A White Oak development proposal is back — with a grocery store, offices and other retail, but housing units delayed until another time.
The White Oak Town Center project, at Old Columbia Pike and Industrial Parkway, would be anchored by a 41,000-square-foot grocery store building for its first phase.
Marc Solomon, a principal with Finmarc Management, which is behind the project, would not be more specific on Tuesday evening about which grocery company would be there.
During a virtual community meeting to discuss the project, one participant asked in a chat box “Could we get a Wegman’s? Please?”
Solomon said it would not be Wegman’s, which has much larger buildings for its stores, but declined to comment further.
In 2019, the real estate news site Bisnow reported, citing “a source familiar with the deal,” that the store will be Trader Joe’s. But the grocery company and those connected to the project would not comment to the publication on that possibility. Trader Joe’s stores often are about 10,000 to 15,000 square feet.

Besides the grocery store, the plan for White Oak Town Center shows a restaurant/retail space of 9,100 square feet and an adjoining retail space of 13,080 square feet.
Closer to Industrial Parkway, the plan has 20,000 feet of ground-level restaurant/retail. A second level would also be 20,000 square feet, with office/retail space.
There would be 370 surface parking spaces.
An earlier iteration of a plan for the parcel several years ago showed apartment units.
But the development team said Tuesday that residential development has been tabled for the first phase and could show up in a later phase.
A site plan for the first phase has been submitted to planning officials for review.
Once approvals are in place, the developer hopes to start the project in January 2022 and possibly finish it in the spring of 2023.