A decade after plans were laid to give Honolulu a seafood marketplace rivaling San Francisco's Fisherman's Wharf or Seattle's Pike Place Market, the vision remains unrealized with more than half the land for the state project at Pier 38 empty.

But now, after protracted delays that included problems with underground methane, the effort championed by former Gov. Ben Cayetano appears to be gaining traction.

Five prospective tenants, including Tsukiji Fish Market and Restaurant, have leased or are negotiating for all the remaining available space at the Pier 38 Domestic Commercial Fishing Village, also known as Honolulu Fishing Village.

The additions would finally produce a critical mass of activity in this central piece of Honolulu Harbor, where a few initial tenants, including two restaurants, have eked out an existence despite the relative obscurity of the still mostly industrial area.

"We don't want this to be a hidden gem," said Mike Formby, deputy director of the state Department of Transportation's Harbors Division. "Hopefully, within two years we will have an actual fishing village with a synergy to it."

MOVING FORWARD

Nicolas Chaize, chef and owner of Nico's Pier 38, a casual seafood restaurant that opened five years ago and has built a following largely from Honolulu office workers and dockworkers, said years of frustrating delays are now yielding to positive momentum.

"When we first opened our restaurant, it was a challenge — how are we going to bring people down here? It was an industrial pier," he said. "It's been a great adventure."

The fishing village concept dates back at least to 1990, during the administration of Gov. John Waihee. But the project was launched in 1997 by Cayetano with renderings of a landscaped 10-building campus on 16.5 acres between piers 36 and 38. It was designed to consolidate fish-processing companies in one location next to docks for fishing boats unloading their catches daily.

About a dozen businesses — seafood wholesalers, retailers, suppliers and restaurants — had signed on to the project, anchored by the fish auction house that moves more than 80 percent of Hawai'i's fresh catch, United Fishing Agency.

Two years of construction was to have been completed on the envisioned tourist magnet and showcase for Hawai'i's fishing industry in 2000. But problems with underground methane gas produced by decomposing petroleum contamination complicated work.

A SLOW START

After several years of delay and added costs, the state finished improving the site with docks, roads, utilities, bathrooms and some tenant buildings at a cost of more than $17 million.

Three initial tenants opened — the auction house, Nico's and fishing vessel handler and equipment supplier Pacific Ocean Producers — in 2004.

Wholesale fish distributor Fresh Island Fish Co. joined the nascent Pier 38 community in 2006, and a year later opened an affiliated restaurant, Uncle's Fish Market & Grill.

Today, Uncle's and Nico's have strong local followings, and a few tourists even venture to the area to eat, shop and visit the fish auction.

Among visitors last week was a family of seven from Tahiti that spent $600 to $700 at Pacific Ocean Producers on reels, lures and other fishing gear that costs more back home. "Good shopping," said Simon Roihau.

Mostly though, Pier 38 remains undiscovered.

Makeshift signs are posted along Nimitz Highway but don't do much to publicize the budding marketplace. A main customer parking lot along the highway is leased out by the state for commercial freight truck parking.

By one estimate, the state has missed out on $750,000 in annual rent from the empty parcels at the site.

Many of the originally interested tenants gave up ambitions to be part of the marketplace as problems continued to inhibit expansion opportunities. For instance, a 32,000-square-foot building that the state completed in 2001 for as many as eight tenants has remained empty because additional methane mitigation work was necessary.

PERMIT PROBLEMS

Formby said that even after all methane under the building was dealt with, lease deals fell through because the state hadn't obtained county building permits necessary for tenants to improve the building's interior.

In the last few months, the state obtained the building permits, and has resumed negotiations to lease the space. Formby said he hopes leases can be agreed upon in the next 60 days with two interested parties proposing to each use half the building.

Tsukiji, which operates a restaurant at Ala Moana Center, recently began building a second location on a vacant parcel at Pier 38.

Seafood Hawaii, a wholesaler and retailer that operates the seafood concessions inside local Sam's Club stores, is trying to finalize a lease with the state for another Pier 38 parcel.

Arick Yanagihara, company co-owner, said Seafood Hawaii has long considered being part of the fishing village, largely to be close to United Fishing's auction house, which it used to be near before United Fishing moved off state land in Kaka'ako to make way for development there. That development has languished much longer than the Pier 38 redevelopment project.

"When (the Kaka'ako site) closed down, we became somewhat of a gypsy," Yanagihara said.

ICE PLANT MOVES IN

Not every tenant headed to Pier 38 is being viewed as an enhancement to the project. One, Hawaiian Ice Co., is drawing some criticism.

The Transportation Department is moving the ice maker to two lots in the middle of the fishing village from neighboring Pier 35 because the state needs Hawaiian Ice's site for the University of Hawai'i Marine Center that's being displaced by state redevelopment plans for Honolulu Harbor's Snug Harbor.

Formby acknowledges that the ice plant isn't the most optimum use of space at Pier 38, but said the state didn't have a better option. "We had to give them a parcel so they could move," he said. "We were under the gun."

Fishing boats and the fish auction need ice, but Pacific Ocean Producers already provides it. So Hawaiian Ice, which supplies ice to both the fishing industry and retail outlets, isn't expected to be a fishing village attraction.

Formby did say that architects are working to design Hawaiian Ice's building so that it aesthetically blends with surrounding buildings.

Hawaiian Ice, Seafood Hawaii, Tsukiji and the two unnamed hopeful tenants would occupy all available space within the project area, though there are two adjacent parcels that the state expects to add to the marketplace in the near future.

One site is used by the Gas Co. and could be offered for lease within six months after some equipment is removed, Formby said. The other site is used by Chevron, which previously removed storage tanks but will retain some pipeline equipment. Formby said the state hopes to incorporate most of the Chevron property into the fishing village.

Also in the works are plans for better signs on Nimitz heralding the project's presence, Formby said. A name change from the industrial-sounding Domestic Commercial Fishing Village is a possibility.

"I think it's going to be a really, really, really busy place in the next four or five years," said Chaize of Nico's, contrasting future prospects with the past nearly five years he's been in business at Pier 38.

"It's really exciting."