Transit that ends service at 7PM is almost as bad as non-existent transit. The local busses in my city stop at 7, and it really sends the message that you aren't allowed to use transit and have dinner out after work. A huge number of potential riders won't use the system because of this terrible schedule.

Honolulu is super lucky that its a mostly linear city, squeezed between the Pacific Ocean and really nice mountains. It's incentivised the city to densify, and it also means that this metro line *massively* benefits from having a much easier to reach catchment area for patronage.

Disney gets a lot of attention in transit largely because tourists actually use it. Hopefully HART has a similar but better impact so that people's only experience with transit isn't a monorail

I'm a Hawaii fan of RM. Just correction: Essentially Honolulu Skyline IS NOT meant for tourists. It's meant to connect working class commuters to downtown and any bus lines farther East Honolulu. West Oahu is where people live, East Oahu is hotels and malls people need to work at.

Even though this is a very rocky start, I am very confident that once the airport and downtown phases are open and its operations become smoother, it will be a great success and people will wonder why it wasn't done sooner. The TOD opportunities of the western areas should not be wasted!

Wow! The US is finally getting a decently modernized transit system; and as a Chicagoan, I honestly couldn't be happier. Props to Honolulu for actually going through with this and not proposing stuff just to throw it away. While it's not perfect, this is a step in the right direction. Also, "subway system"? The entire thing is elevated. Lol

Hawaii fun facts: Hawaii as a kingdom was historically a protectorate of the UK. A Red Ensign with the Union Jack was given to Kamehameha I by Captain George Vancouver in 1793, who previously visited with Captain Cook in 1778-1779. However, Ireland wasn't part of the UK until 1801, so this specific ensign didn't become the current Hawaiian flag. So what did? Well, Scottish captain Alexander Adams of the British East India Company! The current flag was created by him as part of a China trip in 1817. At this time, he was part of Hawaiian Kingdom Navy. On his way to China, while stopping on Kaua'i for supplies, he gave Kaumualiʻi (last supreme ruler of Kaua'i and Ni'ihau) an ensign to raise at the port, as Kaumuali'i only had the Russian flag left behind from a failed Russian colony. The state song, Hawaiʻi Ponoʻī, was the anthem of the kingdom from 1876 to 1893, and then the Republic of Hawaii from 1894 to 1898. After US annexation, it became the territorial anthem and was adopted as a state symbol in 1967. Because of its status and Hawaiian pride, it's commonly sung in Hawaiian schools and after the US anthem in sporting events. The words were written in 1874 by King David Kalākaua with music composed by Captain Henri Berger, then the king's royal bandmaster.

Could you perhaps do a video on Santo Domingo Metro? It’s very interesting how the Dominican Republic, a relatively poor country, has managed to establish a pretty good metro system along with a great aerial cable car system. And now, they are building a monorail and light rail system in Santiago, as well as potentially a HSR line for connection between Santo Domingo and Santiago.

NYC expanded its subway service 100 years ago into open farmland with the intention of building communities. Don’t disparage foresight. Everything in Hawaii costs twice as much bc they are so isolated and everything has to be shipped in. I hope they can turn this into a shining example of what the future can look like with trains.

>Automated >Stops service at 7 PM Make it make sense

I wonder how the price of shipping materials out to the middle of the pacific might have impacted the cost?

Hawaii resident here. The story of HART is one of tremendous graft by our recently-departed (and by some polls, least popular in America) governor David Ige (pronounced IY-Gey). The no-bid contract for constructing the rail was given to a company that _just so happened_ to be owned by a personal friend of Ige, and said company _just so happened_ to run into numerous delays that necessitated a near-doubling in budget from the initial ask. Iirc there was a push to allow competition for who was going to build the rail, but Ige overcame the effort at the 11th hour. To add insult to injury, a scandal during Ige's terms centered around how, at the time he was first pitching the rail idea to the state senate, he in fact _knew_ the initial ask wouldn't be enough and the state would be in too deep by then to cancel the project. Hopefully, Skyline can overcome its cursed beginnings to become an at least alright rail.

