Start time pushed up
for sewer night work

Ongoing night work on an emergency sewer bypass along Kalanianaole Highway will start two hours earlier each night at 8 p.m.

Work on the temporary bypass began last week along a stretch of the highway in Niu Valley.

The state Department of Transportation, which owns the highway, approved a request this week from contractor James W. Glover Ltd. to begin night work at 8 p.m. rather than at 10 p.m.

Work on the bypass will be performed during nonpeak hours from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and then at 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. Glover will try to confine lane closures to no more than one lane of Kalanianaole in either direction.

Construction of the emergency bypass, which is expected to take several months, will allow the city to install a permanent replacement for the underground force main that ruptured three times in February because of corrosion. The bypass will run from the Niu Valley Wastewater Pump Station, just Ewa of Niu Valley Shopping Center, under Kalanianaole to an existing sewer trunk line at Puuikena Drive and Hawaii Loa Ridge.

The emergency bypass will cross the townbound lanes of the highway to the median and then run along the median. It will be above ground except for intersections.

The bypass will allow sewage to be diverted from the pump station so that the current main can be replaced. Design and construction of the permanent replacement is expected to take two or three years.