Supermarket Will Close to Make Way for Office Tower

Ralphs on Sept. 26 will close its 40,000-square-foot supermarket at 11740 Wilshire Blvd., just west of Barrington Avenue, to make way for a 17-story office project.

A spokeswoman for the nearby Barrington Plaza high-rise apartments said that some elderly tenants are upset because they will have to travel farther to shop. The grocery store is practically at their doorstep, she said.

Ralphs will continue to operate its 29,000-square-foot supermarket a few blocks away at 12057 Wilshire Blvd., at Bundy Drive, store officials said.

Other supermarkets in the neighborhood include Safeway, at Barrington Avenue and Santa Monica Boulevard, and Westward Ho, on San Vicente Boulevard in Brentwood.

Ralphs spokesman Gene Brown said that normally the company would not operate two supermarkets so close together, but because of the high population density in the West Los Angeles-Brentwood area, it acquired the lease for the Wilshire-Barrington store when Market Basket left a few years ago.

Ralphs must vacate the site to make room for a 17-story office project being built by Homart Development Co. of West Los Angeles. The project, called Landmark II, was approved by the City of Los Angeles in 1984 and at the urging of residents will include a 30,000-square-foot supermarket.