Coming soon to Ferndale at Northwest Highway, Starbucks.

We’ve speculated since the mournful closure of Backus Shell — which shuttered and sold to developers March 2015 after 50 years in business at Ferndale and Northwest Highway — about the property’s future, and since May of the same year, we kind of knew that it would be replaced with a Starbucks. (That’s when Darren Backus told us that the developers he sold to, Crestview Real Estate, had been working on a deal to build a Starbucks.)

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The writing on the wall zoomed into focus after we ran into Cresview’s Grey Stogner at the site in question and asked him, “Well, is it going to be a Starbucks?” And he said, “Starbucks is a possibility. What do you think?”

Now the answer is literally in writing, on the sign that reads “COMING SOON” above the ubiquitous Starbucks logo.

I’ve left word with Crestview in an attempt to garner more details about the future coffee shop — size, drive-thru or not and so forth.