The really good sports photographer always knows the shot to take. Where to stand, whom to focus on and when to squeeze the shutter to catch the decisive moment that captures that game winner or loser.

Too bad politics can’t be that clear. Can we get the picture of the moment capturing when rail jumped the tracks? How can we find the instant that doomed a $3 billion plan to balloon to between $8 and $10 billion and, more importantly, how did it go from the perfectly logical destination of the University of Hawaii at Manoa to now somewhere near Love’s Bakery on Middle Street?

The original destination always was UH-Manoa. Ala Moana Center is loaded with lots of fine stores, but thousands of folks need to go to school; they don’t need to go to Nordstrom’s. Any commuter knows that when UH is on break, traffic lightens.

So to capture the moment when the Honolulu mass transit system first twitched, you need to go back to the Feb. 21, 2007, City Council meeting. Then-Councilmembers Charles Djou and Donovan Dela Cruz were fighting Councilman and now state Rep. Romy Cachola over the route. Djou and Dela Cruz were arguing for “a common-sense approach,” with the train ending at UH.

Cachola, driven by calls from his constituents who wanted the rail to stop in their Salt Lake district, plotted to change the route so it skipped the airport. But doing that meant dropping UH because it was too costly. Salt Lake meant Ala Moana was as far as rail could go.

Picture One: The Council votes 5-4 to build rail, passing a resolution that “recognizing a fixed guideway system covering the entire locally preferred alternative alignment is the long-term goal and that a shorter system should be built first with the revenues available.”

Students howled. Then-Mayor Mufi Hannemann said that was not his first choice, but he wanted action on building the rail route.

A Feb. 28, 2007, Honolulu Advertiser article noted, “Hannemann allies unexpectedly had swapped the airport link for Salt Lake Boulevard last Wednesday to win a crucial swing vote from Councilman Romy Cachola that kept the project alive.”

Then, Djou called the decision “a train wreck” that would doom the entire project — a metaphor that Djou is now exercising to describe the current rail route to Middle Street as he campaigns for mayor.

Picture Two: “This system will be a failure from the day it starts, because it has dropped UH-Manoa,” Djou said.

Political expediency, however, is not a lost art at Honolulu Hale.

A year later after the City Charter amendment on rail won voter approval, the Council reconsidered the Salt Lake route and decided to move the route back to the Pearl Harbor, airport line. UH remains a station too far.

Mayor Kirk Caldwell is now asking the federal government for more time, but that won’t be the defining moment.

Picture Three will be snapped when the Council decides if running out of money means the train to UH doesn’t go to Manoa, doesn’t go to Ala Moana — but instead, learns to ask the folks at Love’s Bakery for half a loaf.

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Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.