KEY POINTS:
Waikiki, long the maligned tart of Pacific tourism, is waking up to its strengths. It is not Maui, it is not perhaps authentic Polynesia, but it is big, bright, busy and it is fun.
It may not be the coolest location for seekers of surf or a palm tree paradise but it is not too badly endowed in both.
Waikiki has realised at last that its strength, its point of difference is that it is urban. For too long it let cultural snobs treat its glamour and glitz as a matter of shame. For a few decades of the late 20th century, Waikiki's planners took the sniffy criticism to heart and imposed stultifying restrictions on development. The usual thing: sight-line and set-back rules, reduced height limits.
The restrictions were so severe, according to Nancy Daniels of Outrigger hotels, that it became uneconomic to do more than minimal refurbishments. Waikiki's towering beachfront palaces began to show their age and decay. The resort went into a long decline as visitors to Hawaii sought out simpler, quieter spots on the archipelago.
But all that is changing, according to the Outrigger Enterprises Group, which has just completed a redevelopment it claims to be the largest undertaken in Waikiki for 30 years.
On an 3.2ha site one block back from the beach, between busy Levers St and Beachwalk, the company has built a US$535 million precinct of hotels, galleries, restaurants and retail boutiques that could point the way to a new Waikiki.
They have certainly broken the mould of building restrictions, according to Daniels. She said the company went to great effort to convince the authorities that it had to be given some breaks to do the kind of comprehensive redevelopment it completed in December.
The Waikiki Beach Walk, as it is called, features a plaza of vaguely Polynesian character, with scores of transplanted palm trees, curving perspex canopies like waves overhead, a tapa motif on the hotel walls and patios, and a "hui" of native Hawaiian cultural and retail galleries in the centre.
When complete the complex is expected to include five hotels and 47 food and retail outlets. A US$100 million repositioning of Outrigger's Reef on the Beach is under way, refurbishment of the Ohana Islander Waikiki starts this year, and a Trump International Hotel is scheduled for completion in 2009.
Group executive vice-president Mel Kaneshige, says the aim is to "let all visitors know they are indeed in Hawaii. Everything you see, smell, taste, touch and hear lets you know you are experiencing the best of the islands."
Well, maybe. When I was there earlier this year not all the planned boutiques and galleries had opened, the instant green grass of the plaza still looked too new to walk on, and the fountain that will double as a stage in the evening was having some teething problems.
But street entertainment was well under way, featuring traditional music and hula, and there was also a second floor, "grand lanai" concourse, between the hotels, which is intended for evening outdoor shows.
Even then, with further touches still to be completed, it was already giving Waikiki a new lease on life.
WAIKIKI
Embassy suites
Room rates at the Embassy Suites hotel start at $399 for one bedroom, $549 for a two-bedroom suite. A special deal at $249 for a single and $399 for a suite may be obtainable for a limited time. Children under 18 can stay free.
For further details see www.embassysuiteswaikiki.com
FURTHER INFORMATION
For general information about Hawaii see www.hawaiitourism.co.nz
