I've always held the opinion that the roads were designed over a few cases of beer, and the streets were all named by Kindergarteners and toddlers.
I give HI a pass in some cases due to the terrain here. Sometimes, the environment creates constraints that are not easily or affordably overcome. No mainland construction companies are going to bid on these road projects -- too expensive to bring or obtain equipment and workers. Also, without guaranteed follow-on work, the companies would never recoup their investment. All of that to say the local construction companies get a monopoly, and we get whatever they give us for the price the bureaucrats decide -- union wages, of course.
I often marvel at how utterly flawless the stretch of road between the airport and the stadium continues to be while pretty much everywhere else on the island the roads in many places are borderline undrivable.
I understand the roads that were first created in the 1800s and unable to be improved due to buildings, land ownership, etc.
What i don't understand is how H1/H2 has all that land it sits on, and the traffic patterns are just ridiculous. They have a ramp that takes westbound traffic from H1 to Farrington. Why can't they have another fly-over ramp to take westbound/northbound traffic to H2? That would give them the entire underneath to figure out a better solution for the H1 through traffic -- pretty much a straight shot without all the merging in and out.
They actually made things more insane when they added the entrance and exit for the zipper lane.
Maybe they can fix this first, then tackle the Middle Street merge that's always backed up?