Wal-Mart application gets extension

Plans for a proposed Wal-Mart Supercenter at 44th Avenue and Regal Street are in limbo, but nonetheless showing traces of life.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. recently asked the City of Spokane for an extension on its building permit application in order to complete environmental and traffic studies for the site, said Steve Haynes, a Spokane city planner.

The company has a permit application on file but was asked by the city last spring to provide additional information and studies.

Haynes said the extension on the application is good until February.

Full Service and Detail to open near downtown

The owners of Car Wash Express and Ruff and Fluff Dog Wash are opening a car wash at the former Kar-Brite location at 902 E. Sprague.

Called Full Service and Detail, the business is expected to open in March, offering express car washes and detailing that may include pick-up and delivery, said Tom Albinson, who owns the company with his wife, Raelene Albinson, and partners Jim and Margaret Moran.

With a growing number of people purchasing downtown condos, Albinson said the timing is right to open a car wash in the area.

“If somebody is going to spend $15 on a martini downtown, then they’ll want their cars handled.”

After the lease is finalized, sometime within the next week, the company plans extensive renovations that will add a conveyor belt and other automated washing equipment.

“It’s a huge facility. It used to be a hand wash, so it used to take about 40 minutes to get the cars washed,” Albinson said.

Unlike the Car Wash Express, which the partnership opened about two years ago on East Sprague Avenue near Costco, the new location won’t offer a self-service dog wash.

Full Service and Detail will employ about 12 people.

SouthCare Animal Clinic will have new home

Veterinarian Greg Benoit is building a clinic at the corner of Regal Street and Palouse Highway, behind McDonald’s.

Benoit and his associate Suzanne Coulson are currently located in a retail complex on 57th Avenue and Regal Street.

The 4,200-square-foot clinic, named SouthCare Animal Medical Center, was designed by Sam Nystrom and will cost about $424,000 to build. Levernier Construction Inc. will do the work.

“We’ve been kind of working under the confines of a growing business,” said Benoit, a veterinarian in the area since 1996.

New digital radiology will be added and the clinic will have expanded surgical-treatment space and a larger waiting area. The practice will also add another veterinarian.

Construction should begin within the next week, he said, and the new practice should be finished by early June.

Former bike shop to become retail complex

A two-building retail complex is planned for 37th Avenue and Grand Boulevard, the past location of Wheel Sport.

Al Payne, owner and developer, said the multi-tenant project will have a total of about 13,500 square feet of space for lease, which would be suitable for small office, retail or maybe fast food.

Demolition is under way and the project is expected to be completed by next summer, Payne said.