Why Covell Crossing Got Three Drive-Thrus and Not a Car Wash

At the Aug. 10 Edmond City Council meeting, a car wash company asked to add an automated tunnel and vacuum bays to a parcel of about one acre at the southwest corner of Covell Road and Sooner Road. It had done its homework. Todd McInnes, speaking for Club Car Wash, said the wash would close at 8 p.m. He said a noise study measured about 50 decibels at the western and southern property lines, and that the site would draw about 450 vehicle visits a day that could also send customers to the shops nearby.

The motion to approve failed 0-5.

The Oklahoman summed it up this way: "Panda Express, Chick-fil-A, and even a 24-hour Whataburger are fine," but the council "flushed plans for a Club Car Wash at Covell Crossing." That line covers most of this fall's story at Covell and Sooner. The new restaurants and the rejected car wash were judged by the same standard. Covell Crossing was approved as a transition, a strip of commercial land meant to ease the change from a busy arterial to the homes behind it. Every request since then has been measured against that promise.

What's at Covell Crossing this fall

Benton Whipple is the operating partner at the Whataburger. Chick-fil-A named Greg Harjo as local Owner-Operator, and Oklahoma State Capital reported this is his third Edmond location. The Planning Commission approved that restaurant's site plan in January. It's a building of about 5,500 square feet on the southwest corner.

The newest approval is the smallest. According to Edmond In Box, 7 Brew's plan calls for a 510-square-foot building on 0.62 acres with 12 parking spaces. It's drive-thru only, with access through private drives inside Covell Crossing. It needed no exceptions to the city's site design standards and passed unanimously.

The car wash lost before it reached the council

The council's vote wasn't the first no. On May 19, the Planning Commission voted on a motion to recommend approval of the Club Car Wash amendment, and it failed 1-4. When the council took it up in August, members gave three different reasons. Edmond In Box reported that the discussion "repeatedly returned to whether a car wash was the right use for a property intended to serve as a commercial transition between heavier development and nearby neighborhoods."

1. The land use itself. Councilmember Phil Fraim said noise didn't worry him much, since added buffers could help. His objection was that the project "does not increase that caliber for the land use desired." He added that the Planning Commission "did get it right." Another member pointed to noise from vacuums and radios and said the property had been planned mainly as a retail site.
2. Water. Councilmember Preston Watterson tied his vote to the summer's water limits. He said he liked Club Car Wash's other Edmond locations but didn't think this request was right "for this time, for this spot."
3. Revenue. Mayor Mark Nash pushed back on the argument that a car wash would make the site less intense, since it would take over an area the development plan showed as parking. He said he might have seen the request differently if the use produced more revenue for the city, at a time when Edmond is trying not to strain its resources further.

Here is the Watterson quote Edmond In Box carried in full:

"We're in the middle of summer and we're having to throttle our water usage. So I can't, in good conscience, approve a new car wash right now."

All three reasons came back to the same question: what the site was approved to be. The restaurants fit the retail plan the center was approved under. The car wash needed an amendment to that plan, and the council measured the amendment against the original intent.

The neighbors argued about the original deal

The official transcript records a neighbor who lives immediately south of the development asking the council to uphold the Planning Commission. He argued the real question was whether the city would keep the neighborhood-compatibility and transition commitments it made when Covell Crossing was first approved. He listed traffic, vacuum noise, water use and how close the site sits to homes.

That explains why the council approved one drive-thru after another and then turned down a car wash on a single acre. The drive-thrus fit the approval as written. The car wash needed the approval itself to change, and that change was the part neighbors and two city bodies declined to make.

The tree vote kept the same promise

About two months after the car wash vote, the same corner came back to City Hall, this time over a row of trees. Covell Crossing's plat included a 20-foot utility easement along the west side of the development. It had never been used. But as long as it existed, a utility company could eventually clear the strip that was meant to stay wooded. Edmond In Box reported that the developer's representative told planners the area "was always intended to preserve existing trees."

The Planning Commission recommended closing the easement 5-0 on Oct. 6. On Oct. 26, the City Council approved it, also 5-0, as Ordinance 4108. Staff told the council the easement held no city utilities and no franchise utility had objected. The existing trees and the approved landscape buffer stay, and that vegetation can now count toward the center's landscaping requirements.

With the easement closed, the tree buffer facing the homes is now protected in the recorded documents as well as in the original plan.

More is coming along Covell than the road was built for

Covell Crossing is one piece of a busier corridor. On the north and northeast side of the intersection, the council's August meeting took up an amendment to Legacy at Covell, a separate mixed-use development. The amendment raised its residential cap to 850 units and widened the area where either homes or commercial uses are allowed. The applicant said it was planning around 150,000 square feet of retail. Farther west, a 9,470-square-foot OnCue planned for the southeast corner of Kelly and Covell won Planning Commission approval Oct. 20, along with a driveway-spacing exception, and was sent to the City Council's Nov. 9 meeting.

The road hasn't caught up yet. Edmond Life & Leisure reported that the city's engineering director cited daily traffic counts above 23,000 at Covell and Coltrane and above 25,000 at Covell and Santa Fe and at Covell and Bryant. The Covell interchange at I-35 was finished in 1994, partly to take traffic off Second Street, and Coffee Creek neighborhoods use Covell to reach the interstate because Coffee Creek has no direct access of its own.

At its July 21 meeting, the city's Capital Improvement Projects Advisory Board weighed rebuilding Covell from about 1,000 feet west of Santa Fe to I-35. Staff estimated $75 million to $80 million for construction plus $15 million to $20 million for right-of-way, engineering and utility relocation. That compares with $110 million to $120 million in projected proceeds from the renewed half-cent sales tax starting in 2027. By those numbers, fixing Covell would use up most of the next decade's capital money. The board didn't decide. It asked for more cost-benefit, traffic, pavement and prioritization analysis to come back at a future meeting.

That budget math connects back to the mayor's revenue question. Restaurants and retail produce the sales tax that pays for road projects like Covell's, so each new storefront at Covell and Sooner adds traffic and also helps fund the fix. If you live off Sooner, the stretch to watch is Covell between Santa Fe and I-35, along with the next time the advisory board puts it back on its agenda.

If you live near Covell and Sooner and you're wondering what all this new activity means for your street or your home's value, Lindsay Greene Homes is happy to talk through the Covell corridor with you, from what's approved to what's still in front of the council. Schedule a consultation, and we'll go through it together.