If Wheaton and Glenmont residents want to shop at a Trader Joe's, they must travel to the specialty grocery store's locations in Rockville and Silver Spring.

But perhaps that will soon change. A community petition to bring Trader Joe's to the Plaza del Mercado Shopping Center at the corner of Bel Pre and Layhill roads has received more than 1,500 signatures on Change.org.

"When Giant Foods closed their Plaza Del Marcado location, it left a great void for the surrounding neighborhoods," the petition states. "The Plaza Del Marcado shopping center is in desperate need of an anchor store and we believe Trader Joe's is just the ticket."

Montgomery County Council President Nancy Navarro has taken notice. She shared the following in her newsletter: "I wrote a letter to Federal Realty, which owns that shopping center. I alerted the company that the community is very interested in bringing a new grocery store and offered any assistance that my office, or the County, could provide in encouraging Trader Joe's to locate there."

Patch blogger Frances Frost writes that "we'll cross our fingers and wait to see what fills the space next.  And maybe Joe does pay attention to petitions and we'll get some peanut butter filled pretzels and flaxseed tortilla chips on this side of town."