Condos or fuel tanks?

WOODWAY – More than 1,000 luxury waterfront condominiums might replace acres of huge petroleum tanks that have stood like sentinels on Puget Sound for nearly a century.

The Snohomish County Council is considering a bid to completely transform Point Wells from a polluted industrial site into an urban housing complex.

Conceptually, as many as 1,400 condominiums would cover 50 acres, according to California-based Paramount Petroleum, the property owner.

Buildings would stretch up to 75 feet tall, and up to 3,200 parking spaces would be built, most of them underground. The deepwater pier used for tankers and barges could berth yachts and tall sailing ships.

Six acres of boardwalks, parks and a public plaza would be built along the water, opening up access to a shoreline that has been blocked for decades by barbed-wire fences.

“We would have access to beautiful walkways right on the beach,” Woodway Mayor Carla Nichols said. “Our residents would love that.”

Her town, dubbed “The Quiet Place,” has about 1,000 people and surrounds the Point Wells property. She said building housing there would create a self-contained village.

Town officials have long hoped that condominiums would come along, Nichols said, but they don’t control what happens to the land, which is in unincorporated Snohomish County.

Eventually, though, the land could join the city.

“It’s going to more than double our population,” she said.

The County Council controls the fate of the Point Wells housing proposal.

The council is weighing the idea alongside more than 100 land-use changes that could boost development on thousands of acres across the county.

Point Wells has a head start.

The council approved a policy last year that gives preliminary support to changing the property from heavy industrial to housing.

The County Council could decide in May whether the proposal will go forward for more review. A final vote could come by spring 2008.

“I frankly can’t figure out the downside to what they’re intending to do,” said County Councilman Gary Nelson, who represents the south county district that includes Woodway and Point Wells.

“The property is so valuable that the improvement they’re pursuing will certainly make a more attractive use of the property and will enhance that beach area quite a bit.”

The petroleum storage tank farm has been on the land since 1912, and there are more than 85 tanks still there. Chevron bought the land in the 1950s and over time developed an asphalt refinery and lube oil distribution center.

The lube oil facilities were shut down in the 1990s. An asphalt refinery closed in 2000.

Chevron sold the land to Paramount Petroleum in 2005, and the company continues to store and transfer asphalt and boat fuel.

Strict security measures and fencing now block public access to the shoreline. Those would vanish if the property were redeveloped.

It might cost tens of millions of dollars to clean up petroleum and other related contaminants from the site, said Denny Derickson, an Everett consultant hired by Paramount Petroleum for the project.

The property owners need a lot of revenue from redevelopment in order to finance cleanup of the property, Derickson said.

The entire community would benefit from the effort, he said.

“There’s almost a mile-long stretch of some of most beautiful beach in Puget Sound and nobody has been able to enjoy it,” Derickson said.

Residents say the fuel tanks have been a familiar part of Woodway’s landscape for decades.

Tankers and barges have lumbered to and from the site daily.

George Galpin, who lives on the bluff in Woodway, said that what happens at Point Wells is a big deal to everyone in town.

People want to know about traffic the project will create and services residents will need, he said.

“There sure is a lot of lively interest (in the development), but ultimately it’s inevitable,” Galpin said. “I’ll miss not seeing the ships come in.”

Land-use hearing

The Snohomish County Council has scheduled a hearing on land-use proposals at 6:30 p.m. May 21 in the first-floor meeting room of the county administration building, 3000 Rockefeller Ave., Everett.

Information on more than 100 proposals for county land-use changes can be found at www.snoco.org; search for docket. A matrix at Docket XII includes staff reports and maps.

Reporter Jeff Switzer: 425-339-3452 or jswitzer@heraldnet.com.