50 Southwest Cutoff, Worcester, MA

Original Grocery Tenant: Big Y World Class Market
Address: 50 Southwest Cutoff, Worcester, MA

Opened: 1994

Closed: 2014

Later Tenants: Massachusetts RMV

Photographed: January 19, 2019

Can't miss that labelscar! Worcester once had two Big Y locations, with one here in the far southeastern corner of the city and the other up in Columbus Park, east of Webster Square (we'll see that in about a week). This one opened in 1994 and closed up 20 years later in 2014. The store faced route 20, or Southwest Cutoff. Three and a half miles west on 20 is Price Chopper, a mile and a half east is Market Basket, and a mile north is yesterday's Stop & Shop.

The 55,000 square foot store is now home to the Worcester Registry of Motor Vehicles office, which moved from downtown right next to the Worcester Market Building in 2022, but when I was at this store back in 2019, it was still very much an abandoned Big Y.

And we can get a good look inside from the large windows at the front! Obviously, this has all been renovated now.

It looks like Big Y even removed the decor from the walls when they closed. I wonder if they sent it to an older store in need of refreshing.

This, by the way, is the decor Southbridge had, but the walls were all white like this.

The entrance/exit doors were at either end of the front foyer area.

Unfortunately, I couldn't really get a good shot of the grand aisle, but I believe it was on the far left side of the store.

Big Y signage was still painted over in 2019, although again, this is all gone now.

There's a lot of the southeastern part of the city that doesn't have chain supermarkets, so we haven't seen it yet. But over the next two days, we're going to pass through Green Island, Canal District, Vernon, Grafton, Union, and Oak Hills, and a bit of Franklin Plantation. Lots to see, so come back tomorrow for The Independent Edition Roundup of those neighborhoods!