More roads are ultimately the only solution to traffic
For those who keep insisting that using more buses, bikes, and walking are the solution to alleviating our traffic problems, let’s review some facts.
There are 72,159 residents on Kauai (latest census figures) and there are 70,947 registered vehicles. Take away those who cannot drive and it means that many families have two and three vehicles. Plus the visitors that come to Kauai and rent cars.
None of these people are going to give up their vehicle to use a bike, bus or walk. And not enough to make a dent in the traffic. They need that vehicle for going to work, using it for work or just having it for convenience to come and go as they please.
When citizens live in areas where a bus stop is three or four miles away (or more) do you think that they are going to bike or walk to that bus stop?
Think of the time involved and if the purpose was for grocery shopping? And the rental car people (the majority of them) will use their vehicle for the same purpose, to see the beauty of this island when they want to and not wait for a bus that is going to one location.
The Wall Street Journal said this about vehicles: “Last year about 76 percent of workers 16 and older drove to work alone — near the all time high of 77 percent in 2005. Just about every other way of commuting has either languished or declined. “Other means” includes biking which stands at 2 percent largely unchanged over the last decade.”
You don’t have to be a transportation expert to see the empty bike lanes besides you while you sit bumper to bumper crawling to work — those lanes, narrowing the roads, making traffic worse.
Hopefully our new council and mayor will get action started to first. Pave those cane haul roads (as was done with the Kapaa bypass — in nine months) and then add one more lane, both being the only way to alleviate traffic, not more buses, bikes or walking.
Glenn Mickens, Kapaa
