Thornton Gas Station Demo Clears the Way for New Investment

A long-vacant, obsolete gas station located in the heart of the Village of Thornton has been demolished. While it might sound like “just an old building”, its demolition actually marks a major turning point for the Village and its central business district.

The property, located two blocks from Village Hall and in the middle of its business district, had sat unused for years. Previous attempts to sell the parcel “as-is” were unsuccessful due to the building’s condition - advanced deterioration along with aging underground storage tanks beneath the site.

Under the new mayoral administration, the Southland Development Authority (SDA) worked closely with the Village of Thornton, the South Suburban Mayors and Managers Association (SSMMA), and Cook County to take a different approach from those previous, unsuccessful attempts.

Nicholas Greifer, SDA’s Director of Municipal Economic Development, described the pivot. First, the SDA supported the Village in securing SSMMA funding to remove the underground storage tanks. Then the SDA worked with Cook County to access a separate funding source to demolish the obsolete building above ground.

“There were a lot of lead-up steps,” Greifer said. “We coordinated with the Village and kept conversations going with the County and SSMMA to make sure they were prioritizing it. We also supported the Village’s request to secure a key County funding source, by persuading the County to give priority consideration to this site.”

Without that shift, the County funds could have been allocated to another part of the region.

Village Administrator Vivian Payne was noted as a key partner in moving the project forward.

According to Greifer, the building and the underground storage tanks were removed within the first two weeks of December 2025. The site is now “a clean slate,” with no blighted structure and no buried tank system – ready for new investors in the new year.

With both components removed, the parcel is officially shovel-ready – a significant change from just weeks ago. Before the demolition, potential developers who drove past the site saw expensive challenges that made the property difficult to consider seriously. Now, Greifer says, that barrier is gone.

SDA leadership also confirmed that environmental remediation is effectively complete, with the project awaiting a formal “no further remediation” (NFR) letter. The site’s transformation was immediately visible, so much so that one SDA official said they “had to do a double take” when visiting the property, given how dramatically it had changed in a short period of time.

With the horizontal development phase complete, the SDA and the Village will begin outreach to prospective developers in January 2026.

“We need to kick the tires and see what the market is willing to undertake from a financial standpoint,” Greifer explained. Possible end uses could range widely from retail to services, but those conversations are just beginning now that the site is viable for investment.

“It’s ready,” Greifer said. “And that’s a critical first step.”