Air date: December 6, 2018 8pm HST
The Waikīkī Natatorium War Memorial was built to honor those from Hawai‘i who served and died in the first World War. A plan has resurfaced to restore the dilapidated and decaying landmark. Some say the pricey plan is worth it; others disagree. What are your thoughts? Join the conversation on INSIGHTS.
Transcript provided by PBS Hawai‘i closed captioning with corrections and quotes by the Kaimana Beach Coalition.
An iconic landmark on Oʻahu for more than 90 years, the Waikiki Natatorium War Memorial was built to honor those from Hawaiʻi who served and died in World War I. the pool and bleachers have been closed for more than a generation due to neglect and decay. A new plan has surfaced to restore the structure but at significant cost. some say it’s worth it, others disagree. What do you think? join the conversation on Insights tonight on PBS Hawaiʻi.
Daryl Huff: Aloha and welcome to insights on PBS Hawaiʻi… I’m Daryl Huff.
Duke Kahanamoku inaugurated the Waikiki Natatorium War Memorial in 1927 when he dove into the pool and was the first person to swim in it. Although the pool remained open for the next 52 years, it was plagued almost immediately with poor drainage and water circulation problems.
Yet one year after it was closed in 1979, it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places and has continued to garner national recognition as an historic site. The government and community have been arguing for years over what to do with the war memorial, proposing everything from demolition to full restoration.
A new proposal was put on the table a month ago. Is this the answer everyone has been looking for?
Our guests tonight include representatives from both the government and the community as well as an expert on the potential impact of climate change on the shoreline area. We look forward to your participation in tonight’s show.
You can email, call or tweet your questions, and you’ll find a live stream of this program at pbshawaii.org and the PBS Hawaiʻi Facebook page.
Now to our guests.
Robert Kroning is the Director of the Honolulu City and County’s Department of Design and Construction. He is a professional engineer by training.
Dolan Eversole is the Waikiki beach management coordinator for the University of Hawaiʻi sea grant college program. He is a coastal geologist.
Kiersten Faulkner is the Executive Director of the Historic Hawai‘i Foundation, an organization that oversees all aspects of preservation programs in Hawaiʻi.
And James Bickerton is an attorney for the Kaimana Beach Coalition, an organization of Kaimana Beach users whose mission is to protect the last local beach on O‘ahu’s south shore from development and commercialization.
Let’s start off with Kiersten Faulkner from Historic Hawai‘i. Can you walk us through the history of the Natatorium and why it was built and why such a facility as opposed to just an obelisk or something.
Kiersten Faulkner: Thank you Daryl. If I can just set the stage a little bit.
World War I was one of the most horrific events of the 20th century. For generations it’s really shaped how we think about world engagement and war. After the war ended in 1918, there was a worldwide effort to remember, honor the dead, but also to say we don’t want this to happen again.
So war memorials popped up all around the world, but they were different than war memorials that we had seen before, from the Napoleonic Wars, or the Civil War, the Revolutionary War, the obelisk you mentioned, the idea was to have living memorials – places where community members could gather, where they could engage in community activities and socializing, they called it the living memorials because the idea was the living would remember why they were able to enjoy the life that we have.
So Hawai‘i, at the time, the Territory of Hawai‘i, decided that this living memorial was necessary to honor the sons and daughters of Hawai‘i who served in the great war. There was a design competition, the territory legislature established the parameters where it would be, it would include a swimming course, at least 100 meters. And they brought a architectural review panel to choose the design.
Daryl Huff: Was the fact that we had this famous waterman, world famous waterman Duke Kahanamoku, famous at the time part of the motivation of having this kind of place?
Kiersten Faulkner: Having a recreational center for swimming, for water sports, was very much a part of it. At the time there weren’t a lot of swimming pools. Natatorium means indoor swimming pool. And so it was a place for that kind of activity to occur. Certainly, Duke Kahanamoku as an Olympian who put Hawai‘i on the map for world water sport, was certainly part of t.
Daryl Huff: Robert Kroning from the City and County. What happened, we mentioned that there was right from the beginning, there were some mechanical issues with it. What happened over time to it and what is the current condition?
Robert Kroning: Well, I think it’s pretty clear the current condition is not acceptable. It’s a blight on the city, on Waikiki.
The original construction behind it, I think, within two years, it started to decay and show some signs of wear already. And through the years, it’s gone through several different efforts to repair it some, and it keeps decaying even more. Until 1979, when it was in such a bad state, that it was just closed for good.
So the problems with it right now are pretty much the visual blight that it provides, that it shows, and then there’s some health and safety issues with it too. Because it’s falling apart into the water, pieces are crumbling off.
Daryl Huff: Do we have a problem with people going on there that shouldn’t be there? Or is it pretty secure?
Robert Kroning: I don’t think there’s been a lot of problems like that. A seal got in there recently, the monk seal, so they get in there when they shouldn’t. But there hasn’t been a lot of problems with people jumping over the fence and getting in there.
Daryl Huff: Jim Bickerton, what is the position of the Kaimana Beach Coalition when it comes to what should happen there?
Jim Bickerton: Well I think first and foremost we’re really interested in making sure that whatever goes in there is open to the public and free. And that’s big deal. There’s very few beaches left that local people can access, and that beach sits at the bottom of ahupua‘a that is probably the most densely populated on on the island. Literally thousands and thousands of people use that beach.
