Today Hawaii’s new cellphone law takes effect.
Drivers with cell phone violations will no longer have to make the usual mandatory court appearance. Since the court system has been congested with violators the law has been changed to make cellphone texting an infraction. However the fine has been raised to $297 from about $100 last year.
Hopefully this costly fine will persuade users to stop, for the sake and safety of others on the road.
All port locations and offices will be closed July 4th.
Have a happy and safe weekend.
we will re-open on Monday the 7th!
Hawaii’s First International Auto Show is this weekend Friday, March 14-Sunday, March 16, 2014 and will be held at Hawaii’s Convention Center in Honolulu.
Over 350 of the newest cars, crossovers, trucks, SUVs, luxury cars will be showcased at the event. New models will be showcased including the BMW 4 Series, Chevrolet Corvette Stingray, Jaguar F-Type, Mercedes-Benz S550, Nissan Rogue, Toyota Corolla and more. Several pre-production and 2015-model-year vehicles will also be on display including the 2015 Audi A3 Sedan, 2015 Ford Mustang, 2015 Ford F-150, 2015 Ford Super Duty, 2015 Kia K900 and 2015 Subaru WRX.
Other exhibits include Multi-Million Dollar Exotic Vehicle display, featuring some of the unique most expensive vehicles, from Ferrari, Maserati, Lamborghini and Bentley. There will also be a test drive, includes a selection of cars, trucks and SUVs on a roadway course around the convention center. A vehicle expert will accompany drivers to highlight the model’s performance.
Motor vehicle registrations in Hawaii rose about 15 percent in 2013, according to a report from the Hawaii Automobile Dealers Association.
Over 28 percent of the vehicles registered were Toyotas, making it the most popular brand in Hawaii. 16.6 percent vehicles were Honda’s which is the second most popular. T
There is immense economic growth and the demand forces are improving the market.
Up to 51,000 registrations are predicted for 2014.
Servco Automotive has purchased Maui’s Island Subaro dealership in Kahului from Kitagawa Motors. This Honolulu-based company will now operate as Servco Subaru on Maui at its current location. In 2013, the Maui Subaru dealership sold 207 vehicles. Servco Automotive now owns three Subaru dealerships, including two on Oahu.
An estimated $51 billion has been spent on the Sochi Winter Olympics, one of the priciest Olympics in history. A good percentage of this high cost this year is shipping the equipment and goods to the games in Russia.
From a logistical standpoint the Winter Olympics is a huge freight and shipping disaster. The goods needed will be shipped by sea, air, rail, and land and all transportation routes will be monitored by the Federal Customs Service.
Most of the goods include sporting equipment, firearms, hospitality goods, broadcast equipment, computer equipment, and awards. The logistical numbers for shipped freight are immense. To handle this huge shipment, the 2014 Sochi Organizing Committee has appointed an official freight forwarder for freight access to Sochi to ensure the efficiency of this transport.
Once all goods and equipment clear through customs, the freight is loaded on the Russian Railways train and shipped to one of two distribution centers based on the type of freight. This distribution center will be the central hub of all Olympics’ logistics operations. From the distribution centers, all the freight will be organized and available for use. Every piece of freight requires shipping documents.
The huge amount of products needed to ship were difficult to manage and problems did arise, the Olympics had a rocky start, but a start nevertheless.
– See more at: http://www.roadrunnerautotransport.com/news/?p=94&preview=true#sthash.ImEHQSKW.dpuf
HONOLULU – Engine failure caused the crash of a plane in the ocean off Hawaii that killed the director of the state health department, the owner of the airline said Thursday. Eight other people onboard, including the pilot, survived.
Owner Richard Schuman of Makani Kai Air said the pilot did his best to get the single-engine plane down safely and keep the passengers together in the waters off Molokai.
Asked how they survived, he responded: “Will.”
“Getting out of the aircraft was important,” he said. “It was, extremely, a team effort on many people to take care of them.”
The pilot of the 2002 Cessna Grand Caravan was physically OK, said Schuman, who declined to release his name. Little information was available on the conditions of the other passengers.
Maui County officials said the National Transportation Safety Board was investigating the crash that occurred on Wednesday and killed health director Loretta Fuddy.
The plane, bound for Honolulu, went down about a half-mile northwest of Kalaupapa peninsula, Maui Fire Department spokesman Lee Mainaga said in a statement.
Schuman said he did not yet know why the engine failed because he has not been able to see the plane. It crashed soon after takeoff, after getting into the air and making its turn toward Honolulu, he said.
Schuman said the plane had no previous problems.
“There’s only one engine on that plane and when it quits on you, you just have to deal with it in that moment,” he said.
Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Ian Gregor said investigators planned to speak with the pilot and some passengers on Thursday.
