RAY BROOK – Two new gas tanks, looking like junior-sized blimps, were lowered into the ground at the Ray Brook Sunoco & Deli Wednesday afternoon. And bigger changes are planned.

The property of this gas station and convenience store has been sold. RL Vallee Inc. bought it in early March from the Sandri Companies and plans to replace the existing convenience store with one of its signature Maplefields stores.

That can’t happen right away, though. First the new owner has to seek permits from the state Adirondack Park Agency – which has its headquarters across the road – and the town of North Elba’s review board.

The gas pumps have been shut down recently while awaiting the new tanks here on busy state Route 86, halfway between Lake Placid and Saranac Lake and across the highway from three state agency headquarters. That left many Price Chopper customers on tenterhooks, waiting to use gas discounts they’d accumulated through the Lake Placid supermarket’s AdvantEdge Card program.

RL Vallee hasn’t decided yet whether to keep Sunoco as the station’s gas brand in the long term, according to company District Marketing Manager Todd Brodhead. He said he knows Sunoco’s Price Chopper connection is popular locally. Sandri, based in Greenfield, Massachusetts, has a 50-year association with Sunoco, whereas an online look at Maplefields shows its stores are often associated with the Mobil brand.

Donna Ottavinia owns the existing convenience store here. She leased it from Sandri and now leases from RL Vallee. That will continue as is for a little while longer, but not forever. RL Vallee runs its own Maplefields stores rather than leasing them out. Ottavinia said Wednesday she hasn’t decided yet whether she’ll try to work for them or seek her income elsewhere.

The company’s plan, if permitted, is to tear down the existing store and build a bigger one – between 4,500 and 5,000 square feet, according to Brodhead. Rather than building on the site of the current store, Ottavinia said the Maplefields store would be closer to Old Ray Brook Road, including where three rustic cabins now stand; the company bought them, too.

The new gas pumps will be on that side of the lot as well, where the new tanks were interred. Separate diesel pumps are also planned, near where the old pumps still stand. It’s planned to be “more of a smaller truck stop site, I believe,” Brodhead said.

Brodhead couldn’t say when all this would happen. It depends on permits, weather and other factors.

RL Vallee is based in St. Albans, Vermont, and runs 38 Maplefields stores in Vermont and New York, also including one in New Hampshire, according to Brodhead. Nearby Maplefields locations include Redford, Plattsburgh and Malone. Brodhead said gas and convenience stores are the company’s primary line of business, although he said it also distributes fuel to non-Maplefields locations.

In the Ray Brook store Thursday, regular customer Tom McGinnis overheard the conversation about the changeover and spoke up for the sandwiches. He loves the way Ottavinia and her staff make them.

“I’m a cook, so I know food,” he said. “They have the best deli around here.”