It’s one of the few beaches you can get to, you can park, you can get in the water without having to go past hotels or rights of way, or belong to a private club. We’re very concerned that any of these proposed solutions particularly those that have public/private partnerships, someone wants something in return.
That usually involves a turnstyle, a ticket booth, money changing hands, and that’s usually the end of public open free beach access.
Daryl Huff: During the run up to the show and for many years, there are people who you represent who feel strongly that it should either be knocked down or just moved and just have the memorial stand by itself and restore the beach, right?
Jim Bickerton: Yeah. The thinking behind that is if you look around this island, there’s no public/private partnership on a county beach park. That’s the one thing that the corporations and businesses haven’t been able to get their hands on. We know that’s a tried and tested model.
If you want to preserve open free space at the shoreline, this is the most valuable shoreline the city owns. I mean, it’s worth hundreds of millions of dollars if it were to be developed. So we think that the beach park is the way to go. But we’re very mindful of preserving history and try to accommodate both interests. So that’s why we favored moving the arches back and keeping it as a memorial.
The real attraction for the commercial interests are those bleachers. They seat 2,500 people and the EIS actually talks about putting a stage – floating stage – in the pool. You can see the tour buses coming down, the taxis, and someone who wants to go for a swim after work, where do they go?
Daryl Huff: We talked about the different proposals being floated, pardon the pun.
Dolan Eversole, what is the current status of the beaches there? I mean, we were talking earlier, you mentioned that maybe one of the reasons Kaimana Beach, which is right next to it, is so stable, is because of that existing wall created by the Natatorium. It’s become sort of almost a natural feature in its natural way, hasn’t it?
Dolan Eversole: Yeah, that’s a good way to put it. I think it’s important to put this whole area in the context that it’s completely manmade to begin with. Kaimana Beach is stable by its nature being right next to the Natatorium.
The diamond head, [what] we refer to as the diamond head wall of the Natatorium stabilizes Kaimana Beach and anybody that’s been there will know it’s an extremely stable beach, it doesn’t change much at all. So we have that to attribute to the existing diamond head wall.
But even the Natatorium and Queen’s Beach, as you go through Waikiki as a whole, it’s entirely man-influenced if not manmade. So this is yet one more manmade structure along the coast in Waikiki, but to your point about Kaimana Beach, yes, the current configuration of Kaimana is largely dictated by the Natatorium itself.
Daryl Huff: If you look at, we actually had a picture up that kind of shows this, on the town side of [the] Natatorium, there is really no beach at all. It’s just open reef for the most part, right?
Dolan Eversole: That’s right. Right in front of the aquarium has really no beach whatsoever. It’s shallow reef. Not a great recreational resource as far as swimming and beachgoing, unless you get in the swim channel that’s there. But that’s a classic example of buildup of sand on the updrift side of the structure and the loss of beach on the downdrift side.
Daryl Huff: Yeah, we’re looking at that picture right now and it’s interesting to me that you look at pulling that feature out of the beach. Does anybody know really what would happen?
Dolan Eversole: There are ways to model that. If you [tried] enough experiments, you’ll start to get a general consensus on what could happen. But I think there is pretty general agreement that we don’t want to remove the diamond head groin because that will have a negative impact to Kaimana Beach almost certainly. And I think at EIS and all of the studies I’ve read have recognized that.
So I’m personally not that concerned about destabilizing Kaimana Beach with anything i’ve seen thus far, because it does retain that diamond head end of the groin.
Daryl Huff: Kiersten Faulkner from the Historic Hawai‘i Foundation. What has been historically your folks’ position on what should happen with the Natatorium and when you hear what Dolan Eversole is saying about it being sort of an unnatural condition, has that, what have you folks argued should happen when that Natatorium over the years?
Kiersten Faulkner: We’ve always said it should be preserved. And part of preservation is first stabilizing it. Robert mentioned its deteriorating condition and the fact that it’s unsafe. So certainly, stabilizing it. Part of that is that diamond head sea wall and holding the sand in place.
But beyond that, there’s opportunities to – we call it rehabilitation, which it to bring it back into useful life while retaining its historic character and the design features. One of the things I’m excited about with this new alternative is that it keeps that historic character, but it really reengineers the swim basin portion of what is under the water surface. So the way it works is fixed so that it’s ocean fed and powered by the waves, but the look and the feel and the features are retained. So I think that hybrid approach is really powerful and actually a very elegant solution to the problems that we’ve been talking about.
Daryl Huff: Let me read some comments that are now coming in from our audience. Again, looking back at the history.
“I support it”, I guess retaining it.
“It is an iconic landmark and those who are around to enjoy it remember it fondly.”
“My great grandmother dedicated to my great grandfather after he died, so it has family as well as historical significance for me.”
Jim Bickerton, let me ask you, when you advocated for changing this facility, what kind of push back do you get from the people who just feel like it’s just too precious to mess with in that way?
Jim Bickerton: We, actually, the newspaper periodically runs the poll on this question. And I know it’s not scientific, but the majority and first place position is typically the county beach park option. So I don’t, haven’t found tremendous push back except from I would say people, it’s certainly older people, maybe, to some extent, but the current generation, we don’t see that at all.
And they recognize that times change and this is a much more density populated – you think about when the Natatorium was built, there was only two hotels in Waikiki. So there was this wide expanse, you didn’t have to just tie up this land. It’s a big thing, [it’s the] size of a football field.
