Turtles, such as the ones that visitors find so fascinating in their habitat at Laniakea Beach, have a long life span. They are concerned neither about what humans devise to manage the crowds and resultant traffic on a narrow beach highway, nor about how long it takes the solution to arrive.

The public, on the contrary, does care — or at least it should. People have waited long enough for this problem to be addressed.

So it’s encouraging that the state Department of Transportation seems poised to move ahead at last, and a proposal for a more lasting fix is the most promising.

The alternative would be cheaper — a slight shift of the highway for about 40 feet, for $6 million to $10 million. But the realignment along about 1,000 feet, although costing out at $35 million to $40 million, provides more resilience in an environment of rising sea levels.

The state should advance the focused planning and acquisition of the easement for a Kamehameha Highway inland realignment as soon as possible.

But given the complications — some of the land is under a lease, for example — it’s bound to take several years under the best of circumstances. Installing a traffic light and crosswalk to give pedestrians a safer path, should be on the table as a stop-gap measure.

The appearance of green sea turtles on that stretch of sand near Sunset Beach can be a problem year-round. They prefer the calmer waters of summer so might come ashore more often then, but during the high-wave season of the winter, the traffic on Kamehameha Highway can be quite heavy with tourists wanting to see the famous North Shore surf.

In addition to slowing down traffic drastically, it’s become a safety concern. Last summer, a 10-year-old boy visiting from California was struck by a car while crossing the highway at Laniakea. Plainly, the state needs to take action in order to provide at least some reasonably protected access to the shoreline at this point.

DOT views the proposal of a crosswalk, with a traffic light, as less than ideal. The crosswalk would not be located at a cross street intersecting the highway, as is standard. Also, officials said, people impatiently waiting for the inevitably long time between crossing cycles are likely to jaywalk, anyway.

It is still worth the effort to install a signal — and implement frequent enforcement periods — if it can add a layer of safety. And positioning it at the crossing most directly facing the destination viewing area would make the wait more worthwhile.

State campaigns to fund a solution go back more than a decade; in 2009, with coastal erosion processes accelerating and starting to undermine the highway support, the focus switched to a realignment plan.

The common practice has been for beachgoers to park on the mauka side of the highway near the beach and then cross on foot, holding up traffic at erratic times through the afternoon peak tourist hours.

There have been various ideas floated. One was to use the nearby bridge over a usually dry stream bed as an underpass, but liability concerns crossed that off the list.

So instead the state deployed concrete barriers to block parking. That was sensible — but was challenged in a suit by surfers and other beach users, a group called Save Laniakea Coalition, and the court ordered the barriers removed.

The coalition remains opposed to the state’s current plan: guardrails in the short-term as a less intrusive way to block the problematic roadside parking.

It should withdraw its opposition. More than anything, the North Shore needs its only access road to be safe and unobstructed, and letting the state move on the current plan offers the best assurance of reaching that goal.