Disasters & Accidents · The Record
Hawaii County holds Waikoloa evacuation drill Aug. 15, a month after a county study found its roads cannot clear the village in time
Mayor Kimo Alameda is urging residents to practice the Hulu Street route. The county's own study, which cost about $100,000, reported that the village's roads cannot clear roughly 7,000 residents in a timely fashion - and one outlet's evacuation-time figure differs from the rest.
County of Hawaiʻi Civil Defense will hold its Hulu Street Evacuation Drill in Waikoloa Village from 9 to 11 a.m. on Saturday, Aug. 15, Big Island Now reported on Aug. 11. Residents and visitors are invited to drive the emergency route from Hulu Street out to Queen Kaʻahumanu Highway; motorists exiting will be directed to turn north, and drivers heading south will be sent to turn around at Puakō. The county also calls the exercise "Hulu Holoholo." The route takes passenger cars, and drivers are told to stay on the main road surface through what the announcement describes as a fire-prone area.
Hawaiʻi County Mayor Kimo Alameda, whose party affiliation is not stated in any source reviewed here, said in the county announcement quoted by Big Island Now: "Practicing your evacuation routes is an important part of any emergency plan, and we encourage residents to join us for this semi-annual drill." The twice-a-year cadence comes from the mayor's own phrasing; no source reviewed here establishes it independently.
Four weeks before that announcement, the county released the record that tests it. The Waikoloa Village Evacuation Traffic Study was contracted by the Civil Defense Agency last year, according to the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, in part to provide "data-driven justification" for building more access roads. It was prepared by the consulting firm KLD Associates and runs 151 pages. Big Island Now, reporting on the study on July 17, wrote that a key finding is that the village's available roadway supply - its evacuation routes and road network - "is not sufficient to service the evacuation demand" within the community in a timely fashion. The study drew on a survey of 501 households, cost about $100,000 according to county spokesperson Tom Callis, and was funded through a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Community Development Block Grant for hazard mitigation. Waikoloa Village has one way in and out for roughly 7,000 full-time residents, Waikoloa Road, the Star-Advertiser reported, a fact that has earned it the nickname "world's largest cul-de-sac."
On the clock, Civil Beat reported that the study found it would take an average of 4 hours and 35 minutes for the last vehicle to leave Waikōloa, assuming traffic is not stopped or diverted at any point apart from northbound traffic on Hawaiʻi Belt Road. The Star-Advertiser put the presenter's figure at roughly four and a half hours; Hawaii News Now reported her as saying more than four and a half hours and quoted her explaining what the number means: "that does not mean that you're going to sit in your car for 4 hours and 35 minutes, that's the time it takes for the last vehicle to exit the area." Those are the same number in different words. Big Island Now is the one outlet reviewed here that differs, reporting about 4 hours and 15 minutes for the entire village. The outlets also differ on the presenter's surname: Big Island Now calls her Rebecca Cullen, while the Star-Advertiser, which gives her title as KLD Associates' Program Director of Evacuation and Emergency Planning, and Hawaii News Now call her Rebecca Cohen. This piece attributes each quotation to the outlet that carried it.
In the same week the study became public, the county announced that construction of a third evacuation route, connecting Kamakoa Drive to Queen Kaʻahumanu Highway at the village's north end, was starting. Alameda stated in that release, as quoted by Big Island Video News: "This evacuation route will provide a third way out during a disaster and reflects our commitment to public safety."
The study's scenarios do not all point the same way, and coverage has blurred three different interventions. Civil Beat reported that a long-sought second, two-lane road out of the village could increase evacuation time by 10 to 25 minutes because of added congestion on Queen Kaʻahumanu Highway; Big Island Now reported the presenter putting that increase at 25 minutes and saying the result surprised her. A second lane on Waikōloa Road used as an emergency egress is a different measure, and Big Island Now reported it would reduce evacuation time by 45 minutes. Controlling traffic on Queen Kaʻahumanu Highway to allow only evacuees is a third, and Civil Beat reported it could cut times by 40 minutes to an hour - that is, by 40 to 60 minutes - with no new pavement at all. Hawaii News Now quoted the presenter: "If you stop traffic on Queen K, you don't need to add another lane, you're going to reduce the evacuation time by an hour, that could mean life or death." Civil Beat reported one further scenario: closing eastbound traffic on Waikōloa Road would increase evacuation times by three hours.