Now that the hotels and buildings have hedged us all in and everyone is scrambling to get their little corner where they can get to the ocean, I think people worry less about using that much space for the memorial. You don’t need, no one else in Honolulu has that kind of space.
Daryl Huff: For all of you, Robert Kroning first of all, when you came in to start working at the city, and inherited this situation, what kind of ideas were being thrown around and what kind of conflicts did you find, political conflicts, one question I want to read from a viewer.
“Will this be the decade a decision is made on the future of the Natatorium?”
We’ve been arguing about this 30 plus years. 40 years.
Robert Kroning: That’s true. And unfortunately, there are a lot of things we could laugh about on this. But it’s really, it is sad that it’s still in this condition. So when I took – one of the nice things about my role in this, is that I can truly just remain objective.
So you know, some of the things that Jim has been talking about, on preferences, so forth, and you know, the feedback he gets is turn it into a beach versus, I see that. That’s part of the analysis, but there’s so much more to it than that.
When I inherited this, as you mentioned, it was at a point where many attempts had been made to do something. There were made lots of progress to come close to demolishing it, I think in the fifties. Then there was another effort that was going to restore it in the 90s, in the early 2000’s. It was going to be fully restored, and then that didn’t happen.
And so I got it and the current mayor – and politicians through time, some of them wanted to keep it away from them and not touch it at all. And others said no, I’m going to try to tackle this. So Mayor Caldwell has decided he thinks something needs to be done.
Because that’s most of the feedback everybody, no matter what side you’re on, pretty much says, something needs to done. That’s the common theme everybody says. And then we diverge from there. So I just look at it, and what’s the best for the City & County of Honolulu. And for the people of O‘ahu. And so I do it objectively. And that’s where the EIS helps in doing the analysis.
Daryl Huff: We’re going go back to that for a little bit. First, we did go out and talk to some people who actually use the beach over there and got a couple of interesting opinions, let’s listen to that tape right now.
Joe Lee: Beach volleyball.
Interviewer: Can you explain? What do you mean, beach volleyball?
Joe Lee: Just fill it in with sand and put up a couple of nets and just have beach volleyball. and they got it down by walls, it’s a big event now.
Maltbie Napoleon: Personally, I’d like to see it restored. I remember my grandfather was captain of the lifeguards here in the 40’s. And it was even back then, it was – to keep it up, to maintain it, it was a big job back then. But now, in present condition, you’re looking at a big expense, I think. So – but it would be nice to be able to keep the majority of it that’s here, that you see.
Daryl Huff: We did get a caller asking exactly, why don’t they convert the pool to a beach volleyball dual court. What kind of ideas, other than that, have been explored or floated over the years?
Kiersten Faulkner: Well, some of the ones we’ve heard of course the volleyball court. I’ve heard of dolphin shows, about hula shows, you mentioned floating platforms for performances. I mean there’s been lots of just kind of brainstorming and concepts and people saying, wouldn’t it be great if.
What’s nice, and Robert mentioned this, but the Environmental Impact Statement really is more about what’s feasible. What is technically appropriate, what meets all the standard and criteria. And just someone sitting around saying, hey, let’s grow coral polyps there, that’s not something that meets all of those standards and criteria.
So I think it’s exciting and fun when people start to say, what if this, what if that, but when it really comes down to what’s possible, what meets our goals as as society, what can we afford, what honors the veterans, what protects the environment, what provides public access? All of those things need to be weighed and balanced.
Daryl Huff: Jim Bickerton, when these hula shows and floating shows and all of these other things [are] proposed, it’s usually because of the need for revenue to maintain it. Because once you invest in this, it’s going to have to been maintained. And that sounds like exactly what you’ve been concerned about, is that someone will turn it into a commercial activity there in order to maintain the facility.
Jim Bickerton: That’s really almost inevitable. When you realize how big it is and how much money it takes to run, the expense, just the annual expenses, but also the capital improvement, where does that money come from? The mayor in very first press conference mentioned, we’re looking for a public/private partnership. That’s a code and it’s not a very well disguised code these days, we know what that means. It means branding it, it means having corporate sponsors and then they want something back.
And that’s something that really people should be on their guard about, because there isn’t another stretch of beach left that we can all move to when we want to go for our recreation in Honolulu. Just regular people who just want to get the in the ocean after a hard day’s work. We all have very cramped housing. One of the things about living in paradise is we say, well, we can go to the beach at least. If you can’t do that, what’s the point?
Daryl Huff: Another viewer weighs in.
“Restore the war memorial and keep the ocean front natural. Don’t let money hungry developers get their hand on it.”
Let me ask, Dolan Eversole, when you have a structure that’s stuck out in the ocean, like this, what are the pressures? How difficult is it to maintain something like that? Are we doomed to have a structure that is always going to be very expensive to maintain?
Dolan Eversole: Well I guess that would depend on how it’s constructed. One thing I can say is it would be near impossible to build a new structure like what he have there now. The regulatory world that we live in would really not allow a lot of the structures that we see in Waikiki now. We used to dredge the reef in Waikiki to make swim areas, you’d be thrown in jail if you did that now.
So there is that element to this project where it was done in a time when you could do those things and would be really difficult if not impossible to create a new one, not to say you couldn’t replace it, but to create a whole brand new one would be really impossible.
