The sight of city crews patching potholes is always a welcome one, but to see it on certain crumbling streets in Kakaako was especially sweet.

This week, workers began repairing the long-neglected roadways, which languished during a long-running dispute among the state, city, area businesses and two brothers, Calvert and Cedric Chun, who claimed ownership of the streets based on dubious circumstances. After the Chuns started charging for parking on the streets, the city stopped maintaining them.

The Chuns and their company, Kakaako Land Co. LLC, based their claim on a quitclaim deed they acquired in 1985 from Adele M. Christian, the last surviving heir of Charles Desky, who obtained the 65-acre Kakaako parcel in 1896. The Chuns paid a mere $5,000 for Christian’s interest in land worth many millions of dollars.

But after a lengthy legal battle, a state Circuit Court judge ruled in February that Christian’s interest — and thus the Chuns’ — was zero. The streets, including Kawaiahao, Queen, Ilaniwai, Waimanu, Kamani and Cummins, were long ago abandoned or surrendered to the state, the ruling said.

The decision cleared the way for the city and state to come to terms on road maintenance for this prime urban Honolulu area. It was encouraging that they did, in reasonably good time and with little apparent bureaucratic fuss.

Larger-than-usual teams started filling holes with asphalt, making short-term repairs in advance of long-term improvements that will occur after the state transfers ownership of the streets to the city.

“This is the state and city working together to (fix) something that has been problematic for years,” Mayor Rick Blangiardi said at a news conference on Kawaiahao Street.

Indeed. Let’s hope that this example creates a template for the future, replacing what too often have been acrimonious relations between Honolulu Hale and the state Capitol.

A good-faith working relationship between state government and Hawaii’s largest county, where 72% of the population lives, is essential to cutting through political posturing and getting things done. Fixing a few streets in Kakaako is just one example.

There are other major longstanding issues that require state-city teamwork: affordable housing, post-COVID economic recovery, climate change mitigation and yes, the rail project — just to name a few.

It’s time to make some real progress.