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Andres Ochoa chose an ambitious project for his first effort as lead developer.

Ochoa decided to renovate a 119-year-old brick building that had housed a Burger King restaurant, a Subway restaurant and a food court in recent years. He decided to turn the building at 827 S.W. Second Ave. into a food hall 鈥� a model that has caught on in cities worldwide, and in Portland with Pine Street Market, The Zipper and others.

Now Ochoa is wrangling tenants, finishing interior improvements and getting ready to open the doors this spring. Portland Food Hall has six restaurants on board, and two more are being sought. The long-gestating development is a leap of faith for Ochoa and his investors.

鈥淗e basically chose the most complicated first development for a fledgling development company to take on,鈥� said Kevin Cavenaugh, principal at Guerrilla Development and Ochoa’s former boss. 鈥淎ny project he does after this, he could do it in his sleep.鈥�

The development follows the opening of Pine Street Market, a bustling food hall, in April 2016. It’s also in a heavily renovated, historic downtown building less than a half mile to the north. Despite some churn among tenants, Pine Street Market has been busy since opening.

Ochoa is scrambling to get Portland Food Hall ready to open. He acknowledged he’s feeling pressure from investors, who have been waiting for the project to get off the ground since 2013. Seven investors have invested amounts between $25,000 and $85,000 in Portland Food Hall, Ochoa said.

鈥淚t was very, very challenging to raise money for this project, even in small amounts,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t was very, very challenging to go with a bank.鈥�

Portland Food Hall attracted financing from Albina Community Bank and small grants, including a $15,000 development opportunity services grant from the Portland Development Commission.

Ochoa purchased the property for $975,000 in July 2015.

So far, Ochoa has lined up six tenants for eight spaces. They are Boke Doke (fried-chicken sandwiches from the same people as Boke Bowl), Moberi (smoothies and Acai bowls), COSA Coffee, The Whole Bowl, Aiko Ramen (a sibling of the Hapa Ramen food cart) and Mini-Bar, a small, upstairs bar that Ochoa is working to put together.

鈥淭he beauty and the challenge of a food hall is it is the sum of its parts,鈥� he said.

Ochoa is working to fill the final two slots. Rather than use a brokerage, Ochoa has hustled to attract tenants on his own.

The building has 6,394 square feet total, according to city records, including 3,200 square feet of office space that is available for lease.

Portland Food Hall is positioned to benefit from substantial foot traffic generated by nearby businesses including those in Pioneer Place and Apple. Just across the street from Portland Food Hall are High Noon Restaurant and 40 LBS Coffee Bar. An A.C. Hotel by Marriott opened in February a block away at Southwest Third Avenue and Taylor Street.

Portland Food Hall will be much smaller than Pine Street Market, which is at 126 S.W. Second Ave. That 28,500-square-foot building was constructed in 1886 and thoroughly renovated in a project developed by Siteworks Design | Build, InterUrban Development, Alta Wallowa Properties Inc. and Northwest Sustainable Properties.

Pine Street Market has had no vacancies since opening, said Jean-Pierre Veillet, Siteworks’ principal. Eateries such as Marukin Ramen and Wiz Bang Bar, a soft-serve ice cream shop from Salt & Straw, have drawn social-media buzz and mostly positive press (the notable exception was a Willamette Week review in May that declared the market a 鈥渕assive disappointment鈥�).

Recently a new burger shop, Bless Your Heart Burgers, replaced Israeli eatery Shalom Y’all.

鈥淚’ve worked with the restaurants and the chefs my entire career,鈥� Veillet said. 鈥淚 saw rents increasing dramatically for them. Creating a small space in a collaborative setting could be a better business model for the future of Portland.鈥�

Food halls require more careful curating of tenants than most projects, he said.

鈥淚t’s not a one-size-fits-all building,鈥� he said. 鈥淵ou can’t plug in anyone who can pay the rent. It takes some customization and a lot of diligence to make it all work.鈥�

Food halls, common in international capitals, are catching on in the U.S. Anthony Bourdain, the noted TV host and author, is putting together Bourdain Market, a massive food hall on the Hudson River in New York City that will highlight international street foods.

鈥淭here has been a huge groundswell of food halls starting in major markets 鈥� New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and now coming to Portland, Atlanta, Dallas, Houston,鈥� said James Cook, an Indiana-based retail analyst at Jones Lang LaSalle. 鈥淥maha just got one.鈥�

Diners increasingly want the type of food they see on Instagram and foodie TV shows, Cook said.

鈥淎ll of that has led to a culture where people have much higher expectations for variety, quality of ingredients, healthfulness of ingredients,鈥� Cook said. 鈥淒iners have more sophisticated palettes, and so food halls are a way to appeal to that.鈥�

In New York City, Eataly and Hudson Eats food halls have added to the dining scene. Bourdain’s project has been pushed back.

鈥淎t least in New York, there’s a feeling that we may be at peak food hall,鈥� Cook said.

For restaurateurs, a food hall represents a middle ground that’s more affordable than a restaurant storefront, but allows more space and capacity than a food cart. It also lends a promise of greater stability because food carts can be buffeted by bad weather or break-ins. There’s also greater permanence 鈥� many food carts are sited in surface parking lots where mixed-use development is planned.

Developing food halls requires constant work to attract the right mix of tenants, developers say. That’s the main task now for Ochoa, who is a relatively fresh face on Portland’s development scene. He started on the path to development through a chance meeting with Jon Carder, then the president of Melvin Mark brokerage.

Ochoa was working for a software company at the time, and pursuing a Master of Business Administration at Willamette University, where Carder was a board member.

鈥淚t’s very serendipitous that I got into this business,鈥� Ochoa said. 鈥淚f I hadn’t met him, I might still be selling my soul.鈥�

Ochoa joined Melvin Mark, and co-brokered the sale of the downtown building that became Pine Street Market.

鈥淗e’s a very high-energy guy,鈥� said Carder, who is not involved in Portland Food Hall.

Carder introduced Ochoa to Cavenaugh, a local developer known for the under-construction Fair-Haired Dumbbell and a series of projects along Sandy Boulevard.

After working with Cavenaugh for a year, Ochoa started his own company, Rogue Development. He plans to develop in the same mold as Guerrilla.

鈥淚 really enjoyed the way (Cavenaugh) looked at development and the way he looked at the community more than just a profit line-item,鈥� Ochoa said.

The food halls may be joined in a few years by the James Beard Public Market, which would showcase foods from Northwest farmers and purveyors.

The market team is looking to the Central Eastside after plans to open at the west end of Morrison Bridge fell through last year. Market backers have lobbied to move near the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry. Snohetta, a Norway-based architecture firm, is designing OMSI’s master plan, and while no decisions have been made, there has been 鈥済ood movement鈥� toward including the market, said Fred Granum, the market’s executive director.

鈥淚t’s not a deal until it’s a deal, but it’s going well,鈥� he said.

OMSI and Snohetta are expected to finalize the master plan by this summer.