The location of the wreckage combined with wind and wave conditions likely means it won’t be recoverable, NTSB spokesman Eric Weiss added.
It was Fuddy who released President Barack Obama’s birth certificate in 2011 after he and his personal attorney wrote to Fuddy to make public his original birth certificate and relieve the state from the burden that came with repeated inquiries.
Fuddy said then that she had viewed the records that “further prove the fact that he was born in Hawaii.”
Fuddy, 65, and deputy director Keith Yamamoto were on the flight after an annual visit to Kalaupapa, a remote peninsula on the north side of Molokai (moh-loh-KY’-ee) island where the state exiled leprosy patients until 1969.
Tom Matsuda, interim executive director of Hawaii’s health insurance exchange, confirmed the death of Fuddy, who was on the board of the exchange.
“I cannot even begin to convey what a terrible loss this is for Hawaii,” Matsuda said in a statement. “I worked closely with Director Fuddy on the Affordable Care Act and came to know and respect her as a passionate advocate for public health and a warm, caring human being.”
Gov. Neil Abercrombie said Fuddy was loved and respected.
“Her knowledge was vast, her counsel and advice always given from her heart as much as from her storehouse of experience,” Abercrombie said.
Rev. Patrick Killilea, pastor of St. Francis Church at Kalaupapa, recalled how he made sign of the cross on Fuddy’s forehead when her body was taken to a care home after the crash.
“I did give her conditional last rites, not knowing exactly what time she passed,” he said. “From what I understand, she could have been deceased for a couple of hours.”
The priest said Yamamoto shared how he had held Fuddy’s hand in the water after the plane went down.
“They were in their life preservers,” Killilea said. “At some point she let go, and there was no response.”
U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz, a former lieutenant governor under Abercrombie, said Fuddy was capable and caring. His office said Fuddy spent 30 years working in health and human services and had been health director since March 2011.
Most recently, Fuddy led the department as it transitioned its marriage license system to allow gay couples to wed under a new law that took effect this month.
Coast Guard Petty Officer Melissa McKenzie said a Coast Guard helicopter rescued three passengers from the water and Maui fire crews picked up others. One person swam ashore.
McKenzie said the helicopter transported three people to Honolulu for medical treatment, while a Coast Guard plane took five people to Maui.
The leprosy settlement on Kalaupapa is still run by the state health department, though only a few former leprosy patients continue to live there.
Credit Source: Fox News
Bad news for foes of distracted driving: A new survey from State Farm says the problem is getting worse, even though drivers know better.
In July 2013, the Annual State Farm Distracted Driving Survey polled 1,014 adults across the U.S., asking them about their behavior behind the wheel and their suggestions for addressing the problem of distracted driving.
The survey’s most remarkable finding was that the number of motorists who access the Internet (e.g. check email, surf websites, etc.) has nearly doubled over the past four years. In 2009, just 13 percent of motorists admitted that they’d accessed the Internet while driving. In 2013, that figure had jumped to 24 percent.
The reason for the increase seems clear: More drivers are accessing the Internet because increasingly ubiquitous smartphones have made doing so very, very easy. Over 80 percent of drivers under 50 now own a smartphone, and the numbers are edging upward, even among seniors. In 2011, for example, 23 percent of motorists 65 and older had smartphones; today, that figure hovers at 39 percent.
The good news is that older, experienced drivers are aware of distracted driving’s dangers. In 2011, 61 percent of motorists 30 and older admitted to talking on a cell phone while driving. In 2013, that number had fallen to 55 percent. The figures for texting ticked up slightly among the 30+ demographic — 32 percent admitted that they’d texted while driving in 2011 and 33 percent said they’d done the same in 2013 — but that’s nearly flat.
The bad news is that drivers 18 to 29 still don’t get the message. In 2011, 68 percent of motorists in that age range said that they talked on a hand-held cell phone while driving; in 2013, that figure hit 76 percent. The figures for texting are just as grim: in 2011, 61 percent of drivers under 30 said that they’d texted from behind the wheel; in 2013, 70 percent said the same.
Of course, as with smoking, alcohol abuse, and other bad habits, distracted drivers know that what they’re doing is wrong. In fact, 91 percent of those surveyed said they agreed either “strongly” (74 percent) or “somewhat” (17 percent) with a law or other measure that would prevent motorists from texting or emailing while driving. Whether such laws would have any effect on motorists’ habits is up for debate, though: over half of all respondents said distracted driving laws currently on the books are rarely enforced.
This story originally appeared at The Car Connection
UPDATE – View live port gate cameras in real time. Get an inside look of the day to day operations from a birds eye view.
Visit the live gate cam page to see what’s going on right now!
