Honolulu Council to review Ala Moana tower plan

What the Council will consider

The Honolulu City Council is set to review Resolution 171, which would adopt a conceptual plan for part of the Ala Moana Center property. The proposal comes from Honolulu-based BSC Acquisitions II LLC, an affiliate of Kobayashi Group and BlackSand Capital.

The resolution addresses an Interim Planned Development-Transit project at 1450 Ala Moana Blvd. If adopted as drafted, it would allow a proposed hotel tower to reach 400 feet and a residential tower to reach 200 feet. It also would permit the hotel tower to extend as much as 33 feet into the Atkinson Drive height setback. The approval would be subject to multiple conditions.

The project area covers 187,174 square feet within Ala Moana Center’s roughly 2.7 million-square-foot property. The site is currently used for mall parking, and the plan calls for demolishing an existing parking structure.

Housing, hotel and parking plans

The proposal includes a 38-story hotel tower with 294 rooms and a 17-story residential tower with 136 market-rate condominiums. A five-story podium would contain 69 affordable rental homes, commercial space, hotel and residential lobbies, a covered driveway and parking.

Plans call for 1,229 parking spaces. Of those, 439 would serve residential uses, 192 would serve the hotel and 598 would serve Ala Moana Center.

UNITE HERE Local 5, which represents hospitality, health care and food-service workers in Hawaii, plans to ask the developer to include more below-market rental homes. The union argues that 69 affordable units are not enough and that the proposed pricing would not be affordable for working people.