But as far as the construction and the maintenance, depending on how it’s constructed, there are much better building techniques than there were in 1927, of course. So we would expect this to last a lot longer. I’m not an engineer, I can’t speak to how much maintenance would be required, but if it’s typically concrete and marine grade construction, there would be probably some maintenance occasionally.
But depending on how it’s designed, it should withstand fairly well. What I will say, however, is our coastline is subject to a number of natural hazards, including tsunamis and hurricanes and the inevitable sea level rise, which is creeping on us. So those are all factors that need to be thought about and designed for. We’re not going to be able to hold back a tsunami, but you might be able to design it so there might be give away sections that prevent the whole complete failure. We [were] just talking about that earlier, that one potential catastrophic event could destroy the whole thing, and that’s true throughout Waikiki.
Daryl Huff: Just in general terms, I know sea grant doesn’t want to take a particular position on the Natatorium, but generally speaking, would you advise people to build structures on the shoreline any more?
Dolan Eversole: That’s a great question. I do a lot of work in Waikiki. As you know, there are ambitious plans to re-envision Waikiki in different parts. And that’s primarily focused on the beach. So we’re very focused on being able to maintain, preserve and in some cases, restore beaches in Waikiki. And I’d like to make the point that Waikiki is different than other places for a whole bunch of reasons.
It’s an urban environment, it’s an urban beach, and so I think it allows a little bit more flexibility on what’s possible. For example, we probably would never think of building groins and sea walls and things like that at Sunset Beach on the north shore. It’s a dynamic natural beach, so you can contrast north shore to Waikiki as kind of the two end point extremes. So I think in that context, it does allow a little bit more creativity in what’s possible in a place like Waikiki.
Daryl Huff: Mr. Kroning, call for you. Who was on the committee to draft the plans for the perimeter deck, what was the motivation to come up this with plan? It’s a pretty good question.
Robert Kroning: It’s a great question, and actually, I was wanting to jump in a couple of times.
Daryl Huff: You guys can all jump in any time you want.
Robert Kroning: ‘Cause we’re already talking about some of the alternatives and given some opinions on that. So if I could at first, let me cover first of all, the EIS has a breakdown of all the different alternatives, Environmental Impact Statement which –
Daryl Huff: Let me roll you back just a little bit. Frankly, I’ve read a lot of EIS’s over the years and a lot of times, they are sort of pointed toward – I won’t say pointed toward a conclusion, but toward a particular project. Was this EIS designed from the front end to lead to the restoration of the Natatorium?
Robert Kroning: Right. So actually, when you submit your EIS, you have go in with a proposed, preferred alternative. And so that’s been done. And the preferred alternative we now have is something we call a perimeter deck.
But if I could first talk about a few things, concern about the private partnership, public partnership, I think the Mayor did mention that in one of his meetings. And it’s been taken as Jim has said, to be understood as well, that’s going to be a revenue generating type of event. And in fact, that’s not what he really meant.
What he’s talking about is – hoping, because there’s been some non-profits, organizations that have said they’re more than willing to support through funding it without any strings attached, because that’s what they want. So if the alternative that we select is something that they support, I think there’s some non-profits out there that would like to help fund it. So that’s kind of what he’s talking about, private support in that way.
Where I was leading to on the Environmental Impact Statement, and analysis that’s been done so far, it provides costs and a lot of the information about how much this is going to cost.
Daryl Huff: How much is it going to cost?
Robert Kroning: Right now, it’s three, actually there’s four alternatives. One of them, do nothing, which always has to be one. Basically, you’ve got this perimeter deck option we’re talking about. We’ve got the turn it into a beach option. And we’ve got restore it fully to where it even meets the pool rules options. That being the most expensive because you’ve got all the mechanical systems and stuff that have to support that and it’s a full reconstruction. The next most expensive is actually the beach. So some of things that Jim hasn’t covered is there are maintenance requirements on the beach also. One of them being you have to bring in sand every once in a while and replenish the beach, which costs money and it’s very difficult to do, and there’s other requirements. Capital cost similar, capital cost is actually a little more, to turn it into a beach.
Jim Bickerton: I think that was a little rigged from our perspective. We read the numbers, and we think there was a little fudging that went into that.
Robert Kroning: That’s why you have the Environmental Impact Statement you can make comments to, to say that. But I’m comfortable with the analysis and the perimeter deck comes in little bit less because we don’t have to have all the mechanical systems. Where the beach, we have to build other structures because if we take away the bleachers, we have to find a place and build a structure for the ocean safety folks that are in there.
So when you talk about the cost and the maintenance concerns and then the private/public partnership, it’s best to go look at the EIS and see all the data. Originally, I would prefer alternative when we first went out with what we call the EIS preparatory notice, we had our preferred alternative was the beach. Because the perimeter deck was not an option.
So the EIS has a lengthy process of checking with all kinds of organizations and different agencies to get expertise information through, throughout. And as we went through what we call 6e consultation, which is this historic preservation type consultation, they basically said we really should look for an interim, a medium preservation option. The reason it wasn’t in there to begin with, is because when the project was stopped in 2000, it was basically stopped because it was designated a pool, and we couldn’t meet the pool [requirements].
Daryl Huff: What are we talking about here? 30 million? 50 million? 100 million?
Robert Kroning: We’re talking about 25 million for the perimeter deck, up to 45ish million for the full pool.
Daryl Huff: And then what was the beach alternative?
Robert Kroning: The beach alternative is about 28.
