Bone to pick with infrastructure projects
You did not see reason to print my last letter (which matters little to me) pertaining to delays in infrastructure using as examples the years of delay on the Queen Kaahumanu Highway widening and the stalling of the Kailua bypass, etc.
Now your paper raises the issue, by the people, on delays in commuting on Queen Kaahumanu Highway. All because of bones from a bygone era (thank God one does not have to be built on Iwo Jima). Now, today, I read in West Hawaii Today about the 650 million federal dollars being left on the table because of “various issues that delayed these major issues and others.” All because of bones. Whose bones? Nobody’s bones (bones that should be reburied in a potter’s field akin to a veterans cemetery).
Is it any wonder why this state continues to flounder onto itself when it comes to homelessness (no vagrancy laws), past overdue infrastructure repairs and on and on.
Didn’t I also hear on the news the other night where the University of Hawaii’s new football coach said something like, give him the talent and he will give Hawaii victories? As I mentioned before, the great, and I mean great, talent that Hawaii has goes abroad and there is no stopping them for that is where their opportunity lays.
Hugo von Platen Luder
Holualoa
Lay off the horn and drive with aloha
One thing, among many, I’ve enjoyed in the 22 years of Kona residency is the aloha on the road. So many people take care to stop to let you out off a side street in heavy traffic and slow down to let you merge, it’s just the way it’s done. I also like that horns are unnecessary. Once in a great while we use them for a quick friendly toot to let the person in front know the light turned green if it seems they zoned out, but even then, some prefer to just wait.
So, for all the newcomers to the ways of the road here, please don’t lay on your horns if you think someone pulled out into traffic a bit close, causing you to slow down. Please don’t lay on your horns if someone in front of you doesn’t move as quickly as you like. It’s just not nice, it’s not what we do here. When you do that we know you haven’t been here long and we hope you go back. We don’t want our roads filled with angry, road-raging drivers who choose to annoy everyone around them by using their horns to assert their stress. It’s just not kuleana.
So please chill, and be sure to shaka the nice auntie or bruddah who lets you in the traffic line.
And most of all, don’t touch that obnoxious horn.
Dee Robbin
Kailua-Kona