First Drive Thru Only Wawa Proposed for Falls Township

Whoa, this is big news. A drive-thru only Wawa, the first of it's kind, is being proposed for Falls Township (Bucks County), Wawa confirms in a statement to 94.5 PST & Townsquare Media.

This brand new Wawa concept will be a drive-thru only Wawa.  It will offer curbside pickup too, Wawa's corporate officials tell us.

You may have heard about plans for Wawa to add a drive-thru window to an existing Wawa in Burlington County, New Jersey recently, but this is different.

The plans have been submitted for a 1,840 square-foot drive-thru only location, Wawa tells us.

It would be constructed next to the recently-opened full-service Wawa store with a gas station at the corner of West Trenton Avenue and Pine Grove Road in the Morrisville section of Falls Township.

If all goes well, construction could begin in late August, and the store's grand opening would happen in December.

Trying to figure out where this is? It's next to the new Rite Aid, where the old Acme used to be. They picked that location because it's a busy intersection and they hope it will attract many customers.

In fact, Wawa's real estate project engineer, Mike Redel, told the Bucks Courier Times that the intersection sees an average of about 25,000 cars per day.

“It is meant to serve drive thru customers only, with no customer access to the store. The menu will be limited to our most popular items, with a focus on value bundles with chips and a drink," Redel said.

I wonder if this is going to become the new trend for stores, as the coronavirus is forcing us all to distance from one another?  It sure sounds like it. Wawa says they're hoping to learn from the location to possibly expand into future drive-thru locations.

“We are hoping to learn from the layout, workflow, and traffic flow at this location, as we continue to explore alternatives for longer-term application to our stores post-COVID-19,” Wawa's Director of Construction, Terri Micklin, said in a statement.  “We appreciate the opportunity to partner with Falls Township officials, who are providing us with the approvals and support of this newly designed store format that will be of benefit to the community.”

Falls Township officials agree about the need for more locations like this in a post-COVID-19 world.

“Particularly in the wake of COVID-19, with concerns over minimizing person-to-person contact, Wawa’s drive-thru only store just makes sense,” Falls supervisor Chairman Jeff Dence told the Bucks Courier Times. “Falls Township is proud to help Wawa pioneer such a forward-thinking development.”

In fact, they say that about 50 other sites were scouted for this brand new Wawa concept before they decided on Falls Township. How exciting!