Which physical road the modeled second, two-lane road represents is not stated in any account reviewed here. Nor does any account reviewed here attach a modeled evacuation-time figure to the Kamakoa Drive connector now under construction. The one thing Big Island Now reports for it is qualitative and forward-dated: the study showed Hulu Street with slightly less congestion in 2030 once Kamakoa Drive is developed as an additional evacuation route.
View the data
| Value (minutes) | |
|---|---|
| Second two-lane road, low estimate | 10 minutes |
| Second two-lane road, high estimate | 25 minutes |
| Second lane on Waikoloa Road as egress | -45 minutes |
| Traffic control on Queen Ka'ahumanu Hwy, smaller estimate | -40 minutes |
| Traffic control on Queen Ka'ahumanu Hwy, larger estimate | -60 minutes |
Source: Waikoloa Village Evacuation Traffic Study, as reported by Honolulu Civil Beat and Big Island Now · Daily Pol graphic
The third route itself has a paper trail. State and county leaders gathered on May 21, 2024, to celebrate the blessing and groundbreaking of the Waikōloa emergency access route, Big Island Now reported at the time. The road, off Queen Kaʻahumanu Highway between Mauna Lani Resort and Puakō, will be three miles long and connect to Kamakoa Nui Road in Waikōloa Village, and the outlet reported that it is funded and constructed by private landowners. Big Island Now also reported that, if nothing is found, a speaker it identifies as Somers said paving of the emergency route could be completed by the end of the year. A resident quoted in that 2024 story said: "I'm thankful they [elected officials] have heard the voice of the Waikōloa people, but I'm not holding my breath for it to get started."
Construction started this July. Big Island Now reported on July 17 that the route had begun to be built that Wednesday; the Star-Advertiser reported the county saying construction was scheduled to start that week; and by Aug. 11 Big Island Now reported construction underway. That is a gap of about two years and two months between groundbreaking and construction. No source reviewed here establishes why, and this piece makes no claim about the cause. The accounts also describe the money differently: the 2024 story says the road is funded and constructed by private landowners, while the 2026 announcements describe it as a partnership between the Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation and the County of Hawaiʻi. No source reviewed here reconciles those descriptions.
Two further limits sit in the record. The model excluded the hazard: Big Island Now quoted the KLD presenter saying, "We didn't model fire, we didn't model roadways being blocked by fire, we didn't model visibility being obstructed due to fire." And the study's inputs were disputed in public. Civil Beat quoted a speaker it identifies as Chalker saying, "The data and the assumptions that were provided by the county, in some cases, were flat out wrong." That is his characterization, not a finding, and Daily Pol could not test it against the study document. Civil Beat also quoted Waikōloa Village Firewise Chief Mary Schramke: "The magic bullet's gone. The bubble's been burst."
Growth is in the model too. Big Island Now reported that the study introduced 2,000 additional vehicles from the Kamakoa Nui development, a 28% load increase, which pushed village evacuation time to six hours; the third route is being built alongside the 139-unit Nā Hale Makoa workforce housing project. For context, Civil Beat reported that Waikōloa Village has a greater risk of wildfire than 92% of communities in the country, according to the USDA Forest Service, and that during the 2021 Mana Fire evacuations some residents said they sat in traffic for nearly two hours.
Analysis
A drill teaches a route; the study measures capacity. Those are different things, and the record reviewed here contains no figure for what rehearsal does to the modeled evacuation time. Nothing in that record argues against attending on Saturday. What it does show is that the county is promoting an exercise on one of two existing exits four weeks after its own consultant reported that the road network cannot clear the village in a timely fashion.
The second pattern in the numbers is that the largest reported saving does not come from construction. Traffic control on Queen Kaʻahumanu Highway, which requires no new road, is reported at 40 to 60 minutes, while the modeled second two-lane road adds 10 to 25 minutes and a second lane on Waikōloa Road saves 45. The capital project the county is publicizing has no published evacuation-time figure attached to it in any account reviewed here, and the development it serves is, in the study's own scenario, part of the 28% vehicle load increase that lengthens the evacuation to six hours.
A checkable test: if the semi-annual cadence in the mayor's statement holds, the next Hulu Street drill falls in the first half of 2027. Daily Pol will check by March 31, 2027 whether Hawaiʻi County Civil Defense has announced one.
Daily Pol has not obtained comment from Mayor Alameda's office or from the Hawaiʻi County Civil Defense Agency. The mayor's statements above come from county news releases as reprinted by other outlets, not from the releases as retrieved directly.