GLENDALE : Fueling Station OKd for Natural Gas Cars

The Glendale City Council has approved a project with the Southern California Gas Co. to develop a $1-million park-and-ride lot and self-service fueling station for vehicles that run on compressed natural gas.

“We’re very excited about the technology of compressed natural gas because it’s a clean-burning fuel,” said Steve Adams, an assistant to the city manager. “It will have a major impact on (improving) air quality.”

Council members voted 3 to 0 Tuesday to move ahead with the project, Adams said Thursday. Sheldon Baker and Eileen Givens were absent.

The lot and station will be at a gas company-owned 2.27-acre site at San Fernando Road and Fairmont Avenue, near the Ventura Freeway. The site was formerly used by utility officials to monitor a fuel pipeline, said Roe Hughes, a sales manager for the company’s compressed natural gas program.

City officials are hoping to obtain a grant in November from the Southern California Air Quality Management District to pay for their portion of the project. Funding would include nearly $500,000 for paving, striping and landscaping property and for buying vehicles that can run on alternative fuels, Adams said.

If the money is available as scheduled, the lot containing 187 parking spaces could open for public use by next May, he said. The city now operates a 200-space park-and-ride lot at the Transportation Center, 400 W. Cerritos Ave., near the Metrolink and Amtrak stations.

Meanwhile, the gas company will spend $500,000 to build a service station, expected to be completed by December, Hughes said.

Gas company estimates show that the station could eventually sell 700 gallons of the alternative fuel each day at 90 cents per gallon. Customers would pay by using a special credit card issued by Southern California Gas, Hughes said.

Vans and small-size trucks are the only vehicles now manufactured that run on compressed natural gas, which is considered to be 90% cleaner in emissions than unleaded fuel, he said.

Hughes expects firms such as Chevrolet and Chrysler to produce smaller vehicles that run on compressed natural gas in the next year.

“By putting the fueling station in now, people would be willing to buy vehicles using (compressed natural gas),” Hughes said. “Certainly, we wouldn’t spend half a million dollars if we thought that wouldn’t happen.”