Perhaps you would be interested in background on the utility pole matter you raised recently. This is not a HECO initiated project but a State DOT project to widen the shoulder of the highway by two feet on either side for safety and better traffic flow. As a result of DOT’s project, HECO has to relocate about 100 poles.
Going back to April, 2003, HECO held meetings (and urged the state to do the same) with both the Kahaluu and Koolauloa neighborhood boards as well as others including Kualoa Ranch and the Waiahole Community Association, whose president recently wrote to compliment HECO on the way things were handled. We tried our best to be square with the community.
Poles support HECO’s lines as well as Verizon and Oceanic cables, and the State’s streetlights and lines. Configuration of the poles had to be changed so all of these lines are on the street side of the poles to avoid encroaching over private property. The poles being installed are wider around than the old ones. The new poles are self-supporting so HECO is removing about 25 stub poles, the short poles typically installed across the street from the main pole with guy wires running over the street.
So, net-net, there are fewer poles, they are -- where possible (not apparently in your picture) -- back from the road and thus, we hope, safer over all. During the course of discussions with the state and the public, HECO decided to use only wood poles, not a mix of wood and steel as originally envisioned.
Wood poles are not designed to breakaway on impact. Thinner poles are more easily broken, landing on cars and homes and sending live electric wires to the street -- as well as cutting power to large areas.
Unknown to most people is that 44 percent of HECO’s transmission and distribution lines are underground already. Why not more? The question is: Who will pay? Should the residents of Kalihi pay higher electric rates to underground lines in Kaaawa?
HECO has commissioned a study by the AIA to look into policy issues like these for undergrounding. The study recognizes the significant cost of underground lines, proposes a long-term goal for undergrounding, recognizes the challenges of coming up with a fair mechanism for paying the extra cost of undergrounding, and recommends that scenic coastal areas should be among the first to be undergrounded, when a mechanism is found to pay for it. It is a community wide issue that should be decided through the political process, not be HECO alone.
Sorry to go on and on. As to the picture of you embracing the pole, if only your arms were longer you could reach around with ease and also scratch the backs of your knees without bending over. Perhaps this in an imperfection on your part.
Feel free to blog as much of this as you like, and use my name and “HECO spokesman” if you wish.
Peter Rosegg
Senior Communications Consultant
Hawaiian Electric Company, Inc.