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Kokua Line June Watanabe |
Ala Wai is deeper but
still not meant for swimmingQuestion: Everyone keeps saying that the Ala Wai Canal is now clean because of the recent dredging. Paddling season is about to begin and tons of people will be on the water. How clean is the Ala Wai? Is it just deeper or is it really clean?
Answer: The Ala Wai, first off, was never meant as a place to take a refreshing dip or to catch fish for dinner. It was built as a drainage canal.
The purpose of the dredging project last year "was not for water quality purposes but to improve the flood holding capacity of the canal, because that's what it really was created for," said Deborah Ward, spokeswoman for the state Department of Land and Natural Resources.
The Department of Health monitored the dredging of the canal "because stirring up contaminated sediment can cause health issues," said spokeswoman Janice Okubo. But "the quality of the water above the sediment remains the same after the sediment settles."
In that regard, the Health Department's long-standing advisory, "do not eat the fish" caught in the canal, remains in effect as it was pre-dredging, Okubo said.
Basically, polluted runoff from streams and storm drains continues to contribute to bacteria and other contaminants in the canal.
Still, removing 24 years of accumulated sediment and debris did get rid of pollutants that had built up over the years.
In that regard, University of Hawaii oceanography professor Eric DeCarlo's assessment is that, "Overall, that (water) system has improved substantially."
DeCarlo has studied the Ala Wai and its watershed, as well as watersheds on Maui, for 15 years. His funding for Ala Wai studies ended about two years ago and he hasn't done any post-dredging monitoring, but from what he knows, "the canal is incredibly much better off now" because of all the sediment that was removed.
That sediment was particularly bad because it had accumulations of metals, such as lead, and of such banned pesticides as chlordane and dieldrin, he said. That's all mostly been removed.
However, "the actual quality of the water coming out of the watersheds and flowing through the canal likely has not changed a heck of a lot," he said.
That's why he still advises people to soap off if they happen to fall into the canal.
DeCarlo explained that the water coming out of the Manoa and Palolo watersheds into the canal "has a lot of bacteria in it, and that's not going to change. It has nutrients in it and that's not going to change."
Meanwhile, "We're still adding copper, zinc and a lot of heavy metals," as well as "oil and grease that's running off our streets, because our storm drains go straight to the water bodies here. But we're no longer adding as much lead and we're no longer adding as much chlordane."
DeCarlo also said none of those elements he noted exceed any regulatory criteria, so "there is no blatant adverse health effect."
Plus, "we're in much better shape now from a physical standpoint" because the carrying capacity of the canal has returned," he said.
Even when it rains like mad "and all the dead cats and shopping carts and garbage bags coming out of Palolo and Manoa come flying down the river they're not going to end up in the canal looking ugly," stopped by years of built-up sediment, he said.
Still, he would not recommend the Ala Wai as a "recreational swimming environment," and his advice if you fall out of a kayak: "go take a shower and soap up just like you did before."
Auwe
At about 11:30 a.m., Feb. 18, there was a large school bus parked in a no-parking zone fronting the Bank of Hawaii on William Henry Road near Kamehameha Highway. The bus was so large it partially blocked the in-and-out driveway to the bank's automated teller machine. I was trying to get in and was nearly hit head-on by another customer trying to get out. We could not see each other around this big bus. I called HPD to report the problem, but had to wait several minutes. While waiting, a blue-and-white patrol car passed by but did nothing about the illegally parked bus. After reporting the matter, I drove on but about then, the bus driver came along and moved the bus. I have reported chronic parking violations in this spot to HPD in the past. For a while it got better but this incident was by far the worst because of the size of the bus. -- James V. PollockYou later told us that you contacted the bus company and received a prompt and satisfactory response from an official, who informed the driver of the "severity of his indiscretion."
We passed on your complaint to the Honolulu Police Department about the chronic parking problem and were told that an officer actually responded before 11:30 a.m. on that date.
The officer arrived at 11:27 a.m., "but the bus was not there and he did not witness any illegally parked vehicle at that location," according to Lt. Mike Moses, of HPD's Kaneohe Station.
Regarding the blue-and-white patrol vehicle that you saw pass by, Moses said that, based on the station's case log that day, the officer was responding to a theft and forgery investigation "around the corner on Kamehameha Highway."
Those cases usually have a higher priority over a parking violation, he said.
However, "we will be making checks of the area for other violations," Moses said.
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