NEW HAVEN, CT — A major Middletown Avenue stop for burgers and fries could next become a gas station and electric car charging station.
Local attorney Bernard Pellegrino promoted the conversion of a diner bar into a gas station Tuesday night at the latest monthly Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA) meeting, held online via Zoom and in person on the second floor of City Hall.
Pellegrino presented commissioners with a request for a special permit and a coastal zoning review to approve the construction of a gas station and convenience store at 420 Middletown Avenue.
This is the current and longtime home of the I-91 Diner, still open and owned by Stavros Karadimos.
Mohsin Aldalali, who has signed a purchase agreement for the property, hopes to build a gas station with four double-sided pumps, a supermarket and charging stations for electric vehicles on the site.
Pellegrino said Aldalali has been in the business for more than three decades and already operates five other gas stations, including one in New Haven at 801 Whalley Ave.
The zoning exemption application will now go to the City Planning Commission for review before returning to the BZA for a final vote. If the BZA approves the gas station proposal, it must be sent back to the City Planning Commission for site plan review.
Pellegrino said the site “was a gas station before it was a restaurant.” This redevelopment would return 420 Middletown Ave. to its former use.
Last year, there were also plans to convert the 420 Middletown location into a cannabis dispensary, but the city planning board rejected the proposal.
The property is located right next to I-91; it is on a state highway, in a “mixed-use area” with single-family homes, multi-family housing and other businesses. “The gas station will be a convenient amenity for residents of the neighborhood” and for people driving by on or off the highway.
Pellegrino said the gas station remodel would save about 350 square meters of paving on the site, thereby reducing the amount of impervious surface on the property.
“What are the opening hours?” asked BZA President Mildred Melendez.
It “wouldn’t be 24 hours,” Pellegrino promised. The hours allowed under the special regime would be 6 a.m. to 11 p.m., he said. “We’re not sure we’ll use all of that.”
The only citizen to speak for or against the project at the end of Tuesday’s nearly three-hour BZA meeting was Lamberton Street resident George Lindsay.
“I’m definitely in favor of the gas station,” he said. “There’s no doubt about that.” He particularly praised the gas station’s plan to introduce charging stations for electric vehicles. “I’m totally in favor of it. I wish them the best of luck.”
The New Haven Independent is a nonprofit, daily public interest news site founded in 2005.
