ONTARIO — A full-service car wash plans to move into the Menards and Furniture Row parking lot in Ontario.
Ultimate Shine Car Wash is waiting on results of city sewer testing before presenting their conditional use permit to the planning commission.
Plans for the 1.5 acres include a 136-foot wash tunnel, as well as mechanical rooms, supply storage and employee facilities. The plans also include 16 indoor vacuum spaces.
Zoning inspector Michael Morton said representatives from Wild Partners, which operates Ultimate Shine Car Washes, wanted to wait for sewer testing results before moving forward with their conditional use approval for the space.
Morton said testing should be completed by the end of the week and the city will compile results on whether stormwater is entering sanitary sewer lines by the end of the month.
“Car washes can use 20,000 gallons of water a day,” he said. “If there’s no rainfall, that’s not a problem. But stormwater and that much runoff water from the car wash could overwhelm the system if it’s going to the wrong places.”
The planning commission also heard the results of a traffic study completed by Moment Development on its incoming hotel located at 2577 Walker Lake Road.
Chris Knapton, director of development administration for Moment Development, said the property owners plan to share ownership of the cinema drive and pave additional space outside of Walker Lake Road.
“Right now, we’re proposing zero access from Walker Lake, just through the cinema drive,” he said. “We want to make sure everyone in this area has good access to the property, so we’ll mill and pave more of the property and share maintenance costs with the Cinemark.”
He said the traffic study indicated there wouldn’t be traffic levels that would require an additional traffic light when the property is developed.
Knapton also asked the planning commission if it could require stone or brick for the first floor construction of the Home2 Suites by Hilton Hotel.
Acceptable building materials currently list stucco, brick, stone and vinyl. Knapton said Moment Development wanted to require stone for the first floor because it’s more durable than stucco.
“You’re going to have sports teams here and people pushing tables in and out, and the stone material is going to be a lot more durable,” he said. “And if you punch a hole in it, patching stucco doesn’t match and it just doesn’t look good.”
Morton said the commission is open to seeing architecture plans for the hotel and approving the plans contingent on using stone or brick on the first floor’s exterior.
Knapton said Hilton representatives indicated they would prefer stucco as it’s cheaper than brick, but they have paid for stone if it’s required by local municipalities before.
Planning commission member Diane Wolfe said she appreciated how Moment Development wanted to invest more expensive materials in their project.
“It’s nice to hear someone wants to do an improvement versus using cheaper materials,” she said.
Knapton said Moment Development has nearly completed its construction documents and plans to present architectural designs at the next planning commission meeting June 14.
Morton said the planning commission will discuss potentially limiting hours of exterior construction because commission members and Mayor Randy Hutchinson have received resident complaints of loud construction early and late in the day.
Service safety director Kris Knapp asked if the city could define “exterior construction” and whether it would include homeowners working on their roof.
“A homeowner who wants to get up early in the morning and clean that roof off before the heat comes, I can see that being reasonable,” Knapp said. “So are we talking about that, or heavy-duty equipment? Concrete people do work early in the morning because of that too.
“Demolition is one thing but construction is another,” he said.
Also at Wednesday’s meeting:
• Planning commission approved a variance request for a front-yard enclosed fence at 1987 Willowood Drive.
• Morton said the planning commission will consider a tabled variance request from Oxyrase on Park Ave. West. Oxyrase is a light industrial manufacturer and Morton said planning commission members can think on what conditions should be required to ensure noisier manufacturers can’t operate out of the space if Oxyrase moves out.
