14th September 2010
Posted in Updates

KHON reports on Saturday’s Malaekahana groundbreaking ceremonies with video posted on KHON.com featuring an interview with Stephany Vaioleti from the Kahuku Community Association. “This is a partnership between the communities to keep people safe and off the highways and a healthy alternative.”

Kaleo also has an in-depth story on the path:

So, it was kind of fun when several hundred people at the September 11, 2010, groundbreaking ceremony watched Junior Primacio, representing Kahuku, and Bobby Chang for Laie fire up their respective backhoes and scoop a six-foot trench out of the cattle pasture near the entrance to Gunstock Ranch in Malaekahana to mark the beginning of a new bike path that will stretch along the mauka side of Kamehameha Highway between the two communities.

The bike path is the first project to come out of the Envision Lā‘ie process. At the groundbreaking, Steve Hoag from Hawaii Reserves, Inc. talked about how community residents had asked for  “more bike and walking paths.”

“We think this bike path begins to address that, and that’s something as an Envision Laie group member, we’re happy to facilitate. This is the first project of its kind in several years where we’re going to try to have the community help with building its bike path… We’ve heard there’s a lot of enthusiasm — Scout troops, BYU–Hawaii students, LCA [the Laie Community Association], Kahuku Community Association and others who are willing and saying they’re waiting for the work schedule to come out and kokua…” Hoag said he wasn’t exactly sure when work on the project would begin, “but I’m assuming it will be within the next two to three weeks.” He explained that one portion of the work will require heavy equipment, “but there will also be a portion where the average resident can come out with work gloves and maybe a rake or shovel and help prepare the ground.”

Envision Lā‘ie is about planning a future that protects quality of life and emphasizes the values of the people who live in the Koolau Loa region.