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Kona Charrette Finishes with Flourish: Final Night Presentation Attracts Applause

Oct 27, 2009

KAILUA-KONA, HI – The weeklong workshop to apply key components of the award-winning Kona Community Development Plan (CDP) to the Honokohau Village site ended in a Tuesday night presentation at the Sheraton Keauhou Bay Resort. But already the week’s efforts were earning endorsements from many folks, including those with the tasks of taking the plans forward.

Mayor Kenoi met with the PlaceMakers team Tuesday morning.

Mayor Kenoi met with the PlaceMakers team Tuesday morning.

Members of the PlaceMakers consulting team met on Tuesday morning with Mayor Billy Kenoi, who repeated his support for the project. And earlier, community members were enthusiastic about previews of the final product.

Tuesday night, more than 50 people attended the PlaceMakers presentation. Key elements of the overall plan are explained by PlaceMakers planner Geoff Dyer in the video below. (Note: If you don’t have the capacity to download videos, don’t worry. Details of the week’s proceedings are covered in text and still images augmented by the videos.)

[Story continues below video]

Immediately below are images taken from the presentation. And below the images are videos of reactions from attendees.

Watch these pages for updates of the Honokohau Village Process over the coming weeks.

ABOVE: This regulating plan serves as the "zoning" for the property, in accordance with the Village Design Guidelines. However, it differs from conventional zoning in that it places a higher focus on form, character and intensity, and then mixes uses accordingly. Click image for larger view.

ABOVE: This regulating plan serves as the "zoning" for the property, in accordance with the Village Design Guidelines. However, it differs from conventional zoning in that it places a higher focus on form, character and intensity, and then mixes uses accordingly. Click image for larger view.

           

ABOVE: The illustrative plan demonstrates how, in accordance with the regulating plan, the property might build out. Click image for larger view.

ABOVE: The illustrative plan demonstrates how, in accordance with the regulating plan, the property might build out. Click image for larger view.

           

ABOVE: Various architectural techniques can be employed to maintain a coherent streetscape while addressing the site's sloping condition. Click image for larger view.

ABOVE: Various architectural techniques can be employed to maintain a coherent streetscape while addressing the site's sloping condition. Click image for larger view.

           

ABOVE: Honokohau Village's civic building at the heart of the community, which would likely also serve as the primary transit stop. Click image for larger view.

ABOVE: Honokohau Village's civic building at the heart of the community, which would likely also serve as the primary transit stop. Click image for larger view.

           

ABOVE: A primarily residential street scene, featuring the integration of multiple product types. Click image for larger view.

ABOVE: A primarily residential street scene, featuring the integration of multiple product types. Click image for larger view.

           

ABOVE: Addressing sloping grade through alleyways and tuck-under parking. Click image for larger view.

ABOVE: Addressing sloping grade through alleyways and tuck-under parking. Click image for larger view.

           

ABOVE: Addressing the sloping grade through this bungalow court, small homes sharing a central pedestrian greenway and featuring rear-access parking. Click image for larger view.

ABOVE: Addressing the sloping grade through this bungalow court, small homes sharing a central pedestrian greenway and featuring rear-access parking. Click image for larger view.

           

           

FILED UNDER:   Architecture, Charrette Information, Kona Planning, Transit Oriented Dev., Village Design GuidelinesTAGS: , , , , ,

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  • Big Ideas Become Reality as Kona
    “Charrette” Applies Community Development Goals

    “This is a whole new way of planning,” says Margaret K. Masunaga, deputy director, County of Hawai`i Planning Department. “That’s what makes this so exciting.”

    The immediate focus of this new planning experience in Kona is the Honokohau Village, a 80-acre site that includes the new West Hawai`i Civic Center. But the broader aim is educational.

    As County Planning Director Bobby Jean Leithead Todd explains in this video, this is the first major project to be planned under the award-winning Kona Community Development Plan (CDP), enacted into law in September of 2008. During the multi-day public “charrette," residents and community leaders, developers and builders, and County officials and staff will get to see how new guidelines apply to a real project in a real place.

    “We’ll use this experience to learn from and to teach one another,” says Masunaga, who was hired by Mayor Billy Kenoi and Planning Director Bobby Jean Leithead Todd to oversee Planning Department activities in West Hawai`i. Masunaga is a resident of Captain Cook in South Kona and lives on a Kona coffee farm.

    “By the time we’re finished, we’ll all know exactly what it means when we say ‘TOD’ and what the term implies for development in Kona,” says Masunaga.

    TOD stands for Transit-Oriented Development, a neighborhood development approach encouraged under the new Kona CDP. The transit orientation comes into play when development can be designed to make the most of not only personal automobile travel, but also biking, walking, and transit. A TOD, in fact, maximizes the advantages of mobility choices so that people representing a wide range of ages, abilities, and incomes can share the advantages of living, working, and playing in a compact, walkable community.

    The Kona CDP provides much more than guidance for TODs, of course. It prescribes goals for putting Kona-appropriate development in the right places, in the right scale for those places, and in the right relationships to surroundings. The upcoming Kona charrette will customize Village Design Guidelines described in general in the Kona CDP specifically for the 40-acre, transit-oriented site around the West Hawai`i Civic Center.

    “So we’re not just talking about planning for transit, walking, biking, and cars,” says Masunaga. “We’ll also use the charrette to set standards for Honokohau Village that will include building setbacks and heights, the width of streets and sidewalks, the mix of building types, allowable density ranges, and the placement of public parks and other open space. The result will be a village design that encourages a true neighborhood atmosphere.”

    Conventional planning approaches often complicate community-building goals. “In the not so distant past,” says Masunaga, “we planned subdivisions that were disconnected from one another and where people without access to automobiles were isolated. The disconnections affected all sorts of other things, including infrastructure investment, environmental protection, and public services like police and fire fighting. “

    “One of my dreams,” Masunaga says, “is that my seven-year-old daughter will be able to safely walk just about anywhere she needs to go for her daily needs. That’s not possible in most places in Kona now.

    “Mahalo nui loa to everyone who made the Kona CDP a reality. Now we can implement the policies to guide the Planning Department and the Planning Director on how we want Kona to look like in the next twenty years and into the next generation.”