I like the word "Skyline" as a more modern synonym for "Elevated" or "El". I would imagine people think that an elevated rail system will be gross and antiquated, or compare it with NYC or Chicago. Saying skyline may make people think of a modern above-grade metro or light rail system, meaning they're less opposed to rail projects in a city.

Just by chance, I happened to sit next to one of the guys at the company contracted to build the screen doors on a flight recently. Was an interesting conversation hearing a bit about the challenges they were running into!

I lived in Japan for several years. The trains are integrated into the cities. There is a whole life in and around the train stations. It’s good to see Honolulu taking the step with the new system. It needs to get connected to the airport as soon as possible. In Japan, you can go everywhere on trains. Cars are moderately impractical there.

I just rode it for the first time today, it was free all weekend for its public grand opening. The stations are nice and the wait times (by American standards) are pretty short. The trains themselves are nice and spacious, and it moves faster than you think it does just looking at it from the freeway lol. Its a shame that its gonna take so long to be finished (apparently its stop at Ala Moana is planning for a 2031 opening) but this is a step in the right direction

I voted for this rail 15 years ago when I was 18. 15 years later, I really can't believe this day is here. Although, I don't think it will make the biggest impact until it reaches the airport and downtown Honolulu (which will take another 8 years minimum), it is still a step in the right direction to get away from car dependency. We live in probably the most beautiful place in the world and it's really a shame how dependent we are on cars here. Sentiment towards the rail still isn't good, mostly because of how HART totally mismanaged the project and many people here have the same American mindset of cars over everything, but I think Honolulu is taking a step in the right direction building up it's public transportation and bicycle infrastructure. Hawaii is expensive to live as it is, at least now we have another choice of transportation if we don't want to go into more debt for a car.

When I was a kid in high school in Hawaii in late 2000s this project was a point of huge debate. Crazy to see it come to fruition. I moved away shortly after they'd started construrion. Insane

This is great for Hawaii, no reason why an island with a big city should not have a local train service for the public, the admin for it was terrible,but the infrastructure seems excellent ♥️✌️🇬🇧

Hawaii is a particularly high cost area for the US from its high wages (due in part to the military bases bringing in a lot of money) to the high cost to import into the state. So add on the US' normal incompetence at infrastructure cost control with those factors and this was a worst case scenario for costs really. Making this elevated and automated however is fantastic and I very much hope they lean into the advantages that allows and extend the hours of operation and frequencies (though every 10 minutes already beats the peak per line frequencies in my much larger city of Atlanta...) because I REALLY want to point to this project and say "this is how we should upgrade our rail lines!"

I currently live on Oahu (the island in which Honolulu is located), and when I found out I would be moving here from Korea, the first thing I looked into was the public transportation, as I had grown accostum to living car free for years over there. And I was sorely disappointed to learn of all the delays and issues with the HART project. Oahu is going to need a huge infrastructure overhaul to make this project successful. There isn't much surrounding even the most dense station currently, nor are any of the stations walkable (I believe many, especially further west, are meant to be a drive/ride). Currently the only open stations go suburb to suburb, and it's going to be several more years, if not decades until it serves it's intended purpose of moving workers from the suburbs to their jobs in town. I sure hope it is successful. Oahu is in desperate need of it, as the roads essentially become parking lots during rush hour(s). The traffic here is the number one reason I am pushing to move back overseas to Europe or Asia so I can go car free once again.

"Subway"? Should we call it that if it is entirely elevated? That said ... wow!

The reason it goes from West to East is that it is a development tool. It was promoted by the landowners on the westside. Oahu has a pinch point between the upper reaches of Pearl Harbor and the Koloolau mountains that backs up road traffic between the westside and Honolulu proper. Releasing that pinch point has been considered key to getting people to move to the westside. The rail solves this. At the moment, none of the stations are really high traffic areas, so the first few years of operation are going to be a financial disaster. In about 2 years when it gets to the airport, ridership may increase and when it gets to downtown and Kakaako, there may be decent ridership. But, it really needs to go to Ala Moana, and ideally Waikiki which is not only the top tourist destination , it is also the most densely populated part of the island and at least some people there don't have cars. Alas, the hotel owners don't want an above ground transit system in Waikiki. (I lived in Chicago many years ago, and I loved the "EL".)

