Atlanta-based convenience store plans first SC shops in Columbia. Here’s where they’ll go
RaceTrac convenience stores, boasting ice cream and pizza along with normal gas station fare, may be on their way to Columbia.
The first two South Carolina locations of the Atlanta-based chain are being planned in the Columbia area. One of the stores is planned at the intersection of Garners Ferry and Fountain Lake roads and another at Shop Road and Pineview Drive, near the Mark Anthony Brewing site.
The Garners Ferry site got some resistance from Columbia’s Board of Zoning Appeals on Thursday. The location is heavily commercial, with big-box stores and chain restaurants tightly packed into the corridor.
Zoning board member Sherard Duvall asked if the area already has too many gas stations and convenience stores. Given that the board was considering granting a special exception for the site, Duvall asked if the proposal met the standard of not proliferating an existing industry.
“If we’ve already got a bunch of somethings, where it could prevent the development of something else,” is that over-proliferation, he asked.
Board member Kathryn Fenner said that because the area is already heavily commercial, she did not think another convenience store would be a problem for the area.
“I just don’t see this as something that’s going to bother the community,” she said.
The proposed new site would include an 8,000-square-foot convenience store and just under a dozen gas pumps, diesel and regular, according to a company representative.
Duvall was the only person to vote against approving the proposal.
The second location, on Shop Road, flew through the initial approval process, receiving unanimous approval from the board Thursday. That site also will have a convenience store along with diesel and regular pumps.
The RaceTrac company claims to have pioneered self-service gas stations in Alabama, Florida and Georgia under the name Carl Bolch Trackside Stations. The company moved to Atlanta and adopted the RaceTrac name in 1976.