Daryl Huff: Jim, you’re saying that you feel like that’s –
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Jim Bickerton: Let me give you couple of examples that jumped out at us right away. First of all, there’s 90 years of silt in that pool, and it’s completely anaerobic, there hasn’t been any current in there, there’s a lot of bad stuff on the bottom, if you will. The beach proposal has a mitigation expense for that. There’s a way they’re going to cover that and put sand over it. The pool? They don’t do that. They leave that out. Now, the way they’re going to build the pool –
Daryl Huff: You’re saying more expensive to do this restoration project than the EIS is saying?
Jim Bickerton: Yes. I mean, and the other thing they’re going to do, they don’t have mitigation for, they’re going to drive piles into this muck to build this deck, this perimeter deck. There’s no mitigation for that, it’s just going to spread out into Waikiki, you’re going to disturb all of that silt. Other example is, they say the pool only requires four lifeguards. That’s where they get the maintenance expense. But the beach will require five. But Kaimana Beach next door just has one lifeguard station. This beach isn’t going to be any bigger than Kaimana, we don’t see five lifeguard stations in a 200 yard stretch of beach.
Daryl Huff: The city [has] now, as I understand it, picked its favorite, right? Of all of those alternatives?
Robert Kroning: If you want to call it that. That’s why I say, for my job, I remain objective. For me, it’s not a matter of favorite or not because it’s not emotional. It’s a matter of what I think is the appropriate selection out of all the alternatives to do with this.
Daryl Huff: Describe how this alternative would work and why you think it will work and survive all of the things that we’re talking about that are going to threaten, all the seaward pressures and stuff.
Robert Kroning: Why would it work as a structure?
Daryl Huff: In fact, we have a couple of schematics that we can put up. If that’ll help you explain it.
Robert Kroning: Right. Well, I think the –
Daryl Huff: Picture up here? This is the current –
Robert Kroning: Current status.
Daryl Huff: And what are we seeing here?
Robert Kroning: That is the ewa facing side of the Natatorium right now.
Daryl Huff: So it’s as if we’re sitting on the beach and looking out at the ocean?
Robert Kroning: Yeah. If you’re sitting in the stands, it’s on the right side looking out into the ocean. The main problem with the current design of the Natatorium is that the, what you see in that photo is a pipe that goes through that rock formation. That was supposed to be the water flow, the natural water flow in the original design. And it wasn’t sufficient enough, so it didn’t really get the water to flow well enough. And then the other problems are the actual material, the concrete that they used was not of the standard that we use today. And the rebar that they used is iron-based which will –
Daryl Huff: Rust.
Robert Kroning: Right. And now, we commonly used stainless steel rebar. So, as far as an engineering adventure, we think the current materials that we have today and the ability and the work that we know how to do in waters and construction techniques today, will have a much better chance of surviving in the water.
Daryl Huff: And if we can show you the second drawing is how the – it would be set up to allow water. If you wouldn’t mind describing what this looks like.
Robert Kroning: So the main reason we came up with this alternative was, again, because SHPD was not happy when we only had two alternatives.
Daryl Huff: The State of Hawai‘i Preservation Division.
Robert Kroning: Historic Preservation Division. Wanted – we only had the turn it into a pool, which is very expensive and lots of maintenance with mechanical systems and so forth, or the beach. And they said, well we want you to look at options that at least preserve a little more of the structure. And we actually went through two iterations. We went through once, basically took the beach, but kept the bleachers. Everybody [that was] asked about that, said no way. That’s not an option.
So we looked into it a little more and came up with this option, which was at first something that we didn’t think might work because of the pool rules. We have to – the pool rules are a little vague. It defines “swimming pool” as a manmade structure that contains a artificial body of water. “Artificial body of water”, that’s all kind of subjective.
Daryl Huff: What’s artificial anymore, right?
Robert Kroning: Exactly. So we didn’t know whether something like this would even be accepted by DOH as a pool. But we came up with this. This allows, so what you see here is the wall now doesn’t come all the way down to that rock formation and it allows water to flow through so it’ll circulate much better. And then what you don’t see here is the actual makai wall which will be all basically a grate allowing water to flow in and out, flow in and out. And when we presented this to DOH, they said, yes, this would not be classified as a pool. Which then saves a lot of money and makes it a much more easy project for to us maintain.
Daryl Huff: Let me ask, Kiersten from Historic Hawai‘i, this is changing it, but is this changing it too much for you folks?
Kiersten Faulkner: That was a big point discussion for all of us. There’s the kind of extremes of “tear it all down” to “keep it exactly as it was designed”. And in between is basically this solution. It’s a compromise. And I know there are people who think it’s kind of gone too far the other way. I’m not among them. I think it really does save that character and that feel and that association, that we all associate with the Natatorium while still addressing these issues of water quality, water safety, security, and build, being able to build it and manage it. So there have been some people who are concerned, but overall, I think it really has addressed all of the preservation issues that we’ve brought up.
Daryl Huff: Dolan Eversole, I don’t know if you had a chance to evaluate this scientifically, but does it satisfy you as a person concerned about the shoreline, that it is a good compromise?
Dolan Eversole: Well, I thinks that word compromise is a really good, this is appropriate use of that. And as I read through the EIS, I saw repeated mention of pros and cons to the different designs. And I think that’s something we all have to keep in mind, that – is it perfect? Maybe not. But certainly, there’s benefits and drawbacks to every approach that you might take.
