Bigger and better gas station planned in Ralston

Posted 3/4/21

The Good 2 Go gas station and convenience store in Ralston is about to get a dramatic overhaul.

The existing concrete building — constructed roughly 60 years ago — will soon be …

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Bigger and better gas station planned in Ralston

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The Good 2 Go gas station and convenience store in Ralston is about to get a dramatic overhaul.

The existing concrete building — constructed roughly 60 years ago — will soon be demolished and replaced with a larger, more modern facility. Good 2 Go will shift its entire footprint to the west while adding new fuel pumps.

Park County commissioners approved a special use permit for the facility during a Tuesday meeting. Brandon Lee, representing Good 2 Go, said the plan is to begin construction March 21.

“We’d like to start at least moving some earth here,” Lee said.

The new store will total 3,300 square feet, a 65% increase from the existing building. Three pumps will be constructed on the east side of the store and two new fuel pumps will be added on the west side.

Good 2 Go officials have been working on the plans over the past couple of years. That included buying an adjoining lot in 2019 — and removing the home that had been located there — so the convenience store can expand to the west.

According to materials the company submitted to the county, customers can expect better parking, shorter wait times at the pumps and a broader selection of items in the convenience store. Though no increase in traffic is being projected, the facility is being built to handle a 25% increase in parking and wastewater, according to a Park County Planning and Zoning report compiled by Kim Dillivan.

Dillivan said the convenience store will not have a kitchen and will only sell pre-packaged and pre-cooked food. However, the Wyoming Department of Agriculture is still requiring a food plan from the business — and that became a subject of debate among commissioners.

Vicky Snider of the ag department’s Consumer Health Services had recommended that commissioners issue their permit after the department had reviewed and approved Good 2 Go’s food plans. However, Commissioner Lloyd Thiel said that, while he understood the need for a state inspection, it was “wrong” to hold up the project over the issue.

Lee said the store would comply with all the requirements, but “to prevent us from beginning construction on an item like this, I believe there’s other ways for us to satisfy this department and make sure they understand that we’re in compliance.”

Commissioners did not make the food plan a part of their conditions of approval Tuesday.

As for how the expanded store will fit into the area along Main Street/U.S. Highway 14-A, Good 2 Go representatives “think it’s a positive,” Dillivan said, “and they don’t think there’ll be any additional, harmful impacts to the neighborhood.”

By moving the building west, it will add some distance between the store and a home owned by Jerry Thompson to the east. Customers have long crossed a portion of Thompson’s property to get to the store; when the new building is constructed, Thompson said he may seek to have that easement removed.

“Other than that, we’re excited to have it,” he said of the new Good 2 Go facility.

Meanwhile, the owner of the properties to the west of the store, Dave Barrows, had voiced some concerns.

Most specifically, Barrows said a couple of his properties are hit by the headlights of vehicles as they enter the gas station, ”so we get impacted by the lights for sure.” He requested an 8-foot-tall fence that would block the light, saying it “would make a big difference.” Good 2 Go representatives said they’d look into the possibility.

Barrows had posed multiple questions about the project, starting in late December with an email to planning and zoning staff. Noting that his grandparents created the subdivision and the lots that now hold the gas station, Barrows wrote in part that he did not want “to let an out of state company disrupt Ralston for the worse … and take their profits back to Utah.”

The Good 2 Go chain is based in Idaho Falls, Idaho. It’s owned by Brad Hall and Associates, which acquired the Ralston store and 15 others in Wyoming and Montana in late 2012. The company purchased the assets after the prior owner, Cody-based Red Eagle Oil, went bankrupt.

Good 2 Go currently operates 12 locations in Wyoming, according to the company’s website, including three sites in Cody. They’re among 48 stores spread across Arizona (17), New Mexico (16), Idaho (10), Colorado (2), Utah (2) and Montana (1).

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