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Bear Creek Albertson's has closed As shoppers wander through the shiny new aisles of Albertson's Inc.'s new Central Point store today, the company's original Medford store will spend its first day vacant. On Tuesday, Albertson's closed its Bear Creek Plaza store, which opened in 1978. Earlier this month, the firm announced it would close the store as the Central Point location opened; the store's 60 employees were offered jobs at the new store. The future of the Bear Creek Plaza store remains unclear. Pan Pacific Properties, the Bellevue, Wash. firm that owns the plaza, is confident that the 44,300-square-foot space won't be empty long. Jeff Stauffer, the company's chief operations officer, says there's been "a lot of interest" in the space, though he declined to reveal from whom. He hopes to have a lease signed in the next 30 to 45 days. Despite the loss of a prominent anchor store such as Albertson's, Stauffer says the plaza -- which Pan Pacific bought in 1998 -- will remain a strong retail center. He points to stores like Bi-Mart and TJ Maxx, as well as its location at the intersection of two of Medford's busiest streets: Biddle and East McAndrews roads. The Albertson's closure leaves Medford with three vacant grocery stores. The others are the former Safeway on West Main Street, closed in June, and the former Cantwell's on Black Oak Drive, which closed September 1998. Other prominent large retail spaces available include the new portion of the Medford Center, the former Future Shop in Crater Lake Plaza and the former Medford 4 Cinema on Progress Drive. Today's Edition : News | Sports | Business | Weather | Tempo | Classifieds Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 2000, Medford, Oregon USA