30-year bridge battle nears end

Developer to complete Waipouli pedestrian bridge next month

by Nathan Eagle – THE GARDEN ISLAND

KAPA‘A — A 55-foot-long pedestrian bridge connecting two major Eastside shopping centers will be open for public use by the end of March, according to Soul Construction President Joshua Copeland, the Kapa‘a-based contractor for the project.

When completed, county officials said a nearly 30-year fight with various developers will be over. The accessway, which will likely be incorporated into the county’s proposed 16-mile multi-use path from Nawiliwili to Anahola, is a zoning condition that has gone unmet since February 1979.

“It’s going to be another closure on a really conflicted, controversial issue,” Councilwoman JoAnn Yukimura said yesterday. “Assuming everything goes well, … it will bring another incomplete to completion.”

The 10-foot-wide marine grade aluminum bridge spans 55 feet across Uhelekawawa Drainage Canal parallel to Kuhio Highway. The southwest end is situated between McDonald’s and Pizza Hut in the Waipouli Town Center; its northeast end spills into the Safeway parking lot at Kaua‘i Village.

The bridge, paid for by the retail centers’ developers, is valued at roughly $400,000, according to Doug Haigh, the county’s building division chief and project manger for the path project.

“Not only do we not have to pay for the bridge, but we get a soft-match credit,” he said.

The county intends to use the bridge as part of the path project, he said, which will make more federal funding available.

“We’ll get a four-to-one match,” Haigh said. “It’s a beautiful bridge too.”

The complex history behind the bridge came to a boil two years ago when County Council championed the cause after community members expressed concern.

On May 24, 2006, council unanimously passed an ordinance that gave the developers 24 months to build the bridge by holding at stake the building and zoning permits.

“There were also stiff penalties for failure to complete on time,” Councilwoman Shaylene Iseri-Carvalho said. “This definitely was an incentive for them to hurry.”

Council spelled out in the legislation that if the property was sold, the next owner assumed responsibility, which happened six months after the bill became law.

Califonia-based Passco Cos. bought Kaua‘i Shopping Village from Kaua‘i Village Associates in July 2004 for $26.9 million, according to Iseri-Carvalho.

The company in January 2007 sold the 110,000-square-foot retail center to a group of California investors, represented by Faris Lee Investments, for $40 million.

Previous councils and county planning commissions had tried imposing similar restrictions and enforcing the bridge condition, but the deadlines lapsed, time extensions were approved or permits were granted regardless.

“While it is unfortunate that we had to wait for decades to get a condition fulfilled, I am extremely pleased that through the hard-working efforts of Tracy Murakami and the hundreds of residents who signed petitions demanding that the developer build the bridge, and the joint support of the 2006 council in setting stringent construction schedules, penalties for non-compliance on the developer and a prohibition on obtaining any new zoning or building permits until the bridge was open for use to the public, we were successful in getting the developer to provide the bridge that was promised to the people almost 30 years ago,” Iseri-Carvalho said yesterday.

Copeland, the project contractor for developer Easton Pacific, said he feels “everyone’s excitement in just getting it done” and moving on with community projects.

“It’s a giant step,” he added.

Councilman Jay Furfaro said the bridge’s completion will be another important item the county has knocked off its list in recent years.

He pointed to this council’s approval of a housing policy a decade in the works, a tough shoreline setback law, a ban on new transient vacation rentals, a 2 percent cap on homeowner-occupied property, and soon a circulation and transportation plan for Po‘ipu and Koloa.

“We took on a difficult issue,” Yukimura said, regarding the bridge. The solution was a “tight law” that forced compliance, she added.

• Nathan Eagle, staff writer, can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 224) or neagle@kauaipubco.com.