As far as the beach goes, from a process standpoint, the preferred alternative, I don’t feel will have a negative impact on Kaimana Beach, if that’s the ultimate concern. I think it will remain as is. I do have a couple concerns about some of the more technical details with the grate, what does that grate look like, how does it work. But those are relatively easy questions as far as talking with engineers and figuring out what does that really mean.
Backing up from 10,000-foot level, how will this impact the beaches, I don’t think it will have any significant impacts to the beach. There are some other concerns. Water quality is one of those. I do share the concern Jim has about the silt on the bottom. I think need to look at that a little closer. But again, those are not deal killers necessarily, they are just things we need to look at a little more carefully.
Daryl Huff: So Jim Bickerton, what are you guys concerned about [with] this design?
Jim Bickerton: Well, if you’re just focusing on the pool design itself, we do see some concerns. There was many years ago, and people forget this, a little boy on a school trip to the Natatorium when it was still open, drowned there, and they missed him. They didn’t see him because it was so murky. And they got back to the school and discovered that he was missing. And that was why the pool rules were kicked in. And any time you have a public pool, it’s calm. You attract the weakest swimmers. Those of us that want to go out in the surf, no problem, we’ll go next door. But you get a lot of weak swimmers and visitors who are not familiar with the water. You have this untested anywhere in the world as far as we know, this grid or mesh system. It has to be small enough so that little kids hands don’t get stuck in it. But big enough so that algae and barnacles and limu and all kinds of things don’t grow on it.
Those pipes that we were looking at, those big old pipes that went through the wall into the pool and drained it, the reason that pool shut down is they filled up with marine organisms. So we’re not clear that you’re ever going to be able to build these mesh structures and then what’s the real maintenance cost of keeping those things clean in the ocean, making sure the pukas remain open for the flow that you need to have to avoid the build up of bacteria?
So that’s why again, why go to all this trouble when we have the solution all around this island of how to use our shoreline.
Daryl Huff: Robert Kroning – so along the lines of what Jim is saying, supporter of preservation, but says, there needs to be never to make sure sharks don’t get into swimming area, this happened in the past. The public safety aspects that Jim Bickerton is raising, how does this plan address that? I find it interesting thought about when you create an attractive nuisance, where it looks really nice, and safe, but maybe there’s currents and stuff under there, are you sure it’s going to be safe for the kids and the tourists and so on who want to go there?
Robert Kroning: Right. We’re definitely going to design it for that. And as far as sharks, the mesh that we’re talking about is actually a series of bars, and they’ll go up and down. So there’s not going to be a grid system that can catch anything. It will be bars and space that the right distance that none of these animals can fit in there.
Daryl Huff: Not a big enough one to do any damage?
Robert Kroning: Right. I’m sure jellyfish will be able to squeeze through, or something, but there’s jellyfish everywhere. So as far as the safety, of course, the lifeguards will be there and if it gets to any point where it looks like it might be dangerous, for some reason it’s a turbid event, we can close the pool. So when it’s too dangerous, we’ll do that.
But the probability of that happening, based on the analyses we’ve done in the area and how often the waves are rough and so forth is infrequent and so the pool will be open quite often. But right, I mean, there’s no expectation that this pool is going be the same type of pool at one of our parks, where it’s just clear – it’s still ocean. And that’s why it’s an ocean flow. And so as people use it, that’s what they have to expect.
Daryl Huff: Will you feel the current? Will it be more like being in the ocean than being in a pool? Or more like pool being in the ocean?
Robert Kroning: You’ll still feel some choppiness and current here and there.
Daryl Huff: When you talk about the climate change and especially sea level rise, how much sea level rise would you say that they should work into this design?
Dolan Eversole: Well, I’m happy to say that the report, the EIS, readily acknowledges sea level rise. And they refer to the recent sea level rise risk and vulnerability assessment that the State of Hawai‘i just completed. So that’s written right into the EIS.
And to answer your question, it depends on your time frame and the state is now starting to adopt benchmarks for sea level rise. And the magic number that is starting to – we’re coalescing around is about 3.2 feet. And the magic question of that, of course, is when. And that’s where it gets a little fuzzy. The recommendations coming out of the State of Hawai‘i now are – we expect at least 3 feet by the end of the century, but we should be planning for it now because it’s very likely it’s going to happen much sooner than the end of century.
Daryl Huff: I know you said it – how much does the EIS envision?
Dolan Eversole: They don’t necessarily pick a benchmark. The EIS mentions that sea level rise will be considered in the final design. We’re not at a place yet where there are any requirements that you build to a certain level. Or design for a certain sea level height. But the guidance coming out is about 3 feet, 3.2 feet is a minimum.
Robert Kroning: And the city has accepted that in all designs we do now. Every project that we’re doing anywhere, and as the Director of Design and Construction, I’ve got about 600 of them I’m doing, they all have to take into consideration sea level rise now. And we’re using that 3.2 number. So when we design this, that will be taken into account.
Daryl Huff: Got several backup questions here and there’s sort of a theme developing. People are wondering OK, how are you going to maintain this thing? I’ve got like four questions. Here’s one that’s pretty indicative.
Maui resident believes Natatorium is iconic, rare, and unique and should be restored, but they should look into a commercial way to make money to fix it and not make it a burden to taxpayers.
Another caller says, “Who is responsible for us getting to this place? They should be held responsible. You could raise money through a GoFundMe or private foundation”.
