New fire station in Salton Sea's North Shore to open Saturday after years of planning

Tom Coulter, Palm Springs Desert Sun
·2 min read
An earlier rendering of the new North Shore fire station, which opens Saturday.
An earlier rendering of the new North Shore fire station, which opens Saturday.

A grand opening for a new fire station in North Shore will be held Saturday morning, marking the first fire station to be built in unincorporated Riverside County in at least a decade.

After breaking ground late last year, Fire Station 41 will be located at 99-054 Sea View Dr., with the Salton Sea community invited to a ribbon-cutting ceremony set for 11 a.m. Saturday.

The modernized, energy-efficient facility is set to replace the community’s existing station, which has operated since 1964, with Riverside County Fire Chief Bill Weiser saying the new facility will be a home to firefighters “for decades to come.”

“This station has been years in the planning and it’s fantastic to see it standing, ready to be in service for the citizens and guests of North Shore and the lower Coachella Valley,” Weiser said in a press release sent Thursday.

With a total cost of $11.1 million, the new station includes living quarters, a kitchen, individual bedrooms and more restrooms than the previous station. It also features state-of-the-art systems for cleaning firefighters’ personal protective equipment.

An earlier rendering of the new North Shore fire station, which opens Saturday.
An earlier rendering of the new North Shore fire station, which opens Saturday.

Fire Station 41 also has a larger apparatus bay, allowing fire trucks to be better protected during severe weather, as well as a carport for staff parking, a gym and a backup power generator.

The county's board of supervisors approved plans to replace two county fire stations — North Shore's and another in the eastern Riverside County community of Desert Center — in October 2021, but they ultimately held off on Desert Center's due to increased costs.

Riverside County Supervisor V. Manuel Perez, whose district includes the Coachella Valley, cheered the completion of the station in a statement Thursday.

“Our firefighters are our first responders and they take care of our communities, and we need to do our best to make sure we take care of them as well,” Perez said. “I want to thank our Chief, and our firefighters for the good work, as well as our constituents for advocating for this effort and I appreciate my colleagues and our county staff for finding a way to build out this much-needed fire station.”

A schematic shows the interior of the North Shore fire station.
A schematic shows the interior of the North Shore fire station.

This article originally appeared on Palm Springs Desert Sun: New North Shore fire station in Salton Sea area will open Saturday