91ÊÓƵ

Backers of the James Beard Public Market are focusing on a site on the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry campus after moving on from plans to build at the western base of the Morrison Bridge.

The market has been invited to participate in OMSI’s master plan for the land, Executive Director Fred Granum said Friday.

“We are participating in that and have every expectation that we’ll be included in that if all goes as we expect,” Granum said. “We are talking to some other sites in the Innovation Quadrant just to make sure we’re getting the very best site. But right now our focus is with the master planning that OMSI has organized.”

Earlier this summer, the James Beard Public Market board voted to abandon a proposed site at the west end of the Morrison Bridge after years of designing around the difficult parcel. The board’s move was first Thursday by local architectural blogger Brian Libby.

Other possible sites include the South Waterfront’s Zidell Yards, or even Centennial Mills, a river plot owned by the Portland Development Commission that the agency has struggled to redevelop.

The Public Market board had engaged the well-respected Norwegian architecture firm Snohetta on the project. Snohetta is also at work on OMSI’s master plan for the 17-acre property in southeast Portland.

“Snohetta’s a great firm,” Granum said.

Issues with the Morrison Bridge site had “nothing to do with the architects,” Granum said.

If the OMSI location works out, the market would serve residents and visitors of the close-in Eastside. That part of town has seen an explosion of growth in creative office tenants, with tech firms such as Simple putting down roots.

Granum said the timeline for the Public Market envisions breaking ground in 2019 and opening in 2020. The market would focus on fresh-food vendors plying Oregon-grown and harvested foods.