Good Idea, Bad Reporting
As dutifully reported by the Advertiser and Star-Bulletin, the City put up numbered yellow 911 signs on public beach accesses to aid first responders. Good idea -- except the press and TV news media failed to note that there are only 87 public rights of way for the entire island of Oahu, which has over two hundred miles of coastline!
More importantly, the need for these 911 signs underscores the public safety issue we've been raising: locked gates on private lanes could mean the difference between life and death in ocean emergencies. Those nice, new 911 signs? Sorry, but they're nowhere in sight for long stretches of Kailua Beach because some the public accesses are over a half-mile apart!
And look at the photo above of Sign #89A at the access next to Kailuana Loop. On the left side you can see the back of the yellow 911 sign... which they put behind bushes, trees and a sand dune, several yards back from the beach. Great job! Don't they have any common sense? Hello? Stand on the beach and look back before you install the sign!
