Car Crashes into Downtown Novato Building; No Major Injuries

’s grand opening in downtown Novato could be slightly delayed after a car crashed through the brick façade on Tuesday.

The building at 880 De Long Avenue, formerly a but slated to become a Chipotle restaurant later this year, was rammed by a Honda Accord that was sideswiped by a Nissan Pathfinder SUV during rush hour Tuesday afternoon.

Four people were involved in the crash — a family of three in the Honda and a young woman in the Nissan — and none were seriously injured, Sgt. Oliver Collins said. The family included a 3-month-old child. Airbags were deployed in the gold sedan and the occupants got out without assistance from a crew.

Collins said the Honda was westbound on De Long at 5:51 p.m. when it was struck in the passenger’s side door by the Nissan SUV, which was attempting to cross De Long from Machin Avenue. The young woman in the Nissan crossed De Long after the impact and pulled into a nearby driveway.

Collins said the woman in the Honda had visible injuries, but no one was transported to a hospital.

Collins told the Marin Independent Journal that neither driver had a valid license. The woman in the Nissan SUV was also uninsured, and the preliminary investigation puts her at fault for the collision, he said.

The incident took place next door to the Novato Police Department where a Starbucks was closed in November 2010. Chipotle had done some renovation work on the structure and taken off the roof to retrofit it with new trusses to meet seismic standards. The tentative opening date was to be in October, a Chipotle spokesperson said in April.