Communication No. 2019-10- NKCDP RR Trail Plans

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contracts, Acts and laws, and was built prior to 1892. This indicates that it should be considered a 'trail' under HRS 264-1(b). In the Mapping Section of this document, we will further examine the railroad ROW and determine if there were any legal changes to the railroad ROW that would not qualify it as a road. Understanding Hawaiian Land Tenure prior to 1778 From 1778 to 1890, when the Hawaiian Railroad Company was formed, there were drastic changes in land tenure as well as the economic, social, political and religious norms. This description is included in this report to show how these changes altered the day to day life in North Kohala, and relates to the importance of public access to important cultural and historic sites. Prior to European contact in 1778, Hawaiians developed a complex and stable land tenure system. The eight main islands were divided into several separate chiefdoms, with an ali'i 'ai moku (district or island chief) or moi (high chief) controlling one island or section of an island and with a kalaimoku (counselor) to manage lands. 10 The ali'i 'ai moku also had an 'aha ali'i (council of chiefs) for advice and guidance. Certain lands were reserved for the ali'i 'ai moku and the remaining lands were given to the most loyal chiefs, relatives, or allies. In turn, the chiefs retained lands for themselves and distributed the rest to their followers. All lands were given subject to revocation at will, and when conquest or death brought a new ali'i 'ai moku, lands would be redistributed according to the preference of the new high chief in consultation with the kalaimoku and 'aha ali'i. The ali'i 'ai moku was managed by ahupua'a, with an ahupua'a chief who was responsible for the production of the ahupua'a. The ahupua'a was the land unit that most closely related to the everyday life of the people. An ahupua'a could range in size from one hundred to thousands of acres. An ahupua'a typically "ran like a wedge from sea to mountains."11 An ali'i 'ai ahupua'a (ahupua'a chief), or sometimes a konohiki (land agent), administered the ahupua'a. An early Hawai'i case explained that the ahupua'a afforded to the chiefs and people "a fishery residence at the warm seaside, together with the products of the high lands, such as fuel, canoe timber, mountain birds, and the right-of-way to the same, and all the varied products of the intermediate land as might be suitable to the soil and climate of the different altitudes from sea soil to mountainside or top." 12 Hawaiian society paralleled this land division pattern. At the top were the ali'i ai moku and kahuna nui (high priest), then the ali'i 'ai ahupua'a, then the ahupua'a konohiki, and finally the maka'ainana (people of the land). " The maka'ainana worked together under the direction of the chiefs and priests and within the boundaries of the ahupua'a, the maka'ainana had the right to hunt, gather wild plants and herbs, fish offshore, and use parcels of land for kalo cultivation together with sufficient water for 10 See E.S. Craighill Handy & Elizabeth Green Handy with the Collaboration of Mary Kawena Pukui, Native Planters in Old Hawaii: Their Life, Lore, and Environment 45-49 (rev.ed. 1991), as found in Native Hawaiian Law - A Treatise, Edited my Melody Kapilialoha MacKenzie with Susan K. Serrano and D. Kapua'ala Sproat. (Referred to as Handy, Handy & Pukui) 11 ibid 12 See Patrick Vinton Kirch, When did the Polynesians settle Hawaii?A Review of 150 Years of Scholarly Inquiry and a Tentative Answer, 16 Hawaiian Arch. 3 (2011) " Handy, Handy & Pukui