Gas mileage has gotten far more important in new-car choices over the last 10 years, and that’s not likely to change.
But not everyone really understands automobile efficiency–or how to maximize their mileage–and which tactics will really save them money.
Here’s our cheat sheet.
1) Your driving style matters (and so does your highway speed).
You know how they say “Your mileage may vary”? The way you drive is one of the major variants.
If you want to save money on gas, drive as if there’s an egg between your foot and the accelerator pedal: Accelerate gently and smoothly, and look several cars ahead so that if you’re going to need to slow down, you can lift off and let your car coast up to a light or stop sign.
Any time you have to brake, you’ve wasted more gas than if your car rolls up to the stop sign and ends up stopping right at the line of its own accord.
Stay safe and be very mindful of surrounding traffic when you drive this way, though–there are a whole lot of impatient, aggressive drivers out there.
Once you nail the smooth driving, focus on your highway speed. The energy required to push a car through air resistance rises almost exponentially above about 45 mph–so going from 60 to 75 mph costs you a lot more than the “same” 15-mph increase from 45 to 60 mph.
Try driving the speed limit on highways for a week–instead of 12 mph over–and see how much gas money you’ll save. You may be surprised. Just remember: Do it in the right-hand lane, not the fast lane!
2) Improving a low number saves more gas (and money) than improving a high number.
It saves way more gas money to improve a car from 10 to 20 miles per gallon than it does to go from 33 to 50 mpg.
But most Americans surveyed think the opposite is true; they get gas mileage exactly backwards.
While a 50-mpg Toyota Prius hybrid will give you great bragging rights, if you move up from a 33-mpg compact car, you’re only saving 1 gallon every 100 miles.
If you can replace your old 10-mpg truck with a new 20-mpg pickup, you’ll save 10 gallons every 100 miles. You do the math on that one.
3) Any new car gets better gas mileage than the same car 10 years ago.
After years of stagnation, new corporate average fuel-economy regulations came into effect a few years ago.
For the next 11 years, the average gas mileage of new vehicles sold in the U.S. must rise each year–to an average of 54.5 mpg in 2025, which translates to about 42 mpg on the window sticker.
That’s well below what the current 2013 Toyota Prius achieves, never mind the more efficient model coming in 2015, but it applies across all vehicles–including those pickup trucks.
And it’s working, too: The average gas mileage of new cars sold has never been higher.
Take the mid-size Chevrolet Malibu sedan, for instance.
In 2004, the best combined gas-mileage rating for any model of Malibu was 25 mpg. Now, the highest-rated 2014 Chevrolet Malibu gets 29 mpg–with or without the Eco mild-hybrid option.
And gas-mileage ratings for pretty much all new vehicles will continue to go slightly higher every year for the next decade.
That means that every new car you buy in the future will be more fuel-efficient than a similar car today (not to mention safer and most likely with more standard features).
4) EPA ratings and real-world results are two different things.
Your mileage may vary, and it usually does. But the differences between EPA-rated gas mileage and real-world results varies a lot across manufacturers.
Comparing real-world mileage for Ford, Honda, and Toyota cars, we found Honda to do better than its EPA combined ratings, Toyota to be slightly lower–and Ford to be significantly worse in its latest 2013 hybrids and EcoBoost models.
To save yourself money, compare the real-world results for cars you’re considering to their EPA ratings on both Fuelly and the “Our Users’ Average MPG” link for each model on the EPA’s FuelEconomy.gov site.
If a car you’re thinking of buying is delivering real-world mileage that’s 20 percent lower than its EPA combined rating, that’s another 25 percent added to your fuel costs each year.
At 15,000 miles a year, if a car is rated at 30 mpg combined but only gets 24 mpg (using $4-per-gallon gasoline), that’s an extra $1,000 you’ll pay every two years.
5) Plug-in electric cars are much, much cheaper to run per mile.
Do you know what you pay per kilowatt-hour? Most people don’t, but the U.S. average is around 12 cents.
Most plug-in electric cars get 3 to 4 miles per kWh, depending on speed and driving style, when they’re running all-electric.
So driving 100 miles on grid electricity might cost you around $4–whereas in a 25-mpg car using $4-per-gallon gasoline, that would cost you $16.
See the advantage?
Sure, plug-in cars are pricier today–but they’re way cheaper to run. Do the math for yourself, and see if you could save enough gasoline to offset the higher price.
It doesn’t work for many people today, but it does for some–especially if they have workplace charging as well as overnight charging at home.
Electric cars are also nicer to drive, most owners say.
The costs of electric cars will fall over the next decade and beyond, meaning that you should at least consider an electric alternative each time you buy a new car.
This story via Hawaii News Now – originally appeared on Green Car Reports
