City OKs Queen’s
construction plans

Queen's wins approval to build
a five-story parking lot, as long as it pays
for nearby traffic improvements

Other decisions by the city

By Gordon Y.K. Pang
Star-Bulletin

City officials are hoping to solve myriad traffic problems in the Punchbowl Street-Vineyard Boulevard area thanks to $3.27 million from the Queen's Medical Center.

The hospital yesterday won approval from the City Council to construct a five-story parking lot and make other improvements on its grounds as part of a 10-year, $39 million face lift.

A condition of approval requires Queen's to pay for traffic improvements in the hospital's vicinity:

Allowing Ewa-bound traffic on Lusitana Street to connect with the Vineyard on-ramp to H-1 going Diamond Head. The move is designed to ease mauka-bound traffic along Punchbowl, a concern magnified with the closure of Miller Street (between Punchbowl and Vineyard) to nonemergency vehicles.

Allowing traffic coming from the H-1 Kinau Street offramp, Diamond Head bound, to curve back onto Lusitana. The change would gain ambulance and other hospital visitors quicker access, thus easing the burden on makai-bound traffic on Punchbowl, which is fed by a separate freeway offramp.

Making several improvements along Punchbowl in front of and around the hospital to ease bottlenecks there. Included are creation of a mauka-bound left-turn lane onto Vineyard, and left-turn storage lanes into the hospital for makai-bound traffic.

James Kumagai, Queen's vice president of facilities planning and management, said the hospital is willing to pay for the improvements because they benefit patients and employees.

No decision, however, has yet been made on who will actually do the improvements -- the city, state or the hospital, Kumagai said.

State transportation officials said yesterday afternoon that while they recommended the freeway changes, they have no immediate plans to spearhead such projects.

Yesterday's Council approval capped off months of discussion on the Queen's plan.

The approval allows for a parking lot on the triangular block bounded by Miller, Punchbowl and Vineyard streets.

The original plan called for a seven-story structure with 604 spaces. Also included will be an underground tunnel connecting the parking lot to the hospital.

The hospital expects to close Miller Street in the next month or two in order to begin tunnel construction. Kumagai expects Punchbowl Street work to begin and finish next year. The emergency room is nearly finished, but it won't open until the tunnel and an ambulance court are completed next March.

Other decisions Other action by the City Council yesterday: Final approval A bill allowing city customers to make payments, fill out forms and do other transactions via the Internet. Introduced by Councilman Andy Mirikitani, the measure calls for nonpayment online documents to be available by November. Development of an Internet payment system would be in place by June. Preliminary approval A bill lowering sewer rates of single-family households and raising the rate for apartment/condominium dwellers. The base charge for single-family homes currently is higher. Introduced by Councilman John DeSoto, the bill would make the base charge the same for both classes. Mirikitani voted against. Two bills requiring property tax rates for the apartment/condominium and residential classes to be the same. The tax rate for apartment/condominium currently is higher. One of the two bills, introduced by members Duke Bainum and Rene Mansho, includes unimproved residential properties in the same rate. The second bill -- introduced by members John Henry Felix, Donna Mercado Kim and Mufi Hannemann -- does not. Councilman Steve Holmes voted against both.