So really, here’s another proposal. We’re getting a lot of calls actually.
“Build an Olympic size pool on the mauka side of the arcade and turn the existing pool in a beach.”
“Let’s start from scratch.”
Let’s talk about that. Realistically, the maintenance, can we afford to maintain this thing and without some sort of revenue stream?
Robert Kroning: Well – the cheapest maintenance is to do nothing. But as most people agree, we have to do something. So whatever we do, is going to require maintenance. All options require maintenance. It’s a piece of property the City & County of Honolulu has to maintain.
And whether it’s maintaining the perimeter deck, whether it’s maintaining a complete pool, whether it’s maintaining a beach, they all have costs and they all have requirements. So it’s part of parks’ responsibility or I think, if this ends up being a perimeter deck or beach, it becomes ocean safety’s responsibility to maintain.
Daryl Huff: Does the Historic Hawai‘i Foundation, you folks have money to help an organization like the City maintain an iconic site? Is there really revenue streams out there other than commercial?
Kiersten Faulkner: One of the interesting things about having a solid proposal is we’re going to find out. And I know there have been many funders and philanthropists over the years who have said, once you commit to a course of action, the philanthropy will be interested. And certainly, there is more interest in fundraising to restore a war memorial than fundraising to destroy one. And I think that has been part of the conversation. You know, the public/private partnership idea could be as extreme as the commercialization that Jim is concerned about but it could also just be a philanthropic way to support places that matter. And I think when we talk about what are the values that we are trying to aspire to, it’s not just about the cost. It’s also about who are we as a community, who are we as a people, and what does that look like. So I’m interested in seeing what happens next. I think until there’s a committed course of action, there’s nothing to contribute to. So you know, restoring and taking care of a war memorial, I think will attract a great deal of attention from across the world.
Daryl Huff: Jim Bickerton, when we talked about this, I think that many of the folks in your coalition are swimmers, they go regularly and they swim the shoreline and they have to go out past the Natatorium to do that most of the time. But I mean, couldn’t it possibly be an asset to your constituents that there’s this place you could do laps in the ocean? You see, just think positive about it is what I’m asking.
Jim Bickerton: You know, I’m a fair-minded person. I can see positive in everything. What we’re trying to do is look not just at the immediate, but looking far into the future.
Daryl Huff: Which is what we’re talking about.
Jim Bickerton: Really thinking. I mean, I taught three children to swim. My three kids, I taught to swim there. And my hope is that their kids and their grandkids can have that same experience. And I don’t see the solutions, the other solutions, producing that in the end because of this risk of commercialization.
Daryl Huff: You taught them to swim at the beach, not at the Natatorium.
Jim Bickerton: At the beach, not at the Natatorium, right. I should have been clear about that. So the swimmers have a great experience now. Can you tell them it’s going to be better? We all have this experience with our technology – we’re going to make it better. I like the first model better. It worked better. So that’s the fear that people have. We’re going to – and what Kiersten’s talking about is, I would challenge them all who say that, to say, look, show me a $30 million project that was funded by just goodwill and philanthropists.
Kiersten Faulkner: Sure. Hawai‘i Theater, Pacific Aviation Museum, Bishop Museum, I mean there are dozens –
Jim Bickerton: But are there shows every night at the Hawai‘i Theater? That’s my point. It isn’t like it just gets to sit there and the public just gets to come and use it for free. There’s a quid pro quo. And the theater has to have as well – tickets and people.
Kiersten Faulkner: But let me point out as well, there’s a cost to demolition and building a beach. So that 28 million dollars also has to be paid for. Is the Kaimana Beach Coalition going to raise that money? How are you are you going to pay for that 28 million? So there is a baseline cost to do anything. We need to accept that there is a baseline cost to do anything. And then the delta is what we’re really talking about. So when you talk about having this experience and swimming and teaching your children to swim, that doesn’t go away. Kaimana Beach is still there. The diamond head sea wall still holds that beach. You’ve lost nothing. And then by putting this new opportunity that adds opportunity, brings more people in, it gives more, without taking anything away, it’s a win-win solution.
Jim Bickerton: Well, I would say, where do I go to park my car when the tour busses are there for that stage show. Just like the Hawai‘i Theater has shows, you’re positing a revenue source. You’re going to have competing users, and they’re going to have the money. That’s what it’s going to take. You’re gonna have people filling those bleachers. There’s tens of thousands of people in the hotels just down the road. They won’t have any trouble filling that out for shows. And when that happens, my grandkids, they won’t remember how it used to be.
Daryl Huff: Robert, I was going to say, can you rule out at this point, as a policy, the Hollywood aspect of it as opposed to – how is it going to operate? You’ve got a big grandstand there that you’re going to be maintaining, that you want to use. How do you picture using that if it’s not a revenue stream? Are you ruling out having to develop a revenue stream to maintain it? Talking about maintaining it now.
Robert Kroning: So like said, we maintain all our parks, all our everything, with taxpayer money. And so that’s really the – right now, in the foreseeable future, how we’re going to continue to maintain this because as we talked about, it doesn’t matter what the solution is. The maintenance has to happen and it’s going to be a cost. I’m not willing to guarantee anything about it not becoming somewhat commercialized. But I’m pretty sure it’s not going to. And for that to happen, would require more conversations.
