Kailua Town's Holiday Season Comes With a Detour Map This Year

Where do you park for a Kailua Town Sunday when the city is digging test holes in the municipal lot, Lōkahi has moved to a different address and Kailua Road has a paving crew on it? Most of November 2026 runs into some version of that question. The holiday calendar and the work schedules have landed in the same few weeks. They also share street names: Aulike, Maluniu, Uluniu and Kuʻulei.

The work comes in three pieces: a one-week archaeological survey in the municipal lot, a crossing at Kuʻulei and Aulike rebuilt with paint and posts, and a resurfacing job on Kailua Road. Each touches a different part of a holiday weekend in town.

The municipal lot gets its delayed survey first

The City's Department of Design and Construction is sending crews back into the Kailua Municipal Parking Lot from Monday, November 2 through Friday, November 6, from 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. each day, weather permitting. The work was supposed to wrap up in April. The March Kona Low stopped crews before they finished, which is why the City's October 19 notice calls this the final stage.

The survey checks whether culturally or historically significant resources are present before any construction starts. Crews will dig exploratory excavations at five spots inside the lot. During that work, the notice lists these possible impacts:

• Up to eight stalls may be closed at a time while crews excavate.
• The Aulike Street and Maluniu Avenue driveways may close one at a time, or run single-direction contraflow, but at least one driveway stays open at all times.
• Equipment may be staged along Aulike Street or Maluniu Avenue.
• Alternate public parking is across the street at 25 Aulike Street.

The City's archaeological consultant, Honua Consulting, will watch traffic and move equipment as needed. Survey week is short, but it opens a longer story. The same notice says lot improvements could begin at the end of 2027, including new asphalt, better lighting, accessibility upgrades, improved pay stations and landscaping. This November's digging is a step toward a rebuilt lot more than a year from now.

A block over, Kuʻulei and Aulike get a quick-build crossing

The intersection of Kuʻulei Road and Aulike Street is also scheduled for work in November. The Department of Transportation Services plans "quick-build" pedestrian safety changes there as an interim measure until a planned traffic signal goes in. Each crossing gets a pedestrian refuge island, so people on foot cross one direction of traffic at a time, plus curb extensions that make people waiting to cross easier to see. The work is built from pavement markings, signs and delineator posts. The City's Kailua Complete Streets page says installation is anticipated to begin in November 2026 and take one to two weeks, weather permitting.

As part of the same work, the school-zone speed limit drops to 20 mph, in line with Ordinance 24-32. The City is also lowering speed limits near schools on Kuʻulei Road and Kalāheo Avenue to 20 mph and marking new crosswalks on Kalāheo Avenue at the beach access points near ʻAinoni Street and Kuʻuniu Street.

Put the two projects together and a driver coming into town on Kuʻulei in early November could meet a new crossing layout at Aulike and then a partly coned lot entrance a few turns later. The City describes the posts and islands as a stopgap until the planned signal goes in. Larger, federally funded designs with crossing beacons, bike lanes and traffic calming are heading into the design phase for three segments: Kailua Road from Hāmākua Drive to Aumoe Road, Kuʻulei Road from Kailua Road to Kalāheo Avenue, and Kalāheo Avenue from Mōkapu Boulevard to Kailua Road.

Lōkahi moves for four Sundays, and the new spots are on the same streets

Sunday is where the overlap reaches the farmers market. Lōkahi Kailua Market normally runs every Sunday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 340 Uluniu Street, with 60-plus vendors on site most weeks. On November 29 and December 6, 13 and 20, the market moves to one of its two relocation venues: 419 Uluniu Street or 25 Maluniu Avenue. The market says those dates are subject to change and posts updates through its newsletter and its Instagram account, @lokahi_kailua_market.

25 Maluniu Avenue sits on the street the City lists as a survey staging area and a lot driveway, although the survey ends weeks before Lōkahi's first relocation date. Street parking is free on Sundays, according to the market.

The other Sunday market doesn't move. FarmLovers' Kailua Town market keeps its usual schedule every Sunday from 8 a.m. to noon at 640 Ulukahiki Street. On a relocation Sunday, the steadiest stop in town is the one that starts an hour earlier.

The holiday calendar, placed over the work

Here are the main holiday dates for Kailua and the nearby Windward side, from survey week through December 20, with the events and the work in one list:

The Kalama Beach Club fair falls the day after the survey crews leave, so the first holiday-shopping Saturday gets a full municipal lot. The Holiday Sip + Shop on November 12 brings shopping, entertainment and refreshments to more than 30 local businesses in a three-hour Thursday evening window. Two days later, the Kailua Town second-Saturday series brings Kalaʻe & Kalena to the parking garage behind Longs/CVS, which is a parking structure doing double duty as a stage.

For a Windward parade, the City's 2026 street-use calendar lists the Kāneʻohe Christmas Parade on December 5. It runs from Windward Mall along Kamehameha Highway and Kāneʻohe Bay Drive to Castle High School.

Kailua Road is the job most likely to stretch past the holidays

At the Kailua Neighborhood Board's August meeting, the Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation's new contact for the board estimated that resurfacing Kailua Road from Kalanianaʻole Highway to Hāmākua Drive would start in November 2026 and finish by January 2027. He added that the schedule might move up because the nearby Kaʻelepulu Stream bridge project was finishing sooner than expected. That summary is in the City's posted meeting record.

That is the main road into town, scheduled to be repaved during the holiday stretch, on an estimate HDOT gave in August. Two beach-side projects were on similar timelines:

1. The North Kalāheo Avenue bridge. The board was told it was still on track for completion in October 2026.
2. The new Ocean Safety building and parking lot at Kailua Beach Park. At the September 3 board meeting, Ocean Safety said both were progressing, with completion expected around October 2026.

All three dates were forecasts when they were given, and forecasts on Oʻahu road jobs move with the weather. The muni lot schedule is the example: April turned into November after one Kona Low.

Updates on these projects tend to come out at the Kailua Neighborhood Board, where city and state representatives report on them in person. The board meets on Thursday, November 5 and Thursday, December 3 at 7 p.m. at 21 South Kainalu Drive. The City posts agendas on its event pages for the November 5 meeting and the December 3 meeting. The November meeting falls during survey week, at the start of the estimated Kailua Road paving window, so it is a good time to hear where each project actually stands.

Most of Kailua's holiday events are happening on the same streets as this work, so it helps to know the town street by street. If you're settling into Kailua or helping family get to know the Windward side, Hawaii Home Group is happy to share the neighborhood knowledge we use every day, from which lot to try first on a Sunday to where the market moves this month. Start your Oʻahu move, and let's find your Hawaii home.