Spokane Valley-based Sarff Investments LLC plans to develop a car wash facility at 1111 N. Maple, in Spokane’s West Central neighborhood.  

Hal Sarff, one of three owners of Sarff Investments, says the company plans to handle most of the construction of the $1.5 million project itself. 

“We’ll likely be waiting on permits from the city for another two or three weeks, so I anticipate we’ll begin construction near the end of August,” he says. 

The site on which the company intends to build the new car wash takes up most of the block bounded, by Ash and Maple streets and Boone and Gardner avenues. Much of the block has been taken up by rental homes, but tenants of those homes were given notice to vacate last winter. 

Of the 13 homes on the building site, seven already have been demolished, while a group of West Central neighborhood activists who wish to preserve some of the block’s more historic residences is arranging to move the remaining six.

The facility will be the second car wash that Sarff Investments has opened in the Spokane area. The other, called the Mega Wash Express Car Wash & Detail Center, is located at 17316 E. Sprague. 

Sarff says the new 5,000-square-foot location will have a similar name to the Valley location. 

“It will be a conveyor system, allowing for drivers to pull up onto a conveyor that will pull them through the tunnel wash,” he says. “It’s designed to be energy efficient and ecofriendly as far as water usage.” 

Paul Mathews Architects PLLC, of Rathdrum, is the architect for the project, and Simpson Engineering Inc., of Spokane Valley, is the project engineer. 

Sarff says the car wash also will include up to 14 vacuum stations. He estimates construction should take about six months, and upon completion, the facility will employ up to 10 people. 

While a good portion of the 20,000-square-foot lot will be used for the car wash facility, Sarff says the company intends to leave the northwest corner of the block, near the corner of Boone and Ash, open for the possible future development of a fast-food restaurant.