I mean, this EIS and the construction of this facility is not going to include uses of it in commercial type activity. So if for some reason, three mayors down the road, they decide, “you know what, we’ve got a facility there, we should use it for commercial activities” – they would have go through all kinds of public input and everybody would have their say in the matter there. You remember also that this is butts up right against Kapiolani Park, which is very strict about no commercialization. And so it would be extremely difficult to turn this venue into a commercial type activity.
Daryl Huff: There are shows now 2 or 3 nights a week, commercial events at the aquarium. That never used to happen. There was no conversation about that. And it’s just happening. That’s how these things end up working. And so that’s why we have to really look hard at it before you go down that road.
Daryl Huff: OK. Let me get more callers in here.
“Caller’s father fought in the Philippines, and said maintain[ing the] Natatorium was unnecessary. As a memorial, a beach would be a better memorial.”
“Have you considered using Natatorium for ocean safety education for the keikis and tourists for programs like junior lifeguard training”, the ocean safety ‘ohana is asking that.
What other positives, what are the things do you see happening there? Kiersten, maybe you can weigh in. What would you like to see a weekend at the Natatorium look like?
Kiersten Faulkner: I see it as a place [where] families gather where they are teaching keiki to swim but also where it’s a safe place perhaps with people with disabilities to enter the ocean and participate in ocean experiences. I think just as a viewpoint, looking out over the ocean and watching the ships and the sunset, I don’t see it as a commercial venue. I see it as a community venue. And I think that offers a nice anchor to that part of Waikiki, to that part of Kapiolani Park. I see it as an asset to the community, as an asset to the city and to the state. I don’t share this unwarranted fear of what might happen some day if we’re not vigilant. I think we will be vigilant and we can guard against that.
Daryl Huff: Dolan, I’ve been giving you a break and not dragging you into this conversation. But I would like to hear your perspective. I mean again, maybe less as an expert, more as a person who knows Waikiki, knows the ocean, loves the ocean. What do you think about this? What thoughts come to mind when you have this conversation?
Dolan Eversole: Yeah, I wanted to kind of take off my university that for a minute and just tell you me personal opinion. And full disclosure, I used to be a City & County lifeguard for about 15 years.
Daryl Huff: OK, that’s where I knew you before.
Dolan Eversole: I also recreate in this area with my family quite a bit, so I’m very familiar with the area. I wanted to reflect on one of the comments that came from the viewer about having ocean safety – some kind of headquarters or a station there. There’s a lifeguard tower at Kaimana now. It’s just a single person tower, and they rotate through. And there is a lifeguard jet ski storage facility in the Natatorium now. Regardless of whichever option we end up doing, I think it is a tremendous opportunity to create an ocean safety education center there. And the lifeguards could have a presence there. There could be water safety, junior lifeguard programs as you mentioned. To me, that would be something I would really like to see happen in that area. It seems fitting. It would be something that the community would enjoy. So a multi-use area that could be part educational, and bring the lifeguards into the fold.
Daryl Huff: Let me ask you another question that just occurred to me, from your expert point of view. Pulling out that existing structure, cleaning up whatever stuff is there, is there any way of predicting what the beach would look like after doing that? Would you even have a beach?
Dolan Eversole: That’s a tough one. I think the sediment on – that’s in there now is something that we have maybe underestimating how difficult it is to remove. When you try to remove really fine sediment like that, it gets everywhere, it’s like dust. So that is something I think regardless of whichever option we end up pursuing, that’s something we’re going to have to look at more closely. And it will need to be addressed I think. ‘Cause just leaving it, if you start to expose it to wave energy, it’s going to start flushing and get around, and we’ve had some experience with that in Waikiki in 2012. We did a beach nourishment project and it turned out to be much more fine sediment than expected, and it turned milky.
Daryl Huff: Jim, one last word in, it seems to be 3 to 1. About 30 seconds.
Jim Bickerton: I don’t know, I think Dolan agreed with a lot of the that points we made.
Dolan Eversole: I’m somewhere in the middle.
Daryl Huff: One thing I’ll just throw out event though I know we’re running out of time, is that it occurs to me that Hanauma Bay is a good example of where there’s a lot of commercial activity at Hanauma Bay associated with supporting people using it. Another day we’ll talk about Hanauma Bay and whether it’s appropriately being commercialized or too commercial. But anyway, I want to give everyone a chance to know how they can make their comments, we have a lot of comments from viewers. There is an address and email address you can send public comments to.
The mailing address is to Mayor Kirk Caldwell care of the Department Design and Constructions, which is basically Robert Kroning.
650 South King Street, 11th Floor.
Honolulu, Hawaiʻi, 96813.
You could also send an email to wwwmcnatatorium@aecom.com. I think that’s the consultant’s email address. We will post these addresses at pbshawaii.org if you don’t get them. And you can weigh in on what you think should be future of the Natatorium. And I want to thank all of you for joining us and our guests tonight.
Robert Kroning, Director of the Honolulu City and County’s Department of Design and Construction, Kiersten Faulkner, Executive Director of the Historical Hawai‘i Foundation, Dolan Eversole, Waikiki beach management coordinator for the University of Hawai‘i sea grant program, and James Bickerton, attorney representing the Kaimana Beach Coalition.
This is the last Insights of 2018; our next live show will be January 10, when we will preview the 2019 legislative session. I’m Daryl Huff for Insights on PBS Hawaiʻi. Happy holidays, a hui ho.
