The City of Ripon recently received an application from eFUEL.
According to Planning Director Ken Zuidervaart, this is a company with mobile on-site fueling, yard / tank management, and provided access via a commercial fueling card network.
Included in the plan was placing a large diesel tank on-site for trucking companies – during the application process, staff discovered that cargo containers had been modified to include a door and windows to accommodate house scanners for the fueling card network.
“Our ordinance specifically prohibits that,” said Zuidervaart at the recent Planning Commission meeting on the modification plan in the Heavy Industrial district.
Needed was a Zone Text Amendment to the City’s “Cargo Container, Storage Container and Construction Dumpsters” ordinance.
City Council approve the changes as previously reviewed by the Planning Commission, waiving the first reading and introduction to the ordinance amendment at the June 8 meeting.
Zuidervaart clarified that the cargo container will be used to house the scanners – necessary for the purchase of fuel – and not the fuel pumps,
The cargo container would also require climate control within for the computers and scanners.
Cargo Containers in the Heavy Industrial district “may be modified to include doors, windows, electrical, mechanical, etc.,” with only one such cargo container allowed on a parcel and modification being required to “meet all applicable building codes” while obtaining “all applicable building permits for such modification,” according to the changes.
The other part of the ordinance amendment specifies that “the modified cargo container shall not allow for human occupancy of the container, meaning no person shall be allowed to occupy the container as their workspace or office.”
Zuidervaart, in addition, told elected leaders that the changes call for only one modified container will be allowed per site for those in the Heavy Industrial district.
“But they’re allowed to have more than one unmodified cargo container (per site),” he said.