It is INSANE that, the service will only run until 7pm. I have lived in Miami, but I've been living in Lima, Peru for several Years now. And BOTH of the Metro Systems run from 6am till 11pm at night... Then again both Cities that I mentioned, have MUCH bigger urban and more denser Areas. 🤔

Here in Mexico City, most of the new public transit lines are and will be elevated

As a Londoner it mostly reminds me of the DLR.

Closing 7pm seems fair in Hawaii. The earliest the sun sets is 5:45pm and the latest is probably 7:15pm. Most Hawaiians go to bed around 10:30pm and they have been home way before 7pm.

Gotta say as cool as the name Skyline is, considering they have TheBus, I wish they chose TheRail 😂. I know subway is a general term for rapid transit, but I wouldn’t call it that since none of the stations are underground. Just call it a metro or light metro! But that aside, about time Honolulu has rail! Did it take a lot of time and money? Yes, but it will still help the locals big time! I love the fact that all the station names not only have two languages but that the Hawaiian names are featured as the more prominent names thanks to the effort of the Hawaiian Station Naming Working Group or HSNWG. The world is lucky to have so many languages from Hawaiian to Papiamento and Tagalog, and it’s important we do our best to protect this diversity. However, it’s absolutely silly that this closes at 7 pm daily. I know certain people love to hate on the NYC Subway and while it's certainly not perfect, but a big advantage of it is that it runs 24 hours a day, every day of the year! It's one of the only systems in the world to do so! Seeing that it will close at 7 pm makes me appreciate the NYC Subway even more. Last I checked, Honolulu has a nightlife and people are still getting home at that time! It's like how certain local or state governments not running or barely running any service on Sundays despite the fact that people wanna go places on Sundays!

As a Hawaiian urbanist I've been saying for years that they should have built between the airport and Waikiki FIRST! I don't live in Waikiki, but in a part of Honolulu that's not too far away and it's hell to land at the airport at 3 in the afternoon and have to either take the bus, taxi, or have a friend pick you up and get stuck in traffic for an hour or more just to go like 7 miles.

In fairness, NY does have open gangway prototype trains on property, just not in service YET, but they will start in July. So technically Honolulu has the first in service open gangway trains in the US. Initially with HART the original plan was to have a full line open to downtown but ballooning costs attributed to the phasing of the project. I still see this as a stepping stone for a potential metro renaissance for the US to entice smaller cities to consider automated light metro in alternatives to traditional light rail or BRT services

You should do a video on transit systems of the Caribbean.

In Honolulu for work and will be taking time today to ride Skyline on its opening day. Looking forward to the future potential of the system.

4:55 That is absolutely insane. This is the very first time I've screamed at this channel. For the service to end at 7 p.m. is absolutely unacceptable.

One reason that I'm sure made the cost so high would be the cost of materials. Hawaii is very isolated, and sending that quantity of material there would be very expensive.

3:43 because most of the locals live west and they have to commute to East to get to work. Rail is suppose to be for the locals

The Vancouver SkyTrain ,at least on paper, seem to me like the best type of system for most NA cities. Small frequent automated trains on dedicated elevated track And hart seems to be modelled on that

The WMATA system in DC’s upcoming 8000 series cars will be walk-thru. But they won’t be available for a few years.

For some reason, transit projects here in the US always seen to cost ridiculous amounts of money, more so than many other parts of the world. I don't know why that is. It makes no sense to me. But, I am glad that projects like Honolulu's Skyline are being built.

Very good points, but I think this rail was meant first for local workers in the suburbs to be able to get to Honolulu and Waikiki to be able to serve all of the tourists, and second for the tourists to get around. Traffic from west suburbs to Honolulu and Waikiki is horrible in the morning and vice versa in the afternoon, and the expansion of roadways is not possible on an island with limited space

I have one word for y'all: FINALLY!!!

