How good are on-line or CD-ROM maps for the islands?
While some old mapping websites and CD-ROMs don’t cover Hawaii, most do cover the state. Indeed, each of my route lists has a link to a Google on-line map for the island(s) covered by the list. However, definitely take the on-line and CD-ROM maps with a grain of salt, as the map data many companies rely on for their Hawaii coverage aren’t as good as data for the mainland. Some highways are included that were proposed but never built, or used to be open but now aren’t. Most infamously, if you ask for directions from the coastal area of Hawaii Volcanoes National Park to Kapoho to the northeast, at least one of the mapping programs used to route you through an active lava flow, over a highway that has been closed to through traffic for about three decades (last I checked, it has caught on that the road is now closed). Another road that looks like a short-cut on the computer screen, but really isn’t, is the private road that used to connect the two segments of the Piilani Highway in south
