Palatine to restore contaminated gas station site to green space

A prime piece property in downtown Palatine is being restored to green space in a process expected to take up to two years.

Though the shuttered Clark gas station at the southwest corner of Palatine and Plum Grove roads is scheduled to be razed this summer, work likely won’t be completed until at least late 2012 due to environmental hazards on the site.

“We know that it’s a contaminated site,” Village Manager Reid Ottesen said. “There were leaking underground storage tanks and other contamination within the site.”

The village council recently approved a $17,700 environmental consulting services contract with Shaw Environmental, which will inspect and inventory asbestos, lead-based paint and other hazardous materials and waste on the property.

Shaw also will submit a report to the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, prepare bidding documents for demolition and identify expenses reimbursable through a state program aimed at cleaning and managing these types of sites.

The underground storage tanks eventually will be removed and other steps taken to ensure the site meets the highest level of environmental remediation.

“We’re not aware of (the contamination) being a risk to anything other than the property itself, but we want everything cleaned to the residential standard,” Ottesen said.

The property was the only parcel for which the village began condemnation proceedings as part of the ongoing road expansion project, the heart of which is located at that intersection. The property owner, who initially had an extremely high selling price in mind, eventually came down by more than $1 million on his asking price, Ottesen said.

The long-term plan is for a commercial development of some sort — just not another gas station — on the site, Ottesen said.