I can't wait for the people mover in LAX to finally start working

I thought a lot about the HART/Skyline when I visited Honolulu a few years ago as the taxi I rode in inched along the road from the airport to Waikiki in terrible traffic. I can't wait to go back and ride above all the car congestion!

I imagine the immense cost is the price of shipping material to Hawaii (thanks to the Jones Act) and the price of labor as Hawaii is expensive to live in, thus the wages would have to match. Vancouver on the other hand is a major port city just north of the US border and has plenty of low cost areas to pull labor from, keeping prices for construction down. It's very easy to go "wow, why is it so expensive, typical America" and make comparisons without looking at all the factors involved. Soft factors are everywhere - hell, it's why the 2nd Avenue Subway was so expensive. People think corruption but actually, it's really damn hard to tunnel through solid rock and especially underneath an active city; not to mention reworking lots of pipes and other such below ground infrastructure because you might as well when you're doing all that digging anyways. Add in the difficulty getting anything to Manhattan due to a very short number of ways for trucks to drive in and a high CoL in the region and it's an expensive bill in the end.

Skyline has huge amounts of potential. Hopefully, it's able to meet it.

A few notes for context: On the rail yard land issue, to be fair to HART, they were required to minimize Eminent Domain as much as possible and suitable Federal land closer to town was for various reasons largely untouchable and unnegotiable for the State/City. The neighborhoods around the western stations were originally intended to be more dense mid-rises and finished in conjunction if with not earlier than the metro. Naturally, public pushback meant that those developments were delayed and scaled back. Finally the current headways were a result of HART converting half their rolling stock order from powered cabcars to unpowered middle-wagons for cost cutting. Essentially going from 5min headways with 20 two-car trains to the current 10min with 10 four-car trains at opening.

Not a subway, it’s all elevated

I’m a construction consultant for one the subcontractors on this project. I’ve been in the business for 23 years and have had projects all over the world including Bagram air base in Afghanistan and this project is the biggest disaster I’ve ever worked. The issues on this project are the most ridiculous and beyond belief I have ever encountered

Hello Reese, I live in Watertown, MA, a suburb of Boston. I wanted to tell you about the abhorrent transit situation that the nearby city of Lynn has found itself in. The city has been building more densely around its commuter rail station, however, the MBTA has closed the station due to the disrepair of the building, even though it was built in 1991. A new station will not be done until 2030, which is absolutely ridiculous. The city has urged the MBTA to build a temporary platform, which will take 12-18 months. Otherwise, they have to take a shuttle bus to Swampscot for the commuter rail or a shuttle to Revere for the Blue Line, which will take a long amount of time during rush hour. It's ridiculous that Lynn, which is the same distance to Boston and Brooklyn is to Manhattan, has no accessible transit to get to Boston. This is compounded by the fact of the large Latino and Black population in Lynn. This has also caused economic problems as building contractors to have densified around the station will suffer since young commuters will not move in without transit. This has led to a grocery store cancelling its plan to move into one of the buildings. I wanted to spread the news about this. If you want to see the full article, it's in the June 25th Boston Globe written by Joan Vennochi.

I'm from northern Japan, Sapporo, and our metro had absolutely NO escalators at all. We have elevators, but everything else is just stairs. It is actually very useful because of just how crowded it gets, and it keeps people moving reasonably. But for a lower density subway it's a bit odd, although you get used to it really quick

I dont know if you'd count it, but the new R211s actually running on the A line in NYC (though, its only one train) are fully walkthrough and in service.

As someone who grew up in Vancouver it is mind blowing that this is the first automated train in the US when we got ours in 1986!!

I would have liked to see suspended rail instead of standard elevated for a system like this, but it's good that they're doing something at all.

it took 12 yrs which is "kinda of crazy" "its incredible how expensive this project has been" California high speed rail has entered the chat 🤣

Even if it does nothing to reduce traffic due to the induced-demand effect, it will give more people the opportunity to go to more locations when they want to for work or for commerce.

