Half of the current construction phase for the Hilo Bayfront Trails project is on track to be completed by the end of September.
The trails project, which aims to build pedestrian trails connecting downtown Hilo with the Wailoa River State Recreation Area and beyond, completed its first phase in 2016, and broke ground on its second phase earlier this year.
That second phase, however, has itself been split into two stages, one of which will take longer to complete than the other.
Matthias Kusch, president of Hilo Bayfront Trails Inc., the lead partner organization for the project, said Phase 2 is split in two because of separate funding mechanisms for the two components.
The larger piece of the phase — a trail connecting Kilauea Avenue to a Phase 1 trail at the Bayfront soccer fields — is funded by a $440,000 grant from the National Park Service and nearly $200,000 from private contributors and Hawaii County. That phase, Kusch said, is mostly done and should be finished before October, weather permitting.
The second stage of Phase 2 — which Kusch called Phase 2-A — will connect the Phase 2 stage 1 trail to the Ben Franklin parking lot and build a bypass around the soccer fields’ parking lot. But the second stage is funded by an $860,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation, which Kusch said adds more wrinkles to the process.
“It’s really important to understand that we’ve got a nonprofit — Bayfront Trails Inc. — (and) county Parks and Recreation, county Planning, the state Department of Transportation, the Federal Highways Administration, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA Fisheries, all working on this,” Kusch said, adding that the many agencies involved in the process have developed a more collaborative process in order to secure federal grants more reliably, something he said Hawaii is notoriously bad at doing.
Kusch said the DOT grant has cleared most of its review process and should be approved by September, with the funds allocated in October and work to begin shortly thereafter.
Meanwhile, Kusch added, early planning has begun on the project’s third phase, which would connect the Phase 1 soccer field trail with Kilauea Avenue at the west edge of Wailoa park, creating a contiguous path from downtown Hilo to beyond Aupuni Center. Kusch estimated that Phase 3 is still about one to two years out.
The project is planned to include at least five phases, with Kusch’s goal being an unbroken path from downtown Hilo to the University of Hawaii campus with only four street crossings.
Email Michael Brestovansky at mbrestovansky@hawaiitribune-herald.com.