Happy Ending in Honolulu: Once-bankrupt Residential Tower Project Gets to Finish Line

PHOTO COURTESY OF Pacifica honolulu

High-rise condo tower re-emerges from bankruptcy.

Pacifica Honolulu, a 46-story project that was mothballed for more than a year after its first developer went bankrupt, opened as planned early this month. Last year, San Diego-based developer OliverMcMillan resurrected the $284-million project, first called Moana Vista. Ledcor Construction, working with Architects Hawaii Ltd., Gensler Architects and Baldridge Associates Structural Engineers, finished the job that was begun by the first general contractor, Hawaiian Dredging Construction, which lost its construction loan when the project was at the 27th floor.

Nadine M. Post, ENR's former editor-at-large for buildings, is an award-winning journalist with 45 years of experience covering trends, issues, innovations, controversies and challenging projects. Post has written about many industry giants, including 10 ENR Award of Excellence winners. And she has covered disasters, failures and attacks, including the 1993 bombing and the 2001 destruction of the World Trade Center. Project stories include the redevelopment of the World Trade Center; the 828-meter-tall Burj Khalifa; Los Angeles’ Disney Concert Hall; and Seattle's Bullitt Center and Rainier Square Tower. In 1985, Post wrote McGraw-Hill's book Restoring the Statue of Liberty (1986) for the restoration’s architects—Richard S. Hayden and Thierry W. Despont.

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