SERVICING STATIONS; OLD GAS-PUMP SITES GET SHOT AT REBIRTH AS RETAIL CENTERS.

Byline: Michael Coit Daily News Staff Writer

A fenced lot sprouting bunches of grass, green from winter rains, amid broken asphalt slabs is a notable void on an otherwise bustling Moorpark Road.

Before the year is over, the vacant ground will be covered by a 24,500-square-foot retail center featuring two restaurants with an outdoor garden patio, a refurbished retail store, and a small new office building.

``This is really a nice little neighborhood center. We're bringing in a fresh new face,'' said Mark Pettit, architect for the project centered on the lot at Moorpark and Wilbur roads, where a gas station was torn down years ago.

Across Thousand Oaks and Ventura County's other older suburban communities, vacant or abandoned gas station lots have been waiting to be developed.

With the resurgent real estate market and less available land, these pockets are increasingly desirable for commercial projects, say planners, property owners and architects familiar with the trend.

``For the past five or six years, a lot of gas stations have closed down. With the economy, a lot of people are buying the properties,'' said Haider Alawami, an associate planner for the city of Thousand Oaks who deals with many such projects.

Some are refurbished and reopened as gas stations featuring mini-marts and carwashes, especially those on corner lots, where access would be difficult for any other type of land use.

A gleaming new Shell station and mini-mart opened a year ago in the shell of a former Exxon station at Olsen and Moorpark roads. The station had been closed for seven years while toxins from leaking fuel tanks and lines were cleaned from soil on the property, said Gus Vargas, construction director for the Shell project.

Summit Energy Corp. of Santa Monica purchased the site and spent $600,000 on improvements, banking on bringing in enough customers to make the station profitable. The canopy was raised to a higher profile, new fueling islands went in, and the mini-mart with its Spanish-tile roof replaced the service station.

``It's the most beautiful station right now in Thousand Oaks,'' boasts Vargas, who will begin a similar renovation on the Shell station at Thousand Oaks Boulevard and Rancho Road this week.

Other lots are either large enough or next to developable property to allow for new commercial construction.

``It's very valuable if you can get that situation with a gas station site and available property nearby,'' said Pettit, whose firm has designed both new stations and retail projects on the sites of former stations. ``When you get that opportunity, if you've got someone who's smart enough and you can make it pencil, there's an opportunity there.

``That very much is prime real estate.''

The property owner Pettit's firm represents purchased both the vacant gas station site at Moorpark and Wilbur and a second parcel last year to combine with the retail space he owns next door. Pettit said some $2.5 million in

construction and improvements are planned.

Guiding growth

Although the project replaces the eyesore of a vacant lot, City Councilwoman Linda Parks said development no matter how small requires closer scrutiny. Parks' concern is that retail projects on pockets of land within the city will bring more traffic to already congested areas.

``I actually wanted to appeal that project so we could have a public hearing,'' she said, noting that it was approved by the city's planning staff. ``There's been a lot of traffic concerns there as a result of development. That area is just booming right now.''

As a professional planner, Parks said she recognizes that a maturing city like Thousand Oaks will get more dense development within existing commercial corridors.

``As we're building out, these are in-fill locations where we should be developing,'' she said. ``We just need to make sure we're not going to exacerbate traffic issues.''

Commercial projects, however, often are the only way to recover the expense of cleaning soil and sometimes groundwater under gas stations, as mandated by state laws regulating hazardous wastes, property owners and others involved in such projects contend.

``For a lot of the gas station people, either they were operators or owners, the stations are dirty, and it's very expensive to get that fixed,'' Pettit said. ``With the cost of real estate, in order to get a return from the cost of that, normally the development needs to be bigger.

``So it's kind of an economics thing that's happening.''

Judy and Kurt Ralston purchased the tiny former Gasco station along the west end of Thousand Oaks Boulevard more than 12 years ago with hopes of building a small delicatessen or fast-food joint.

Their timing was terrible. Laws mandating and regulating soil and groundwater cleanup were coming on, and they also faced opposition from neighboring businesses who feared greater traffic congestion.

``We felt that it was a very visible corner and would have been a good spot. We had plans drawn up,'' Kurt Ralston recalled. ``The city really wanted basically nothing on there.''

The couple paid $150,000 for the property, operated the gas station for six months, and then watched as the debts mounted for cleanup costs.

``It was a money pit for us,'' Judy Ralston said.

The Ralstons said they spent between $200,000 and $300,000 removing the fuel tanks and lines and hauling away soil.

``When this happens to you, you feel like selling everything you have and moving to Rio de Janeiro,'' Kurt Ralston said. ``Because otherwise you go broke.''

The city last year agreed to pay the couple $100,000 so the site can be converted into a neighborhood park.

``I think it would be a real asset to the community in helping the beautification of Thousand Oaks Boulevard. We have had no redevelopment done in this area, and I think it would really help give a shot in the arm and encourage landowners to improve their property,'' said Susan Duntley, president of the West Boulevard Business Group.

Old town makeover

The park is the first of what the group hopes will be a series of public improvements that would complement private renovations governed by a common old town theme.

The sale to the city has not closed, but all sides remain optimistic.

``Hopefully it goes through soon, because I'm tiring of messing with it all these years,'' Kurt Ralston said.

By contrast, the West Boulevard merchants favor development plans for a much larger vacant lot at Thousand Oaks Boulevard and Moorpark Road, where a Mobil station operated until about a year ago. The fenced site also includes the former Armstrong Garden Center and building.

``It's not going to benefit the city if it sits vacant,'' Duntley said.

A large retail store and center is expected, though no formal plan has been submitted, said Alawami, the city planner.

Duntley noted that the property owners met with the West Boulevard merchants group recently to discuss their plans. ``They're interested in what's going on in their neighborhood, and they want to follow suit with our design idea. We want some uniform look along our boulevard.''

A look north up Moorpark Road reveals a success story in gas station conversions. When the popular Mimi's Cafe opened two years ago, its country manor building blotted out any sign of the former station.

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Photo

PHOTO (Color) An empty lot on Moorpark Road in Thousand Oaks where a gas station once resided will be home to a new store center and small office building.

Joe Binoya/Special to the Daily News