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Home My WebLink AboutCOM 0018.011 2002-2004 January 23, 2003 RE: Proposed Bill 3, Draft 3 Sunstone Realty Partners X, LLC RECENED'"r^~.., TMK: 7-5-18:8 By..~_.~ ~ i County Council Dear Members of the Hawaii County Council, My name is Josephine Keliipio, I am from Kona and I am here to express some deep concerns about Bill 3, Draft 3, which involves Sunstone Realty Partner's development on Alii Drive across from the Honls surf spot. I watched the televised December 17`" Council Committee on Planning meeting with Sunstone's representative, Greg Mooers. I was extremely disturbed to hear Mr. Mooers speak of changes to their conditions which would harm other nearby neighborhoods. But what was more disturbing was that no one ever questioned him over these changes. I would like to discuss these changes as follows: 1) Unlike the Alii Lani and Sea Ridge condominium projects, which are located about a mile away from Kailua Village, the Sunstone project literally sits within walking distance of Kailua Village. Tres Hombres is just down the street along with the Royal Kona Resort, Huggos and the Coconut Grove Marketplace. Yet, there was absolutely no discussion of how this development could further help to lessen its impacts upon the surrounding area by encouraging its own residents to walk more and use their cars less. Mr. Mooers mainly stresses that residents will use Alii Drive for walking however, Walua Road is a very quaint and quiet road which would serve well for walking too. Mr. Mooers' idea of building a pedestrian walkway on just the mauka side of Walua Road fails to consider residents of his own development who will live in the condo units along Walua Road. These folks would be more inclined and encouraged to walk along Walua Road if the pedestrian walkway were located on their side of the road too. Sunstone should therefore be repuired to provide pedestrian walkways on both sides of Walua Road. On Walua Road, Mr. Mooers provides a pile of reasons why the walkway must be located on the mauka side of the road only. He says that if a pedestrian walkway were located on the makai side of the road, then they would have to cantilever the road then put up chainlink fencing along their property which would block the view plane from the road. Don't fall for such baloney. Retainer walls work wonderfully as support systems for cantilevered roads and since when did a chanlink fence with large pukas in them ever block someone's view? If anything is going to block the view plane it would probably be the project's own condominium structures which I assume are multi-level? A I 'r n it ri on both sides of Walua Road. Comm. No. File N~o~} Ref. 'T6*" " ~o un c: Ref. Date JAN 2 3 2003 ~ Mr. Mooers speaks of expanding the width of Walua Road to 60 feet but what he fails to disclose to you is that when you increase the lane width of a road, those wider travel lanes will encourage drivers to speed no matter what the speed limit is. I should know, I have lived on a 25-mph collector road for 15 years and until the speed humps were installed, most of the drivers would drive with excessive speed on my road. Walua Road happens to be one of our last remaining Kona style roads. In my photographs, you will see how it winds its way down toward Alii Drive and up toward Kuakini Hwy. Widening such a road would not only ruin its ambience but also bring some disastrous consequences to other residents on Walua road in terms of speeding. What should be widened on Walua are not he trowel lanes but rather the shoulders so that pedestrians will have lots of room for walkina_ Narrow travel lanes, along with keeping the curves and bends in the road all help to calm traffic. But if the travel lanes mu~+ be widened then please make Sunstone install traffic calming likes ed h Imo o h- a -ill not sRPPfI Mr. Mooers speaks of installing a 3-way stop sign at Lunapule Road so that cars from his development can use Lunapule Road to make left turns onto Alii Drive. However, testimony, which you received from Lunapule Road residents, indicates that they are not in favor of such a plan, which would dump more speeding cars into their neighborhood and further deteriorate their quality of life. Sunstone needs to redesign the mauka makai road within its own property so that left hand ts~rns are allowed onto Alii Drive and so that their road can serve tie~R relieve mauka makai traffic on Lunaoul Road. Don't let Mr. Mooers convince you that this is not possible. If engineers can put a man on the moon, then redesigning a mauka makai road should be "duck soup" for them. Lunapule has become inundated by speeding traffic from gated communities such as Kona Hawaiian Village, Kona Sea Ridge and Alii Lani. As the photos will also indicate, Lunapule is narrow, steep and it lacks safe shoulders for pedestrian access. ! ~naoele does not de~~rve anymore abuse from more develoomen DMIp~ ~~4a Cuna+nnn_ I don't come from Lunapule Road. But I do live on another well-known mauka makai collector road called, Royal Poinciana Drive. As a resident of Royal Poinciana for the past 15 years, I have seen how the cul-de-sac culture and the gated community culture have impacted old kamaaina neighborhoods like mine and Lunapule. The gated community culture blocks off much needed mauka makai access and forces its noisy speeding cars into our older neighborhoods. This is not right, it is very UN-KONA and it naoda to stop now beginning with Sunstone Your decisions ~a~ o~+~+.•r harm or enhance nearby neighborhoods Please aue~+ion Mr Mooers on everx chance that he 1 P ' r r i ' M I se e e ~ipic~ _ Dist ict resi ent i > i ~ ~ i h~ e i- • p~ ~ ~ ~c.. ~ 1 1 I I I1 ~ r i~i~. r~ - rr r ~I^- • . ~h, ~ r y ~ ~ " i .i T... W. NF y 1~Illil 1.l~ ` 19 Hil M vu e ~ ~+qn i ~ ~ ~ ~ f s, . ~ d. ~ { ~ ~ J a 1(~av ?o-~ m'~~ ,~~f ~~rr "S::A: t ~ ~ ,\~r` \ ~ V `V~\ 1 ~Z . 3 :r y.' " ~ \ ^ I: V \ v~ _ Fy3 ~V