Pahoa Farm store on 130 - SUP

[randomq]

quote:

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Originally posted by Rob Tucker

I can walk to about a dozen local restaurants and shops. That was a choice I made.

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I'm happy for you, but that was not a choice I could afford. Does that mean my neighborhood cannot strive to have nice things and create jobs?

[Rob Tucker]

"Does that mean my neighborhood cannot strive to have nice things and create jobs?"

I don't know where you came up with that correlation.

This is a poor rural district. That does not make anything easier. Our county and state governments are both inefficient and corrupt. That does not make anything easier either. Does that mean your neighborhood cannot strive to have nice things and create jobs? It does not. But someone has to do it.

What we have in this district largely is here despite the circumstances. People did it for themselves. I admire and appreciate that.

[Chunkster]

Pahoa has an advantage in getting commercial development because the village was there (with some stores and eateries) before the modern zoning regime went into effect. Even with that in place, the rules aren't always fair or equitably enforced in Pahoa.

Meanwhile, I can't think of a community anywhere in the United States as large as HPP that has no grocery store, no gas station, and no restaurant. All we have are a few auto repair and catchment equipment places. Between the politicians' "drive to Hilo" mentality and the Watamull family's refusal to develop the lots set aside for commercial use, HPP is a vastly underserved commercial desert. And this in a place with plenty of demand and a desperate need for jobs of any kind.

[Rob Tucker]

The biggest single obstacle to economic development is the County of Hawaii and Harry Kim.

[Obie]

Why couldn't Pahoa be the center of geothermal energy on this island ?

[Obie]

Why can't Pahoa be the center of geothermal energy for all of the islands ???

[TomK]

Obie, I think you know the answer. We could have had the super ferry by now and the TMT. Ferries, the next generation of large telescopes and geothermal energy are going ahead elsewhere without problems. We have a local government that can't see the forest for the trees and doesn't give one jot about our future. All they want is our money.

"Let them eat cake."

[Punaperson]

Chunkster: I can't think of a community anywhere in the United States as large as HPP that has no grocery store, no gas station, and no restaurant.

The original plans for the Wikiwiki mart at the bottom of Orchidland Drive were to have it located at the top of Paradise Drive. The Paradise Park hui argued against it because they said they didn't want the traffic or the trash, and had several retired attorneys who had the time and training to block it. OLE had just recently formed its community association, and did not have the knowledge or manpower to adequately address the issue. The applicants sent out letters to all the owners of lots in OLE, touting the wonderful benefits of having a local store, with the promise of having a gas station next, all increasing property values. The gas pumps would not become functional until traffic lights were installed at the intersection of OL Drive and Hwy 130. The residents who actually lived in OLE overwhelmingly voted against the development, absentee owners overwhelmingly voted for it, so when the application was reviewed , it was passed. The fact that HPP had four times the number of lots and potential residents that would have to cross the main highway was not considered important, because they did not want the traffic on their own roads. Now the daily nightmare of trying to take a left turn from OL Drive onto the highway is exponentially made worse by the unending line of cars coming out of the expanded commercial center. I totally agree that this development should have been in HPP.

[randomq]

quote:

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Originally posted by Rob Tucker

"Does that mean my neighborhood cannot strive to have nice things and create jobs?"

I don't know where you came up with that correlation.

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Based on your statements:

"growth in a manner preferred by the residents of Puna. Village centers, not commercial sprawl."

"location, location, location. I can walk to about a dozen local restaurants and shops. That was a choice I made."

I guess it's easier to prefer development in a village center when your village already has a center! For the rest of the large Puna subdivisions, though, I would advocate for organic commercial growth (within reasonable limits of hours, noise, traffic). Planning department can help or get out of the way.

Alternately, a "peddlers mall" or "flea market" would probably fit pretty well in/near our subdivisions. They are typically large warehouse or quonset-hut style buildings with lockable "stalls" for each vendor to securely set up shop. Then each new business does not have to deal with the county permitting regime, aside from food safety.

[kalakoa]

"growth in a manner preferred by the residents of Puna. Village centers, not commercial sprawl."

PCDP doesn't suggest many new "village centers", mostly only those which already exist, along with some completely unrealistic locations that will never be allowed ("near someone's house", inadequate roads, etc).

Study the plats and find the larger pattern: all these subdivisions were created to maximize revenue (sales, property taxes) and so left no room for "livability" concerns.

Today there is nowhere left to build: everything is "near someone's house", there isn't any room to widen the roads/highways, remaining large parcels are owned by the State or a "large local landowner" who has no incentive to sell ... and if you somehow get past all that, you're left dealing with County and their infinite "requirements".

Remember when Puna Kai shopping center was announced and would cost $40M? Now it's $80M and the completion date has been pushed back at least a couple of times. A "softening economy" and/or "increased construction costs" only explains so much. (Not to mention the irony of solving traffic problems with a roundabout, only to build a new signalized intersection a few hundred feet away ... but I digress.)

a "peddlers mall" or "flea market" would probably fit pretty well

I called it a "dirt mall" above, but we're on the same page here. A truly "agricultural" subdivision doesn't need shiny class-A retail space suitable for a Starbuck's, we just need a warehouse where we can get fertilizer and a couple of 2x4s, ideally reachable via our "privately owned" roads so we can drive our quads and unregistered farm trucks to get supplies.

A trip to Hilo is a minimum 2-hour commitment during which I am not growing crops or raising livestock or whatever -- and I'm not retired enough to have that kind of spare time, nor do I want to make all my "economic contributions" to a big-box chain store that exports all its profits off-island.