Plant More, Build Less!
Plant more and build less. Plant more trees, plants, seeds, and stop building! Being a resident of Honolulu, Hawaii for the past 30 years has opened my eyes to change, not for the good, but for the bad. Honolulu has experienced some record breaking temperatures recently and with the ever-lingering vog (volcano smoke) that plaques tiny Honolulu every now and then, change has definitely come to Hawaii. In 5 years, it will probably be so hot in Honolulu because I'm guessing that another ten or so building projects will go up instead of trees. What's even more ridiculous is most of Honolulu's buildings are unoccupied real estate ventures meaning the condominiums are outrageously priced that everyone wants to live in one but they can't because they can't afford it. Google "Waikiki Landmark" and you'll wonder why that building never goes over 50% occupancy because of the prices for the units. And Waikiki Landmark was built in 1993 so it's been sitting there for the past 16 years.
If humanity was smart enough, people would plant trees and build less. Trees help keep the earth cool. Take out Waikiki Landmark and plant a forest there. A forest sitting for 16 years would be more beneficial to not just Hawaii, but the earth too. But more buildings, more luxury high-rise condominiums went up, and 3 of them did, yet again, in Honolulu. Now the Ko'olani, one of the 3 buildings that was recently built in Honolulu, supposedly sold out all of its condos priced above one million dollars but I don't see all the lights turned on as I'm driving past the unoccupied building at night along Ala Moana Boulevard. Ko'olani, Hokua, and Moana Pacific are the three recently built luxury condominiums that are just sitting there in Honolulu just like the Waikiki Landmark. If that wasn't enough, another two high-rise condominiums went up near the Ko'olani. To make matters worse, there are more buildings going up in the Honolulu area and soon enough, Honolulu will be just like Manhattan New York with buildings everywhere!
To save the earth, we should all band together and plant more trees instead of build more high-priced condominium buildings that ultimately become unoccupied because nobody can't afford the price range between $400,000 - $2,500,000,000 to live in one. If we can't save the earth, then at least save Hawaii! Maybe just enough trees and forests going up instead of buildings could be the solution to global warming. I'd rather look at the beautiful blue sky, not unoccupied sky-scrapers!
This hub was published May 1, 2009.