Project managers, engineers and leadership from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) - Honolulu District networked Monday with more than 100 local industry, academia and engineering innovators at the Ala Wai Watershed Flood Risk Management project’s Industry and Innovation Day at Honolulu Country Club.
The Corps-sponsored event provided industry with latest updates to project elements and performance requirements, while also allowing industry the opportunity to provide comments, perspectives and brainstorm about the project development process. The project includes a series of integrated elements: six debris and detention basins, three multipurpose detention basins, one standalone debris catchment structure, mitigation, and a flood warning system.
“The keys in delivering this project will be collaboration and seeking a common understanding that includes public safety, the economy, the environment, and the rich culture and diversity, which has thrived for generations in the watershed,” Lt. Col. Kathryn Sanborn, Honolulu District Commander told event patrons in her event-opening remarks. “It’s important to get expectations and perspectives of the project and project features from subject matter experts to help us build and deliver the best structures possible.”
“The Ala Wai Watershed Flood Risk Management project is just one piece of an overall watershed flood risk mitigation and resilience effort, said Ala Wai Watershed Flood Risk Management Project Manager Jeff Herzog. “We are committed to continuing our work with our partners to improve the existing conditions. “We have flexibility to incorporate industry innovations, natural solutions, and adaptability into our Congressionally -authorized project features. Industry Day maximizes our exposure to industry’s most current standards and innovations.”
“Industry Day is a standard for USACE construction projects,” said Gina Pasqualucci, Honolulu District’s Small Business Programs chief. “Interaction with industry is a best practice to maximize business competition, expand the USACE portfolio, and serves as an opportunity for businesses of all sizes to learn more details about the Ala Wai project and share ideas.”
Herzog said at the event that the collaboration of stakeholders and industry helps the Ala Wai project design identify and embrace LEED engineering and natural alternative construction materials, as well as assist the Corps “in collecting knowledge of recent industry developments and construction processes.”
According to Herzog, the Ala Wai Watershed Flood Risk Management project will reduce riverine flood risks and help protect metropolitan Honolulu, the University of Hawaii, and Waikiki, Hawaii's economic center for tourism. The population at risk includes approximately 65,000 residents and an additional 200,000 daily transient visitors to the watershed. The Corps’ Ala Wai Canal Project Feasibility Study reported that the likelihood of flooding so severe that it encompasses all of Waikiki and the canal’s tributaries is approximately one percent (a 100-year event), with potential damage to 3,000 structures and requiring more than $1 billion in repairs. Construction of the Army Corps-led flood risk management project would help protect Waikiki and neighborhoods along the streams.
Honolulu District is currently working particular terms of the Project Partnership Agreement (PPA) with City & County of Honolulu officials. The project is being funded under the Fiscal Year 2018 Emergency Supplemental and allocated $345 million for pre-construction engineering & design with construction cost-shared proportionately. The State of Hawaii has stated it will fund the project’s local cost-share of approximately $125 million after the City and County signs the Ala Wai PPA.
The Ala Wai Watershed encompasses a drainage area of 16.2 square miles. The three major streams within the watershed - Makiki, Manoa, and Palolo streams, all drain into the Ala Wai Canal. The two-mile-long canal was constructed during the 1920s to drain extensive coastal wetlands and allowing development of the Waikiki district. Given the combination of sheer slope, considerable rainfall — up to 150 inches a year in the Koolau Mountain Ridge — as well as the dense Waikiki population and growing climate-change concerns, the waterway is pegged as “high risk” for flash flooding. Recent increases in intensity and damage caused by severe rain events has local legislator’s calling for added flood protection in the watershed.
“We want to engineer with nature as much as we can,” Herzog told the gathering. “I’m interested in your innovative, green infrastructure moving forward where we can.”
“We want to deliver a masterpiece to the city of Honolulu, a project that mitigates the risk, while highlighting the beauty and the āina of the watershed,” said Sanborn.