Whole Foods’ next exit will not be Brooklyn, it was reported this week.
Plans to open a store at Third Street and Third Avenue near the Gowanus Canal have been scuttled, at least for now.
“Whole Foods does not have immediate plans to open in Brooklyn,” company spokeswoman Mara Engel Weleck told sister publication The Brooklyn Paper. The spokesperson suggested the land would be sold.
The ‘green’ grocer, known for organic and natural foods, was once slated to open in 2008.
The company was proposing a 77,000 square foot store, with 414 parking spaces, including a three−level parking garage, and landscaped shoreline promenade.
During the 1800s through 2004, the site was home to a number of industrial operations, including lumberyards, coal yards, and a petroleum oil company. Whole Foods is paying for an environmental cleanup of the polluted site, under the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) Brownfield Cleanup Program, which provides incentives to remediate former industrial sites before redeveloping them.
