The second segment of Skyline is set to begin passenger operations on Oct. 1, expanding the City and County of Honolulu's rail system and bringing passengers closer to Honolulu's urban core.
Mayor Rick Blangiardi made the announcement during his State of the City address Tuesday, March 18, at Mission Memorial Auditorium. The news was met with cheers and applause from the audience.
Currently, Skyline spans nearly 11 miles from the Kualaka‘i East Kapolei Station to Hālawa Aloha Stadium Station. That segment opened to the public in June 2023.
The new section of rail will extend operations from Aloha Stadium to Middle Street.
The Honolulu Authority for Rapid Transportation, or HART, is leading the planning and construction of Skyline for the city, its website notes, but the rail is operated by the city's Department of Transportation Services, or DTS.
"Our team at HART, led by Lori Kahikina, continues to do incredible work," Blangiardi said during the address. "Construction on the third and final rail segment, through Downtown Honolulu and into Kaka‘ako, will start this year — with the entire system slated to open in 2031. Our job now is to ensure that the new housing developments, the new businesses and the new public spaces we have planned for communities along the rail line keep up with, if not beat, the pace of rail construction."
DTS Director Roger Morton told reporters after the mayor's speech that the department is ready for the opening, "and we're planning to have some excellent bus service to connect people all the way into town, into [the University of Hawai‘i], Waikīkī and into east O‘ahu."
Morton says the new segment will add five more miles and four more stations that include Pearl Harbor; the Daniel K. Inouye International Airport; Lagoon Drive, "where most of our bus connections will be," and the Middle Street transit center.
According to Morton, rail ridership increased February-over-February and he says the new segment will push the number of riders even higher.
"I'm confident that we're going to have significant increases because what we're doing is we're adding rail to a lot of places where there's a lot of jobs — at Pearl Harbor, at airport and in Kalihi," he said. "So I'm confident that we're going to have a great increase in our ridership."
Ridership counts fluctuate from month to month, but data from DTS shows that in February the number of riders totaled 97,819 compared to 93,427 in February 2024. The number of riders per day in February 2025 ranged from 1,708 to 4,330. More ridership statistics can be found here.
For comparison, TheBus reported total ridership islandwide in January 2025 of 3,356,745, with an average weekday ridership of 124,719.
A May 2024 report on commuting patterns by the state Department of Business, Economic Development & Tourism quantified the number of people in O‘ahu neighborhoods who commute elsewhere for work. It identified, for example, just over 19,028 out-commuters in Pearl City, nearly 15,300 in Waipahu, just over 9,000 in Kapolei, more than 13,600 for Ewa Gentry, more than 9,200 for Makakilo, among the largest neighborhoods near the rail line.
Morton said that HART aims to start trial operations in July, "and we're confident that by October, we're going to be in action."
According to the DTS website, Skyline operates from 5 a.m. to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday, and from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, as well as city holidays.
Stephanie Salmons can be reached at stephanie@alohastatedaily.com.
