HONOLULU -- People living on Oahu are one step closer to paying more taxes. City Council committees voted Tuesday to hike Oahu's excise tax half a percentage point in order to pay for a new transit system.

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The proposed tax hike is for a transit system.

Signs protesting the tax hike on a Nuuanu street are a reminder not everybody likes the idea.

The hike to 4.5 percent actually is a 12.5 percent increase some say could cost each family $450 in extra taxes each year.

"This is the largest single tax increase in history. I don't want to raise people's taxes until I know what I am raising it for. It's as simple as that," Councilwoman Barbara Marshall said.

Marshall was the only one Tuesday to vote against the tax increase.

Other testifiers also protested the push to tax with no design or route in place.

"Please, please. I ask you in behalf of the people of Honolulu, show us a detailed plan first and then enact the tax increase. Otherwise, we are handing you a blank check," Rep. Galen Fox said.

Others wondered who will give up their cars to ride a rail system.

"We need to know who will use it because if we build a system and nobody uses it," said Carol Pregill of the Retail Merchants of Hawaii.

Council members amended the bill to clarify that transit tax money raised can be used only for a mass transit system noting else.

There will be three more public hearings before council members are expected to vote to give final approval to the tax hike.