Highways

HILO – The Hawaii Department of Transportation (HDOT) will begin operating the AM northbound contraflow on Keaau-Pahoa Road (Route 130) between Shower Drive and Kaloli Drive on Monday, August 26 at 5:30 a.m.

The contraflow will be open between 5:30 a.m. and 8:30 a.m. Monday through Friday, excluding holidays.

Following field observations, the following changes have been made to the contraflow design:

• No left turn will be permitted from Pahoa bound (southbound) Keaau-Pahoa Road onto Shower Drive during the contraflow
• No left turn will be permitted from Keaau bound (northbound) Keaau-Pahoa Road onto Pohaku Drive during the contraflow
• The modified conceptual drawing can viewed at https://hidot.hawaii.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/new-2019-keaau-pahoa-contraflow-plan.pdf

These movements will be allowed outside of the hours of the Keaau-Pahoa Road AM northbound contraflow, which are 5:30 a.m. to 8:30 a.m. Monday through Friday, excluding holidays.

An additional traffic signal head, which would require design modifications to the traffic signal arm, would be needed to allow these movements during the contraflow. Counts for these movements taken during the April/May 2018 contraflow trial do not show an immediate need for modifications to the Shower Drive signal.

As a reminder, when the contraflow begins operations, the dedicated right turn lane from Shower Drive onto northbound Keaau-Pahoa Road will no longer be in place. Drivers making the right turn from Shower Drive onto northbound Keaau-Pahoa Road must stop on red and yield to oncoming northbound traffic on Keaau-Pahoa Road.

HDOT will continue observations of the contraflow and will make adjustments as needed. The initial contraflow design is based on traffic counts and turn counts that may be viewed here and here.

These observations showed increased volumes on Shower Drive during the morning rush. HDOT believes this is due to motorists from outside the subdivision cutting through Hawaiian Paradise Park to avoid congestion on Keaau-Pahoa Road. The extra lane provided by the northbound contraflow in addition to the removal of the dedicated right turn from Shower Drive is designed to encourage those that do not live in the Hawaiian Paradise Park neighborhood to stay on the main route and off the private roads.

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