"How many car washes are we going to have in Portage?" resident George Graves asked during Tuesday's city council meeting.
His question was prompted by a proposal for a Drive & Shine location near U.S. 6 and Ash Street. As a first step, the city council agreed to vacate a public right of way that was dedicated but never actually had a street built on it, that runs across the property.
Council member Collin Czilli saw no issues with the request itself, even if he didn't like the reason for it. "I'm not thrilled about what's being built there, but I'm not going to not vacate a right of way. I mean, there's absolutely no reason it needs to be there."
Mayor Austin Bonta said that despite jokes about the number of car washes in Portage, he doesn't think the city actually has a disproportionately large number. He pointed to his observations from a recent visit to the north side of Valparaiso.
"There's a gas station with a car wash. Behind it, there's like an enormous Taj Mahal of car washes, and it just so happened that on our way coming to it, there's also, like, a self-cleaning car wash over there — all there on Calumet," Bonta noted.
Still, he said he'd also like to see other types of businesses move into Portage. "I mean, we've also got a Bigby Coffee that's coming in. We've got the Pop's coming in," Bonta added. "I didn't even know what Pop's was until I found out they were coming in, but apparently everyone's excited."
The proposed Drive & Shine still needs to go to the board of zoning appeals and plan commission before it gets built.
