Mokuhinia Restoration Project Draft Survey Online

Closeup shots of the Cultural Surveys Hawai‘i work trench that uncovered the location and corner stones of the causeway (last year). The causeway connected the King’s Road (Front Street) to the island and would have been guarded by sentries. It’s located in the Moku‘ula parking lot at the Front Street driveway entrance. Photo courtesy: Friends of Mokuʻula.

A meeting for the public to review a Draft Archaeological Inventory Survey Report for the Mokuhinia Ecosystem Restoration Project in West Maui has been rescheduled for Monday, Jan. 22nd at 6 p.m. at the West Maui Senior Center.  A previous meeting was cancelled last month due to inclement weather.  A link to the full draft report is available here.

Loko o Mokuhinia is the former wetland that surrounded the ancient island of Mokuʻula in West Maui, located at the site known today as Maluʻulu o Lele Park.

Loko o Mokuhinia was a 17-acre pond that is cited in Hawaiian traditions as the home of Kihawahine, a deity in royal lineage, and guardian for the sacred Mokuhinia ponds and Mokuʻula Island.

State documents describe the island as the preferred residence of high ranking aliʻi through the mid-1800s.

According to an Environmental Assessment filed for the project in 2013, the pond was filled in 1914 due to hygienic and development purposes when the pond became stagnant.

Several years later, in 1918, an executive order established the site as the current Maluʻulu o Lele Park, with the pond and island now located approximately 2 to 3 feet below the ground surface of the park, according to state documentation.