What Happened to the Pro-Rail Movement?
As far as Honolulu officials are concerned, the city’s rail plan is a done deal, and has been since voters approved a ballot question about the project in 2008.
But Honolulu’s highest profile rail skeptics, who filed a lawsuit challenging the project in federal court last week, beg to differ. Plaintiffs say that this is their chance to stop the project once and for all — and they’re confident it will work.
At the very least, the lawsuit is a wake-up call to rail supporters who have remained relatively quiet, and stayed out of the public spotlight for quite some time now.
What happened to the pro-rail movement anyway?
Rail believers turned out by the hundreds for the city’s ceremonial groundbreaking in February (by contrast, only dozens of protestors were there), but they are almost always outnumbered by rail opponents at public hearings. Besides, many of the rail supporters who attended the groundbreaking are current or former city employees.
City officials are vocal cheerleaders for rail, but what about citizens? Groups like Go Rail Go, which coined the catchphrase “No Huhu, Ride Da Choo-Choo,” have been mostly silent in recent years. The nonprofit hasn’t updated since June of last year. Its — never very active to begin with — hasn’t been touched since December 2009.
Go Rail Go President Maeda Timson says the group’s members left the spotlight because they felt they had achieved what they wanted: Voters cast ballots to support the city’s plan to establish a steel-wheel on steel-rail system.
“The anti-rail people, they haven’t said anything new,” Timson told Civil Beat. “That’s where we, as Go Rail Go, are coming from. It makes no sense to us. You hear the same old thing from the same old people. As far as we’re concerned, we’ve already answered those questions. They’re the ones that are train-wrecked because they just talk and talk, so what’s the point?”
Timson’s right that the anti-rail contingency has already voiced the concerns its lawsuit raises. But now that there’s a formal legal challenge, she sees it as a call to action.
“Once the vote happened, it wasn’t any reason to keep ringing the bell,” Timson said. “It was like, ‘What for?’ Now with the lawsuit, we’re working on our website, bringing it back up and making it more current, and reaching out to everyone on our mailing list to let them know we’re back on board. If this lawsuit means that it’s time for another voice to be heard, we will be that voice.”
Timson, a Kapolei resident, says she never stopped talking about the benefits of rail. She says her community is relying on the project, and members of Go Rail Go have continued to educate Ewa residents about the ways in which it is expected to transform the region.
“The lawsuit addresses the same old story, the same old comments,” Timson said. “We’re just a bunch of folks who care about rail, who have been active in rail for many years, and we will continue to pursue our movement. Nothing has changed. Of course they have their right to do this (lawsuit), that’s what living in America does, but we’re going to execute our right to speak up too.”
