After years of starts and stops, the Waipahu Festival Market Place will open this summer.

The Waipahu Community Association is banking that the project, at the former Big Way Supermarket building across Waipahu Depot Road from Arakawa's, will become the focal point that sparks economic revitalization in the historic plantation town.

Part Ala Moana Farmers Market and part Aloha Stadium Swap Meet, the market will feature stalls and kiosks with vendors ranging from fresh produce grocers to artists and crafts people.

There are about 6,300 square feet of leasable retail space. Plans call for a walking path to link the marketplace with Hawai'i's Plantation Village at the Waipahu Cultural Garden, about half a mile away.

The Depot Road neighborhood was devastated by the 1995 closure of the O'ahu Sugar plantation, said Myrna Feliciano, acting executive director of the community association.

"That whole place went dead," said Thelma Gomez, whose West O'ahu Realty Inc. is the leasing agent for the market.

But a revitalization is under way. Both the Leeward YMCA, at the old mill location, and Filipino Community Center, right next to it, have opened up in recent years. Both are within easy walking distance of the Big Way site.

Darrlyn Bunda, Feliciano's predecessor, reactivated the Waipahu Community Association in 2000 and began the arduous task of collecting grants from government and private entities.

The 22 stalls are renting for $3 a square foot. The mix includes two fishmarkets, three fresh produce farmers and crafts people. Available stalls are from 223 to 262 square feet in size.

Additionally, there are nine kiosks in the marketplace designed primarily as low-cost incubator space for new entrepreneurs who go through Empower O'ahu's micro-business training program for low- and moderate-income individuals.

The association is still looking for potential kiosk vendors. The next Empower O'ahu training sessions begin June 9. Future classes will be trained at a facility in the marketplace.

Among those who can't wait for the marketplace to open is Shirley Renteria, who closed her bustling Kalika's Fishmarket in Chinatown and the Kam Drive-In swap meet to move into a Waipahu marketplace stall.

The Makakilo resident, 57, said not only will the commute be easier for her but the West O'ahu region is crying for an attraction like the marketplace.

"It's going to be good for everybody," she said.

The project cost $3.7 million, including $1.25 million to buy the property and $2.38 million to refurbish the Big Way, which is believed to have been built in the 1950s.

Reach Gordon Y.K. Pang at gpang@honoluluadvertiser.com.