HONOLULU -- Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann announced on Tuesday his plan to build a 20-mile route for the fixed-rail transit from Kapolei to Ala Moana, instead of ending at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.

For the first leg, the mayor wants a 20-mile, mostly elevated train system. The mayor said that starting in the west makes the most sense. He said that starting in downtown, the city would have more conflicts about condemning valuable urban property.

PDF See Proposed Route

"And I think the beauty, again, of coming from the west side is that you have open land. You have land available for base yards, which is also a major obstacle to overcome. You have a very strong constituent base," Hannemann said.

The mayor hopes to break ground for the first leg by 2009, and have commuters ride a 7- to 10-mile section by 2012.

Some Kapolei bus riders KITV spoke with said they are looking forward to the entire first leg all the way to Ala Moana.

"I think it would be great because i live in Makiki and that would make it really accessible to me to get back to Ala Moana, then catch a bus home," Makiki resident Sandee Carl said.

However, Kapolei worker Slavas Keerman said he is disappointed that the mayor's first leg does not include stops in Salt Lake, where he lives.

"They need it to go through Salt Lake. That's where most of our population is at. They got so many people in Salt Lake, one bus is not coming all the way through there," Keerman said.

The mayor said he hopes the City Council will approve the first leg of a train plan by next month. He plans to begin a $10 million environmental study in March on what he wants to be a complete transit system, continuing through downtown and on to UH Manoa with a leg going off to Waikiki.

The reason the mayor is announcing his preferred route is because it is a necessary step to get federal funding.