Financial constraints have forced the state to shelve for now extending Daniel K. Inouye Highway in West Hawaii.
“All expenditures relating to Saddle Road/DKI Highway extension project have been suspended for the time being,” said Shelly Kunishige, state Department of Transportation communications manager. “This includes funding for planning documents such as the FEIS and land acquisition.”
Earlier this year, Kunishige said the state expected to receive by year’s end a record of decision finalizing a draft environmental impact statement for the $80 million project released in 2017, however, that’s now off the table with no money to continue to environmental review process, she said.
That record of decision would have allowed the project to move into the rights-of-way acquisition phase, though construction remained in the air due to lack of funding.
Construction of the road was put “on hold” in fall 2020 after state funding sources dried up and the extension effort was not awarded a federal grant. The state had hoped to draw money from the rental car surcharge fund for the project, but without tourism, the account has seen little revenue.
Officials had predicted the $5 per day surcharge that went into effect July 1, 2019, would generate over $97 million annually, however, the COVID-19 pandemic sharply reduced that figure.
In fiscal year 2019-20, which ran July 1, 2019, to June 30, 2020, $57.9 million was collected. Last fiscal year, which ended June 30, $72.5 million had been generated. So far this fiscal year, $32.2 million has been collected.
Kunishige said Friday that while the entirety of the project may be on hold, the department will continue to seek discretionary grant opportunities to revive it.
“Hopefully we will keep this alive. This administration only has less than a year and a half more so I think it will depend on the next governor, and hopefully we can all work together and make sure that is a priority because when you look at major road improvements, I think next to the Puna highway programs, that is the biggest highway budget item for the state,” said state Sen. Lorraine Inouye, D-North Hawaii, who is vice chair of the Senate Committee on Transportation and a member of the Committee on Ways and Means. “Having said that, the Big Island has always been for the last 40 years the island that’s going to be where the growth for the state is. So we should continue to discuss the issue.”
The project seeks to extend the cross-island route, known colloquially as Saddle Road, from its current terminus at Mamalahoa Highway near the South Kohala-North Kona boundary to Queen Kaahumanu Highway. The approximately 10.5-mile extension was expected to take about two years to construct once work is underway.
There’s currently three alignments in consideration. One option would have the road approximately follow the boundary between the North Kona and South Kohala districts. The others would take the road farther north and connect to Waikoloa Road close to mile marker 3, with the third option also using 2 miles of Waikoloa Road west of that mile marker.
Saddle Road, most of which was renamed Daniel K. Inouye Highway post-modernization and western realignment in 2013, was originally built in 1942 as a one-lane road to connect military training facilities. The effort to extend the road from its terminus at Mamalahoa Highway to the Big Island’s leeward coast dates to 1999, though it was shelved until 2011 when the state resumed the EIS process, that’s once again on hold.
To date, 48 miles between Hilo and its terminus a few miles south of Mamalahoa Highway’s intersection with Waikoloa Road have been modernized or realigned. As of October 2017, state and federal agencies reported having spent $316.5 million on the project.
Inouye said Tuesday she’d like to see the state secure federal funding via President Joe Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure plan passed by the U.S. Senate last month and currently held up in the House.
“I think it’s high time we move toward continuing. Perhaps it’s a good time with the infrastructure monies coming to us from the feds that we could use some to revisit the proposal,” she said. “I would like to see us get some of that funding and keep that project alive.”
West Hawaii Today reporter Laura Ruminski contributed to this report.