SEAL BEACH : Panel Overruled on Gas Delivery Limits

Gasoline tanker trucks can continue delivering fuel to a service station on Pacific Coast Highway during early morning hours, the City Council decided this week.

The unanimous ruling, made Monday, reverses a Planning Commission decision in December that prohibited the G & M gas station from conducting fuel refilling between 2 and 6 a.m.

G & M Oil Co. appealed the commission decision, sending the issue to the City Council for a vote.

Company officials argued that it was safer for fuel products to be delivered during early morning hours than during the day, when the station is more likely to be crowded with customers.

Even though the gas station is close to several homes, company officials said that fuel delivery does not create much noise.

No one spoke against the company’s appeal, and planning officials said no one has complained about G & M’s delivery process. However, some residents have complained about the noise generated from fuel deliveries at other nearby service stations, officials noted.

The station, which operates 24 hours a day at the corner of Pacific Coast Highway and 13th Street, has been in operation since 1969.

Planning commissioners voted to restrict the fuel delivery hours when the station’s owners appeared before commission to receive a conditional use permit, which is required to operate a business in the city.

The G & M station is one of about half a dozen gas stations in the city that receive fuel deliveries during the early morning hours.