New car wash opens at Columbia site that was once a lasting reminder of 2015 flood
A new car wash has opened at a spot on Devine Street that was once a lasting reminder of Columbia’s historic flood of 2015.
Tommy’s Express Car Wash opened in late January at 4700 Devine St. It’s in a busy commercial area just west of Garners Ferry Road, near a Food Lion grocery store.
The car wash sits on land that was once home to a TitleMax business. That building was flooded out in Oct. 2015 during a deadly 1,000-year rain event that walloped Columbia. The lower Devine Street area near Gills Creek experienced some of the worst flooding in that storm. The TitleMax building was eventually demolished.
Columbia City Council and the city’s zoning board each voted in late 2019 to allow a car wash to be constructed on the site, despite protests from the Gills Creek Watershed Association, which expressed concern about the project because of its direct proximity to Gills Creek.
The Tommy’s Express that now sits at the Devine Street site has all the bells and whistles of a modern car wash. Drivers remain in their car during the wash, as a conveyor-belt-style mechanism carries the car through the process. There are free vacuums waiting at the end of the line.
The car wash is open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Sundays.
This story was originally published February 7, 2022 at 9:59 AM.
