The weather has impacted plenty of construction projects across the state, but its largest public work project — the Honolulu rail system — is still running on track.
The next leg of the Skyline rail project is headed into the urban core, and evidence of its headway can be seen with the first column and cap being constructed along Nimitz Highway.
HPR spoke with Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation CEO Lori Kahikina to hear how their urban expansion has been progressing.
Interview Highlights
On the maintenance of traffic
LORI KAHIKINA: You can start to see what we call MOT, maintenance of traffic, has changed along Dillingham. Tudor is a much different animal than our previous utility contractors, so you don't have the 1,000 cones out there anymore. … I think it's a much safer area now for ADA, for the pedestrians, for people who ride the bikes, because those cones would constantly get knocked down and get out of alignment. …
So after the tree pruning and removals in September, October, November timeframe, we are going to start the guideway construction. So significant access changes to motorists and pedestrians. It's going to be a more phased approach, not like Dillingham. It's very methodical.
On construction approaching the city
KAHIKINA: Nimitz, we did have our first cap installed on the column. In Iwilei, we had our first oh actually, even in Iwilei, we had our first decorative column, so that was kind of cool. You could actually see an imprint of a choo-choo train, so that was pretty cute. Dillingham, you'll start to see more and more columns coming up. I want to say two already have been installed. To date, we have 30 shafts — that's the underground pukas — and 19 columns that have been erected.
On future progress for Skyline stations
KAHIKINA: We have our procurements that are coming up. On the west side, we have the Waipahu station. So, the previous HART administration value-engineered out the makai entrance, and maybe I would have done the same thing to try and save money, but we did get pushback from the community and some legislators that, you know, we really need that so people don't have to cross that busy highway to get to the station entrance. … Bids are due in September, so hopefully, we can start that construction soon. We still need to do park-and-rides out on the west side. So, we have East Kapolei and UH West Oʻahu. The current UH West Oʻahu was always temporary, so the new one is going to go across the street. So, I'm begging for forgiveness now from your listeners: the park-and-ride is across the street. They will have to walk across the highway, get to the station entrance, go up to the platform, and come back across that pedestrian bridge. …
East Kapolei, so that will be about 900 stalls. UH West Oʻahu, the new one is about 1,100 stalls, and we want to go out to bid maybe early next year for those two park-and-rides.
This story aired on The Conversation on Sept. 2, 2026. The Conversation airs weekdays at 11 a.m. Jinwook Lee adapted this story for the web.