Sounds like Honolulu needs to consult you for advice and marketing

Constructing anything in Hawaii is a major PITA, which is why they built the lower density parts of the line first - simpler to construct in a lower density area than through the densest parts of the city

Theres 20 r211's in NYC with open gangways but thats some trains on one line. I know Atlanta's new trains will have open gangways but they haven't been rolled out yet.

One thing that hasn't been mentioned much (at least as far as I have heard) is that part of putting HART/"Skyline" on an elevated track is important for Honolulu because Hawai'i is at risk of tsunami. If Oahu is struck by a tsunami, suddenly the Skyline becomes a crucial artery and refuge. Put that track on the ground or, even worse, underground, and you have yet another casualty. Putting it on an elevated track hopefully allows it to survive any such event and become the way into, and out of, the effected areas.

I have been to Honolulu, Hawaii before, and I am so proud of them for getting this new subway system. I know that many don't like the cost and are very upset about it, but I am still proud of them. I visited there for the first time for my graduation to get my doctorate degree in accounting from Argosy University back in 2016. Since then, I earned two more degrees, one in Applied Science in Accounting and the last one, a master's degree in accounting for a total of five degrees I have earned. For my celebration, I will be visiting Hawaii very soon as soon as I find a job after graduating with my last degree on May 21, 2023, from George Washington University School of Business.

3:40 You're not wrong that so much of it is west of the airport, but Honolulu's new subway system isn't the only one. St. Louis's MetroLink is the same way, but with a slight twist. Our system, in terms of line length, is about 50/50 split between Missouri and Illinois, but not so much when you look at how far it goes from the city. The Illinois portion runs 20 miles (in terms of line length) to Shiloh, which is 17 miles from downtown. The Missouri portion is 15 miles total, but it only runs through the city's mid section for 6 miles, and splits into 2 different 7-mile lines that go north/south through some inner suburbs within 1 to 4 miles from the city line. So when they finish expanding 5 more miles to Mid America Airport in 2025, our MetroLink's Illinois segments will be run roughly 4 to 5 times further from the city than the Missouri portion.

Even with all the current problems, it's great to see a brand new system starting its journey! Truly hope that the connection to the airport & city center will be finished as soon as possible. Totally agree that for such locations, the link between airport and dense urban area would be more reasonable for a start.

Marta gets full gangway trains in the next year or two, so they barely beat Atlanta getting that title

Minneapolis has all-open train carts in their system! I think all of the newer models have it opened

Phase 3 doesn’t even include Waikiki!! The most dense area with the highest opportunity for ridership from the airport to the hotels. It seems they could build a smartly designed elevated train over the Ala Wai Canal ending near the Waikiki Zoo. They could create something architecturally smart like NY’s High line, like a hybrid of an elevated park with the transit line that offers great views of the canal and Waikiki while serving a great purpose for transit. Maybe I’m just a dreamer :/

Thank you for posting this and I do have to say the word you used "illogical" is correct in terms of why wasn't it built primarily within the urban core instead of out west to lesser populated areas. But you have to understand when first proposed, the push was to encourage people to move out to that side of the island to live, so a plan had to be devised to bring them into the major employment centers in Honolulu proper like the downtown central business district, Ala Moana shopping center which is also a major transit point for the island wide bus system that services the various valleys, Waikiki and the University of Hawaii. Interestingly, because of the high demand for more "affordable" housing, major growth there during the last few decades has been relatively easy, making the rail system even more viable. I have lived in NYC and LA and a proponent of rail because there are just too many cars here. Unlike cities in the "lower 48" or mainland as we call it, when one moves out of state, it's not like you can just drive to another place to live. You need to spend the money and time to ship it to either Oakland or Long Beach. So many opt to sell their cars here. So as new cars are being sold, the total number of vehicles here keeps growing, making the roads more crowded. For a time period, I lived out towards the west side of the island and during one going home commute, I spent over 90 minutes in bumper to bumper traffic that had me and the thousands of other cars spewing out tons of emissions, not to mention the countless hours we all spent sitting in traffic. I am hopeful one day it'll expand to the University and Waikiki and become something we are glad they built. For those who complain about the cost overruns, this is an issue with the bidding process. Also, I didn't pay for the construction of two of the old major highway systems here or tunnels over to the windward side of the island, but it's like everywhere else where one generation pays for the next. Lastly, having a familiarity with development here, if one took some BLM land in Las Vegas, it'd probably take 9 months to a year to move from that conservation type use to urban zoning where one could start building. In Hawaii, that process takes and average of 13 years.

