Food Markets Northwest Inc. wants to demolish the existing Queen Anne Thriftway and redevelop the site with an expanded grocery store on the ground floor and 65 apartments above it. "Economic factors as well as community sentiment" have prompted store operator Food Markets Northwest Inc. to announce this week the project will be postponed for at least two years. Instead, the existing store will receive some interim cosmetic improvements, the company said.

Meanwhile, the Bellevue-based division of The Kroger Company is seeking a master use permit to develop a 35,000-sf QFC grocery store topped by 26 residential units on the site of a former grocery store operation at 39th & Stone Way in the Wallingford neighborhood. This project also is raising community concern, says David Van Skike, the city planner handling the application. "This is a fairly large mixed-use project in neighborhood that has not had a tremendous amount of mixed-use development," says Van Skike.

The existing vacant building on the Stone Way site is a one-story structure. QFC's proposal is to raze the building and build a four-story structure. Van Skike says the main entrance would be off Stone Way, with another entrance off 40th and an additional driveway on 39th. The project's designer is Portland, Ore.-based Sienna Architecture.