City Facts

City Facts

Honolulu is the primary city in Hawaii. It is both a city and a county and incorporates the whole island of Oahu. The smaller communities and towns scattered around the island are overseen by the government, police and fire departments of the City and County of Honolulu and are technically part of it.

Virtually, most of the residential areas of Oahu are accessible by city bus. Learn more about this on the City Bus page.

When giving directions on Oahu, the traditional compass points of North, South, East & West are not used. Instead geographic directions are used, such as: The Diamond Head end of Waikiki; or, the Downtown end of Waikiki. The most common directions are Makai (Ocean side or toward the ocean) and Mauka (Mountain side or toward the mountain).  So, it would not be strange for a local to say,”That new restaurant is on the makai side of Kapiolani, just Diamond Head of Keeaumoku.” If you can say statements like that, people will begin to believe you are local.