Posted on 08/27/2007 7:51:24 AM PDT by SmithL
Honolulu (AP) -- The Coast Guard helped clear protesters who briefly disrupted the second voyage of Hawaii's first-ever passenger ferry service among the Hawaiian islands, but the fight over the ship's environmental impact is far from over.
The Hawaii Superferry made two packed trips Sunday — two days ahead of schedule — after the state Supreme Court ruled last week that the state should have required an environmental report before the ferry launched. State transportation officials, noting that the court didn't explicitly say the ship couldn't run, still allowed the service to start.
A dozen protesters on surfboards blocked the ship for more than an hour from docking at Kauai's Lihue harbor Sunday, but the Coast Guard cleared them away. Hundreds more protesters onshore beat drums and chanted in support of the surfers.
The protesters and environmentalists argue that the ferry's plan to ply 400 miles of Hawaii waters each day endangers whales, threatens to spread invasive species and will worsen traffic and pollution.
They planned to ask a judge on Monday for an injunction to halt the ferry service until the environmental study is conducted.
Hawaii Superferry Inc., in a statement late Sunday, said it was disappointed in the delay on Kauai.
"We are sorry to see that minority dissident groups have chosen to oppose a service that the people of Hawaii have overwhelmingly embraced," the statement said, noting it had sold 22,000 tickets.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
What a bunch of luddites.....
Yeah, cuz ya know sailin’ ... like ... ships ‘n’ stuff on the ocean is ... ya know ... bad, dude.
Note the passenger plane above the ferry. The alternative is more flights. Isn’t that even less ecologically sound?
Surfers, just the people you would turn to to provide meaningful insight into anything not dealing with waves, curls, boards, chicks and bongs.
“Dude, totally mongo waves down at the beach, drop what you’re doing right now and get your board! Just tell your boss you’re not feeling well and need to go home, he’ll sooo fall for it!”
Hey, we build these things here in Mobile, Alabama. The guys down here need the work. If this one works out, they're ordering another.
the selfish locals don’t want day trippers to come to their
island, with a car, and spend nothing.
....Bob
The only people who can make a day trip to Hawaii by ferry are other Hawaiians.
For real....How perfectly ironic!.....Why aren’t they at the airport blocking those awful CO2 spewing jets engines from landing?......................
I assume we are discussing some outlying island.
.......................................
anyone with a car,
Hawaiians, or visitors who have already
rented a car.
would be in a position to visit for a day, and drive around
spend nothing
Most on Kauai are worried about thieves coming from other islands, burglarizing homes and vehicles, hopping back on the ferry the next day, and disappearing into the huge population of Oahu. The superferry is a fad right now. The ticket price is higher than the cost of a roundtrip flight and car rental for the day, and takes three hours each way.
I fully support the super ferry.
I use the time spent waiting in the line up engaging others in political discussions, Busting the Global warming myth etc.
IMHO more old wine in new bottles. To wit, the Leftist (like the Puritans) fear that somewhere, somehow, someone in someway might be enjoying life.
"Idiots on surfboards stop superferry in Hawaii" is more accurate.
Dude, the goal, like, is to stop people from traveling at all.
That can't be. We don't manufacture anything in the U.S. anymore. Really, I read that here.
Ahem, it is an Australian company.
First, why has it now become a pattern in America to use laws for purposes to which they were never originally intended? For example, we now regularly distort the federal income tax statutes to accomplish social engineering. This has gotten to the point that it costs us billions of dollars a year because the regulations have become so labyrinthine that we require highly paid specialists to lead us through the thickets. We use environmental laws regularly to stop unsightly windmills off our Nantucket shores. I am not aware that the environmental laws were designed to protect Ted Kennedy's view. We use wetlands laws to stop development because we don't want the congestion. We use environmental laws routinely to stop nuclear power plants, not for environmental reasons, but because we are afraid.
Now we say we are worried worried about the whales when in fact we are worried about burglars.
I think this distortion comes out of the fact that we cannot always in our politically correct world employ laws for their express purposes. For example, it seems to me that if you're worried about burglars you should look to the criminal law rather than environmental laws. But we've gotten to the point in this country where one has to be very careful about asking for the enforcement of criminal laws lest one be accused of being racist. In any case, the average citizen too often cannot rely for his protection on the government vigorously enforcing the criminal laws, there are simply too many counter interest groups involved. So we cast about for some politically correct law, we say we want to save the whales.
This is the way Third World countries work-that is the laws are not enforced, or they are selectively enforced, or they are arbitrarily enforced- but in those places the motivation is different. In the Third World these circumstances occur because of money corruption. In America we seem to be in the throes of a corruption of the soul.
By the time, you go through the usual airport hassles, return one rental car, and get another, it's probably still quicker than flying (and far more pleasant).
All I need is some cool waves and tasty bud. Hey Stu where did you get that jacket.
But these whackos never say a word about the floating sewers, I mean cruiseships, that dump untold gallons of sewage around the islands. There was never a impact study done for them, must have paid off the right ‘rats in state government.
On Lake Michigan there’s the Great Lakes Express, a catamaran ferry running from Milwaukee, WI to Muskegon, MI about 80 mi. It’s 180 feet long and takes 2.5 hours each way. A tourist fare round trip is about $90.00. I took it a couple of years ago when I attended the NRA convention in Milwaukee. Did you folks make it and do you know if the Hawaii ferry is a similar ship?
Enforce the law! They should just run their asses down, they would get out of the way.
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