The intersection of Bishop and South King streets is one of the busiest in the downtown area, not only with cars and pedestrians but with newspaper racks.

The sidewalks on those four corners are covered with 38 red, white, blue, green yellow and black racks of various shapes and sizes, displaying everything from free weeklies and shopping guides to the daily newspapers.

The Building Owners and Managers Association hopes to consolidate newspaper racks based on the Waikiki model, where city- owned "publication racks" hold as many as 10 publications to reduce sidewalk clutter.

Angie Hodge, chairwoman of the BOMA newsstand committee, said beautification and safety are the main reasons the group wants city support for the plan.

"Vans loading and unloading the newsstands during the day cause a safety problem due to visibility," Hodge said. "Newsstands are also too close to sidewalks, which reduces the walking area when pedestrians step up to the curb."

BOMA is an international nonprofit group that represents the interests of the commercial real- estate industry. In Hawai'i, it represents 185 members and 74 commercial buildings.

Hodge said some racks leave only a narrow space between the street and buildings.

"The other reason (behind the BOMA proposal) is beautification of downtown and the properties that the various newsstands sit in front of," she said. "They also tend to create litter and are often marked with graffiti."

The group proposes that building owners who want new group publication racks pay for them, at no cost to taxpayers. If they don't want to participate, they could keep the racks as they are now.

The Hawai'i Publishers Association, which represents many of the major publications in the state, has formed a committee to work with the city and BOMA on downtown news racks.

"We obviously would oppose any plan that would limit access to news, to media," said Scott Schumaker, vice president of the HPA and president of Honolulu Magazine. "We worked very closely with all parties involved when the Waikiki racks were being developed and implemented."

Schumaker said it took five years of planning to set the rules, procedures and the lottery system for the Waikiki racks.

"We don't necessarily oppose (BOMA's) plan," he said. "What we need is a little more information about what they are projecting in terms of what types of stands and whether or not there would be full access to news with those stands that are there."

City Councilman Rod Tam supports the idea and wants the Hannemann administration to back a city ordinance for private building owners to pay for and maintain the publication racks.

Newspaper rack owners pay an annual permit fee to place racks on sidewalks.

"I hope the publications look at it as a positive," Tam said. "All the different stands are not very attractive."

Waikiki Improvement Association President Rick Egged said the racks on Kuhio and Kalakaua avenues have reduced pedestrian obstacles and visual clutter.

"All and all, it has been a huge success for Waikiki," he said.

Egged said the Waikiki Business Improvement District, which provides security patrols and cleaning in Waikiki, has recently taken over cleaning of the racks from the city and individual publications.

"There were some divided responsibilities, and they weren't getting cleaned up and taken care of as well as they should have been and now we have that under control," he said.

Hodge, who is the general manager of the Davies Pacific Center downtown, said no final design has been made, but the group would like to install racks with a slanted roof so people wouldn't sit on them.

"The area in the ordinance that we propose is from Nu'uanu Avenue to the Ala Wai," Hodge said. "This way, we improve downtown and include the convention center area, which is a high-visibility area for visitors."

Reach James Gonser at jgonser@honoluluadvertiser.com.