From the Curbed inbox:
I live nearby the empty gas station at 23rd & Valencia, and when I moved in I heard this was going to be condos. I know there's some regulations that former gas stations have to sit empty for a few years, but I saw them remove the tanks 4 years ago. Since it's been empty and there are no street lights, cars parked on the opposite side, on San Jose, get broken into almost daily. Would love to know what's in store for this spot if you guys have heard anything. Our reader heard correctly all those years ago—this spot is slated for condos. Last September a Preliminary Project Assesment from JS Sullivan Development was submitted at the Planning Department for a 52 foot tall 56,840 sq.ft. building with 42 dwelling units, ground floor retail, and 31 below ground parking spots accessed on 23rd Street. The PPA identifies all the studies that a project would require - in this case, most of them relate to hazardous waste and transportation. Just this past September they got started on the shadow study, and will now determine the appropriate environmental document for the project. But that doesn't explain the four year delay.
This gas station had underground storage tanks, so in order to build on the property they needed to do some major remediation work. Back in 2008 they got approvals to start demo on the station, which required removal of three 10,000 gallon underground tanks, but also a dual-phase extraction system to remediate ground water and soil contamination. They had to install an above-ground flammable liquid storage tank for the Soil Vapor Extraction system (you didn't realize this was going to be a science class, did you?). All that work was finally finished at the end of last year, so this past year has been all about project planning. Now that the studies are underway, we can expect to see some movement in the upcoming year or two.
· Preliminary Project Assessment - 1198 Valencia [SF Planning]
· Building Permit #201203276910 [DBI]
· Previous coverage of 1198 Valencia [Curbed SF]