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For decades, little has been done to solve the traffic and emergency access route problems plaguing Oahu’s Waianae Coast, a major island stretch with just one public way in and out via Farrington Highway and a population that has swelled to around 50,000 people.

But the local community might finally see some better evacuation routes and road options materialize in the aftermath of last year’s deadly wildfire in Lahaina, as transportation officials scramble to try and prevent a similar tragedy from occurring in other vulnerable pockets across Hawaii. 

The Aug. 8 Lahaina fire moved swiftly and killed at least 101 people, many of them stuck without a way to escape by car or truck. In November, Waianae was reminded of its similar vulnerability to wildfires when a blaze caused by toppled power lines in heavy winds burned 17 acres and damaged several structures before Honolulu Fire Department crews extinguished it.

Now, state officials aim to work with the military to finally fix the rugged, crumbling Kolekole Pass road — the only other way out of the Waianae Coast by vehicle — so that it can accommodate two lanes of traffic and serve as a reliable public evacuation route. 

They’re also poised to remove locked gates at Paakea Road and give commuters an alternate, inland route that runs in the same general direction as Farrington along part of the coast. The move aims to ease some of the daily, severe traffic gridlock that residents face there, plus make it easier to use that route in an emergency.

Hawaii Department of Transportation Director Ed Sniffen said that he met with Army and Navy officials at the Pentagon early last month to discuss fixing Kolekole Pass, which hasn’t been fully restored from the damage it endured during heavy rains in 2008. Officials expect to stabilize the slopes of the pass itself to avoid landslides and tumbling debris.

Both military branches, he said, “are really interested in helping out with this issue.”

The Navy controls the road, and it has an agreement with city and state officials to open up the pass in the event of an emergency. With that understanding, Sniffen said, the military currently allows one-way access into Waianae Coast via Kolekole Pass to ensure the delivery of supplies in emergency situations.

“The big push is to get that access going out as well — and they understand it,” he said. After Lahaina, “there’s now a reason to get people out of the coast very quickly. So looking at this route, making sure it’s stable and dependable, is important.”

Navy personnel at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam couldn’t say last week whether they’re on board with the general upgrades that Sniffen outlined regarding the pass, however. Those include restoring the road so that it runs in both directions, plus stabilizing the terrain around it. Sniffen put those costs at somewhere between $120 million and $150 million.

In a statement Friday, those local Navy officials said that the pass already meets “all requirements” for an evacuation out of Waianae “at a moment’s notice.”

“If there are any potential future development plans being discussed at higher headquarters, we are not aware of those plans at this time,” they added.

The military branch has worked since the 2008 storm damage to keep the road “clear and passable” for emergency access, they said, offering few details beyond that.

Farther down the shore, Paakea and Lualualei Naval roads are already part of an official Waianae Coast evacuation route. But about 1,000 feet of Paakea near Lualualei is owned by the city and gated off, preventing the public from accessing it unless there’s an emergency, in which case city authorities unlock the gates.

The gates are there because the road isn’t up to the proper standards, according to city transportation leaders.

The state aims to take over Paakea from the city and private owners, remove the city gates, build sidewalks and make that 5-mile stretch suitable for round-the-clock public use, getting commuters as far as Mailiilii Road. From there, they could either navigate back to Farrington, along the coast, or head further mauka, or inland.

The idea of using that route dates back to when Mufi Hannemann was Honolulu’s mayor, but efforts for the state to take over the route didn’t start until a couple of years ago, Sniffen said. 

He expects the route to be bought, upgraded and ready to serve as an alternative route to Farrington in 2026. 

Lawmakers: Let’s Explore What’s Possible

Meanwhile, state lawmakers this year are advancing a measure to create a formal interagency task force, chaired by the state DOT director, to help ensure those projects to improve the routes through and out of the Waianae Coast get done.

That measure, , cleared a big hurdle last month when the House Finance Committee approved it.

Sniffen said Tuesday that he would prefer not to have the task force.

“From my perspective it’s talking about talking,” he said. He added that he’d rather just work with the city and the military on those issues.

However, the Waianae Coast’s two representatives, Cedric Gates and Darius Kila, each said that a task force is vital to ensure the area’s badly needed transportation infrastructure projects are seen through to completion.

“I do think it’s important to codify this. Administrations change over, department heads change over,” said Gates, who introduced the bill. “For our community, we’ve dealt with that change over decades and it’s why I feel we’ve been in this predicament for so long.”

Gates hopes that the task force could explore the feasibility of opening Kolekole Pass up to public use even when there isn’t an emergency.

However, that idea would have to clear some major hurdles. Kolekole Pass leads out of the Waianae Coast and straight into the Army’s Schofield Barracks base, so accommodating public traffic there would be complicated. The pass narrows in multiple locations so that one direction of traffic would have to yield to oncoming vehicles, according to the Navy.

The Navy also uses that road to transport ammunition used in the surrounding Lualualei annex, so opening that road up for public, civilian use would require “significant changes” in its operations, officials out of Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam said in an email.

Sniffen said that converting Kolekole Pass to regular public use would cost upwards of $250 million. So far, his discussions with the military have been limited to emergency access only.

Still, for all those challenges, Kolekole represents the only other built route off the coast. Gates said the agencies overseeing the area owe it the community, which for decades has endured the daily impacts of shoddy infrastructure planning there, to explore what might be possible.

The Navy should also at least consider the idea of opening the pass as an act of goodwill after the 2021 underground fuel leaks at its Red Hill storage facility, Gates added. Those leaks tainted the water serving some 93,000 people living nearby in central Oahu, sickening hundreds of them.

Kila added that now’s the time to discuss expanded use of Kolekole Pass with several key military leases on state lands across the islands set to expire in 2029.

The Navy and Army “have control of a road that will ultimately save or hurt people’s lives. Are they ready to be in this community that they claim to be a part of?” Kila said. “They’ll say yes, but that means a fully traversable, two-way access road.”

Tiana Wilbur, who was raised in Makaha and currently serves as transportation committee chair for the Waianae Coast Neighborhood Board, is skeptical that Kolekole Pass could ultimately work as an alternative to Farrington.

“We do need an alternative route. We think that Kolekole Pass is going to be the answer to our problems, but … a lot of things need to be fixed before that’s considered a safe route,” said Wilbur, who toured the pass with the military about a year ago.

She was also skeptical that upgrades to Paakea and Lualualei would make a big difference toward local emergency evacuation. All of the Waianae Coast’s inland roads get very clogged, very quickly with cars during an emergency — that’s what happened about 12 years ago during a major tsunami warning, she said.

“I think the solution would be to stop building homes” because the transportation infrastructure is so limited and outdated there, Wilbur said. “Don’t be developing on this side of the island — we’re good.”

Civil Beat’s coverage of Maui County is supported in part by a grant from the Nuestro Futuro Foundation.