It's very reminiscent of London's DLR, although waaaay more expensive to build! It looks great and I hope it gets lots of use and gets extended in useful ways, rather than half-heartedly left to rot. Running it past 7pm would be a good start. What a ridiculous time to finish service. Sends the message that this is only for commuters and ordinary travellers are not welcome.

Having lived in Honolulu, my hope is that this metro system will be successful and that they eventually extend from the Ala Moana Station into Waikiki (the largest tourist area) and down Kapiolani BLVD all the way to the University of Hawaii at Manoa. That would make it even more useful for tourists and students to use it. If they could extend it even further I think it could go out to Hawaii Kai, but the rich people who live there would likely fight that.

the whole reason they started in kapolei was that they wanted people who live in the suburbs but work in honolulu, to use the rail (skyline) instead of driving

I live in on Oahu where this is built and I'm gonna put this out there, this was not meant for the tourist. The primary reason for this rail was for working class people that live on the west side to have another option to get into town for work. It's not uncommon to drive from the west side to town which is 30 miles or so and sit in hours long traffic. That being said, this project was so poorly managed and there are problems already popping up and it opens today. Nearly everyone that I've talked to about this says that this was a waste of time and money because they won't use it. The only folks excited for it are the people that already use public transportation which in turn will have no impact on our traffic.

Despite the problems with the HART Skyline construction, it is still arguably a far better run project than the Eglinton Crosstown in comparison. While Skyline is a fully-automated metro with high travel speeds and frequency, Crosstown does not.

I remember back in 2018 I went to Hawaii for a vacation and the project was still in construction, it's cool to finally see that it's in operation now. More rail less cars.

Chicago actually USED TO have some walk through trains. The OLD 5000 series (not the current one) were built in 3-car articulated walk-through sets.

Honolulu should have kept the name HART, just changing the acronym to Honolulu Automated Rail Transit.

marta's new stadler railcars will have open gangways, hopefully in service by 2025. they've already been built and shipped from hungary to utah where they are currently being customized before returning to atlanta.

I will ride it this weekend and tell you all how it goes, also I did NOT expect to see a video from RMTransit on this. super cool.

Just a note on the cost comparisons, Hawaii is more expensive to build infrastructure in due to it being an island- with the Jones Act, shipping anything to Hawaii is expensive and cost prohibitive; this is part of why the cost of living there is so much higher than comparable US locales like Miami or Southern California

It closing at 7pm is baffling though

I agree, 7 pm is too early however it’s nice that a US state finally has an automated raised rail. Keep it up Hawaii. Once the extension to the airport is complete, then it will be on my list.

Because it's an elevated system, it provides passengers with unique and beautiful views that weren't available before this opened. I wouldn't mind riding it just for the views.

Would love a review on the miami SMART plan! Talk about extensions to south beach and the N and NE extensions

Sounds very similar to the Tren Urbano in Puerto Rico. A suburban train that doesn't encourge development and doesn't serve the most crucial and densest parts of San Juan. Would be great if you could cover the Tren Urbano.

This would be a great video to loop at the stations or in the cabin. A good idea to reinforce who to use it and where to go.

One of the main reasons for it was the daily clogging of the H-1 west of Honolulu. I sat in that traffic every day for years. Love it or hate it, something needed to be done that didn’t involve more roads.

Keep in mind Honolulu and Hawaii of course, is in the middle of nowhere. The nearest lands are thousands of miles away and even then also islands, everything there is expensive, milk is about 8 dollars, and most goods are a tons more things that are maybe 3 or 4 times. Because they are so isolated the way things get into Hawaii is mainly priced off of how they bring in something, including ships which is most reasonable of bringing in materials for the system. So if everyone is wondering why so expensive the project was. It was the importing price

It was never meant for tourists though. It was always suppose to support locals first.

