travel over Kahana Nui Stream. There are no additional vehicular lanes proposed. The project consists of wider travel lanes, a sidewalk on the mauka side of the bridge, transitions from the existing roadway to the bridge and utility realignments. The standards for reviewing the Special Management Area application are found in your report. And at this time, Tessa Ng of Munekiyo Hiraga will lead team presentation detailing the specific activities contemplated for this project. After that I’ll return to present the Department’s analysis and recommendation. Ms. Tessa Munekiyo-Ng: Good morning Chair and Members of the Commission. My name is Tessa Munekiyo-Ng from Munekiyo Hiraga and I’m here today on behalf of the County of Maui, Department of Public Works who’s requesting a Special Management Area Use Permit for the replacement of the Kahana Nui Bridge in West Maui. Before getting into our project I’d like to introduce the project team that’s with us today. The applicant is the Department of Public Works and we have Director David Goode, Deputy Director Rowena Dagdag-Andaya and the project engineer Ty Takeno. I’m from the planning consultant, Munekiyo Hiraga and here with me today is also Colleen Suyama. The engineer and traffic engineer for the project is Austin Tsutsumi & Associates and we have Terrance Arashiro, Adriene Wong, and Matt Nakamoto from ATA, and finally the biological consultant is AECOS, Inc., and we have Snookie Mello from AECOS with us today. This is just to give you a little bit of context for where the project is. It’s located on Lower Honoapiilani Road in West Maui. Here’s Kapalua Resort to the north of the project, Kapalua Airport is here to the south, and if you’re traveling north on Honoapiilani Highway you would take a left at Hoohui Road just before the Kahana Gateway Shopping Center. Once you get down to Lower Honoapiilani Road you would take a right and the bridge is in a residential area over Kahana Stream. As you’ll see later in our presentation most of the improvements are limited to within the Maui Planning Commission Minutes - November 24, 2015 Page 3 Lower Honoapiilani Road right of way. However, there are some minor improvements to the north and south of the bridge to provide for a new...smooth transition to the new bridge. So just to point out what the existing uses are on either side of the bridge starting at the northwest. It’s a single family property. To the north east is a County owned, Kahana Park. To the southeast is a single family residence. And finally to the southwest is Kahana Village, a multi-family condominium project. And this is a aerial map of the area. You can see it’s primarily single family in nature with the exception of the Kahana Village condominium. This is some photos of the existing bridge. It’s a two-lane bridge. There are no...currently no sidewalks or shoulders on the bridge. As I mentioned earlier, there’s going to be some minor work on either side of the bridge to provide for that smooth transition to the new bridge and there will be some easements and land acquisition required. So I just wanna go over that briefly. So starting here to the northwest, Parcel 49, this is a single family residence. A utility easement has already been obtained by the County, 221 square feet for a new utility easement. To the northeast is the County owned Kahana Park. Because it’s a County parcel, no easement is required. To southeast is another single family residence and there’s an existing utility easement on that parcel and the work will be limited to that existing utility easement, so no new easement’s required for this single family property. And finally to the southwest is the Kahana Village condominium project. The Department of Public Works has been in discussions with the landowner. A utility easement here, 221 square feet will be required and in addition, a road widening of 228 square feet will be required from the Kahana Village property and again, the department has been in conversations with the owner. I wanted to just give a little bit of background on this project. The Department of Public Works proposed the Lower Honoapiilani Road Improvement Project, Phase 4 back in 2001 and this was a 1.4 mile roadway improvement project that spanned from Hoohui Road which is south of the Kahana Nui Bridge to Napilihau Street which is to the north. And the project included the replacement of Kahana Nui Bridge. And in November 2002 a Final Environmental Assessment and a Finding of No Significant Impact was published for this entire 1.4 mile roadway improvement project including the bridge. And there’s been no significant changes since that time. The Planning Commission did approve a SMA Use Permit for this project back in March of 2003. However, construction of the project didn’t commence because of issues related to right-of-way acquisition. Since that time the SMA Use Permit has expired and so the Department has modified the scope of the project and will be replacing Kahana Nui Bridge at this time and so we’re here today to request the SMA Use Permit for the bridge replacement component. In terms of project need the existing bridge is structurally deficient because it does not meet the current standards of the Federal Highway Administration. And in addition, the wider bridge will allow for an increase in the hydraulic capacity which refers to the volume of water that passes under the bridge. Currently there’s no safe pedestrian access due to the narrow road...the narrow bridge span. As Maui Planning Commission Minutes - November 24, 2015 Page 4 you recall in the photos that I had shown earlier there’s no shoulder or sidewalk on the bridge and so it was determined that demolition of the existing bridge and replacement with a new structure is the most practical alternative. The scope will include demolition of the bridge and the bridge span will be widened from the existing 29 feet to 41 feet.