Feds OK Honolulu Rail for Preliminary Engineering

The Federal Transit Administration has given Honolulu a green light to begin Preliminary Engineering for the local rail transit system. We put PE in caps because FTA authorization for this phase is a key step along the way to groundbreaking for the project, scheduled late this year.

Senator Daniel K. Inouye made the announcement:

“This is a critical federal milestone and an important accomplishment in the development of Honolulu’s Rail Transit Project. The competition for Preliminary Engineering among our nation’s cities is fierce. This approval is, in large part, a credit to Mayor Mufi Hannemann’s administration, and a result of the Honolulu project meeting the stringent federal planning and financial justification requirements.”

Future steps include publishing the Final Environmental Impact Statement, scheduled for sometime this month. The Draft EIS was released last November and prompted hundreds of comments and suggestions that the City has built into the Final document.

Here's the Advertiser's story (with a video of Mayor Mufi Hannemann's news conference) on the FTA's approval of Preliminary Engineering; the Star-Bulletin also has coverage.