A white fence recently appeared around the former site of the ARCO station at Fifth Street and Pacific Coast Highway.
ARCO is beautifying the property at the request of Seal Beach officials, according to Jim Basham, director of the city’s Community Development Department.
Basham said that, basically, everyone was tired of looking at the “eyesore” of a green mesh fence and graffiti on the fence.
Basham said the city asked ARCO to put up a more secure and aesthetically pleasing fence.
The beautification project is apparently still on going, but will include landscaping along the perimeter.
Basham said that because ARCO is a large corporation, it took time for city staff to negotiate with the company for the beautification effort.
Basham said the city was still monitoring the on-going decontamination effort that has been on going at the site since the ARCO station was demolished in late 2010.
In mid-2009, it became public knowledge that the soil under Bridgeport neighborhood homes located near the gas station had been contaminated with gasoline vapors. In December 2009, four homes were temporarily evacuated.
Residents of the 25 homes near the gas station expressed concern about exposure to cancer-causing chemicals.
Residents of the other homes in the 175-house neighborhood expressed concern about the potential reduction of their property values as a result of being located near a toxic site.
ARCO advocated decontaminating the site by injecting chemicals into the soil.
When that proposal met with local resistance, ARCO proposed using electricity to “cook” out the chemical contamination.
The Seal Beach Environmental Quality Control Board originally approved the “cooking” option.
However, it turned out that three residents of the Bridgeport neighborhood worked in environmental remediation and the Bridgeport Technical Advisory Committee recommended removing the soil—this was called “dig and haul.”
The city’s environmental board reversed itself after reviewing a revised ARCO decontamination plan for the site in late June 2010.
Ultimately, ARCO agreed to tear down the gas station and remove the soil.
Groundwater was subjected to a decontamination method called vapor extraction.
