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"One of these days, Wailuku will touch Maalaea."
We remember making this prediction in the early 1980s while sitting on a friend's Kula lanai. Long after sunset, the stars twinkling in the clear Upcountry sky shone brighter than the smattering of city lights below. Kahului Airport, Dream City, Puunene Mill and old Wailuku Heights framed one edge of the dark valley, while the condos of Maalaea delineated the other. In between lay a vast expanse of sugar cane and pineapple, two crops with long histories and, as it turned out, short futures.
It didn't take a Nostradamus to see Maui's days as an agrarian backwater had come to a close. Its natural beauty, welcoming people and fantastic weather were capturing the world's attention in a big way. Tourism and construction were now the ascendant industries. The island's population was at the start of a decades-long growth spurt.
A Hawaiian man we met back then said he figured every commercial airliner he saw meant one more person was going to move to this island. There were years when the numbers surely bore him out.
These memories are sparked by a graphic that ran in Thursday's edition of The Maui News illustrating a story on Maui County's proposed Central Maui Wastewater Reclamation Facility. The graphic highlighted housing and commercial areas the facility could service, including more than a handful that have not yet been built. It was a color-coded glimpse into the size and scope of projects planned for both flanks of the central valley. While these developments may not connect the isthmus in one long urban corridor, they will greatly close the gap.
We occasionally peruse long-range maps like this at land use hearings and presentations we cover. It is always a bit jarring how much of what we think of as open space is tabbed for future development. The projects may be on far backburners, or they could be on the verge of breaking ground like the expansive 1,500-unit Waikapu Country Town project.
There is no denying Maui needs housing for island residents. This includes working-class families and individuals, as well as higher-earning professionals who too have found themselves priced out of Maui's real estate market by off-island investors. We take no joy in knowing we'll probably be right about Wailuku touching Maalaea, or that Kihei will someday meld with Kula. It's only natural to yearn for the good old days.
Forty years from now, will longtime Maui residents look back on these times as nostalgically we do the 1970s and '80s? Will they rue future mistakes the way we do those that allowed condos, hotels and critical roadways to be built on beaches barely above the highwater mark? Or, will they give thanks for a community vision and leadership that guided the island's development in a sustainable way that best served the people, environment and host culture?