Sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic the other day, a simple question came to mind: Why does every public works project in our state seem to take forever? For example, the construction work on the Pali Highway is now in its sixth year and remains far from finished. Anywhere else, a project of this size would have been completed in months, not years. Why do we put up with this nonsense?

It doesn’t have to be this way. Elsewhere, much larger public works projects have been done in much less time. For example, the Hoover Dam was completed in just five years. The Golden Gate Bridge in four years. The Oakland Bay Bridge in three years. And, most impressive, the Empire State Building took just one year and 45 days from start to finish. Incredibly, all of these projects were done almost a century ago when technology was primitive by today’s standards.

The amount of time we lose sitting in traffic and the disruption in our daily lives don’t seem to matter to our public officials. Let’s remember their indifference the next time we vote.

Stephen T. Molnar

Kailua

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