Blatstein seeks Plan B for Northern Liberties supermarket

The Northern Liberties developer behind a planned Pathmark supermarket has asked a bankruptcy judge to clear the way for a different supermarket to open, if need be, at the old Schmidt's Brewery, where Pathmark holds a lease but has not yet opened a store.

"I petitioned the courts to have them do that a month ago," Bart Blatstein said Wednesday of his efforts to enforce or dissolve his lease with Pathmark, whose parent company, A&P, has been in bankruptcy since December.

"Leave," Blatstein said. "I've got a bunch of operators that want to go there."

In a motion filed in March in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Southern District of New York, Schmidts Retail L.P. asked for a ruling to compel A&P to assume or reject its lease on the Northern Liberties site near Blatstein's Piazza development.

Delays since A&P filed for bankruptcy are having ripple effects across the newly constructed project - an L-shaped center that would contain a second-story supermarket, with national chain retailers at street level. Delays also threaten the developer's financing obligations, according to court filings.

Pathmark's delays are affecting the ability to sign leases with other tenants, according to the motion.

"Schmidts' ability to rent other retail space in the Redevelopment Project has now virtually disappeared because prospective tenants and real estate brokers are concerned about whether Pathmark will occupy the premises," the motion said.

"This delay puts Schmidts in danger of breaching its financing obligations as to, and its leases with other tenants in, the Redevelopment Project," the developer said, and is hurting efforts to potentially sign a different supermarket operator, too.

Blatstein's motion came amid upheaval from the bankruptcy filing by the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Co. Inc., which has stalled Pathmark's plans to open in the 52,000-square-foot space he built in the heart of resurgent Northern Liberties.

A&P spokesman Eric Andrus declined to comment Wednesday on the company's intentions regarding the Northern Liberties site.

But a Schmidts executive, Adam Lisausky, said in an affidavit filed with the court that Pathmark officials told him they wanted to abandon ties to the project.