Good video. I'm from Vancouver and frequent Hawaii

Islands are honestly where public transportation makes the most sense, and tropical islands make renewable sources truly viable. Cars cost money to ship to the island. Then you have to constantly ship fuel. But rail helps residents and tourists alike. Solar power for and electric grid is a no brainer.

UH Manoa graduate here - Really appreciate you bringing up HART! This was a huge issue when I was studying there and a lot of the people that were against it (Including professors...) brought up that whole "Oh, it'll be noisy and horrible like the L in Chicago!" so happy to hear someone fighting that misinformation! As a railfan, I remember pointing that out but nobody would listen! Can't compare a brand new system to something that's been around since the 19th century! Regarding the difficulty in the downtown or Waikiki extensions, I remember one of the big arguments being from building owners not wanting the elevated tracks blocking their views. A lot of relatively low-rise apartments/condos along the route that would have their ocean views obstructed. You bring up a really good point about Japanese tourists too. I've read some Japanese articles that point out that some Japanese tourists might even use it as a tourist attraction to see parts of Oahu they'd otherwise not get to. Not to mention a nice elevated view! Anyways, awesome video! Hope I get a chance to ride this new system...

You nailed the main problems; the fact that there are stations multiple stories up, without escalators, that dump you into a stroad parking lot is reflective of how the opportunity is squandered. That and the fact that they aren't hitting the university or high density residential, or the main tourist destination until phase 3+ means that Honolulu is going to be a car haven for a while.

The purpose of mass transit is to cut down on car traffic which is exactly what this transit system does. It focused on the western section because that is where the workers live. They can now take HART into the city to work and leave their cars at home. There is a stop in the middle of a field because that is a good spot for a parking lot for people living farther out to drive in and park to take HART.

You did some good research and your criticisms are pretty spot on. I think it might also be worth mentioning that they don’t have public restrooms at any of the Skyline stations. Sure, they have a locked restroom that can be unlocked if/when you find a worker to unlock it for you, but staff has been advertising them as “for emergencies only” lol. I dunno about you, but every trip to the bathroom feels like an emergency when you (or your kid) have to go. Much like the lack of elevators, it just feels like they tried hard to save a few million after burning through a few billion.

I mean, BART isn't necessarily open gamgway, but it is walk through (i.e. you can move between cars) inba way you can't (or aren't supposed to) in other US systems like NYC, Chicago or Boston.

Most of the people working in Waikiki and Honolulu are mostly from west of the airport and beyond

Great vid. One correction though is Skyline is not a subway...at least not yet....the line is elevated or at-grade in some places. Digging too far below -- 100 feet or so -- below the sea level island of Oahu will mean seawater will flood into the system.

Nice video. I almost forgot about Honolulu's system. The rapid transit in the field isn't a big issue I believe. If I'm correct. That's how the Bronx in NYC got started. Development may get moving later. Unless some people object to the cities expansion.

hey, i had made a request for this video a few days ago and wow here it is! i haven't started watching the vid yet cuz im on the bus heading back from the station after riding it! the ride was super smooth, quiet, quick, i was really impressed, if we put the issue of construction cost and utility of stage 1 aside. when i stepped out at the last station out of the city, there wasn't really anything to do. although i'm sure that'll change! from my place to the bus, +1 bus transfer, then transfer to the train, ride to the end, get off and exit the station, then back on the train, and 2 more buses home, only cost $3 thanks to the 2.5 hr transfer window. not bad for 40 miles total travelled! i'm really excited to see this thing expand into the city and the airport! fingers crossed! gonna watch the vid when i get home! thanks in advance for making this, i'll leave my feedback in another comment!

We have to be very careful when talking about "metros to nowhere" if we want to encourage transit oriented development.

Great video! Very informative, thanks for sharing!

Greate video as always :). I'm hopping you some day make a video on the Santo Domingo transport network in the Dominican Republic, with its metro system and Ropeways!

I guess I got to give translink props for building the evergreen line at a decent cost per km. Congrats Honolulu!. Hopefully the system makes the cost of living a little more bearable.