DOWNTOWN : Grand Central May Get Grocery

A full-service grocery store could be coming to downtown if negotiations between the Grand Central Market and Brentwood-based Westward Ho Markets are successful.

Westward Ho, which has eight stores in West Los Angeles, hopes to move into a 30,000-square-foot downstairs space at the historic market on Broadway. But Westward Ho owner Jerry Preston said a move into the Grand Central Market is still at least a year away and depends heavily on when a parking structure is built in the area.

Officials for the Yellin Co., owner of Grand Central Market, declined to discuss details of the negotiations, although owner Ira Yellin publicly announced Westward Ho’s intent to move in at the market’s 75th anniversary celebration last week.

Downtown residents have been without a full-service grocer since the early 1980s, when a Thriftimart in Bunker Hill closed.

Preston said a number of uncertainties, including whether residents will shop after 6 p.m., make Westward Ho’s move into downtown Los Angeles a risky financial venture. He said he intends to keep his grocery store open until 10 p.m. but doesn’t know what the response would be.

“If I can get down there and give people what they want, over a period of years, it’ll pay off,” he said. “It’ll take the support of all the residents down there.”