Portland's newest outdoor market will open next week in the Boise-Eliot neighborhood on a plot of land that's been a vacant eyesore for years.

The new Boise-Eliot market is the brainchild of stonemason Spencer Burton who ran for Dan Saltzman's seat for Portland city council in November. Though the bid for city council flopped, Burton and the NE Coalition of Neighborhoods did succeed in a different project: securing a plot of land for a farmer's market in his neck of the woods.

Five weeks ago, the owner of the vacant lot on the corner of North Williams and Fremont offered up his land for a twice-weekly neighborhood market that has about 30 businesses signed up to sell goods so far, including Martini Farms, Canby Asparagus Farm and Portland Organic Garden. Burton hopes to sign up 20 more businesses before the market opens next weekend, July 17.

This isn't one of the official city farmer's markets and it's been a little bumpy organizing a market from scratch, says Burton.

"People can't believe there's nothing there," Burton said about the area's empty lots, many of which are scars from the early 1970s when Emanuel hospital razed 20 businesses in the area to make way for an expansion (which then never materialized).

Opening a market will "help the area as a new commercial hub," Burton says. He hopes people who don't have enough money for a storefront for a business can sell their goods at the lot.

During the summer the market will run twice a week on Tuesdays from 3-7p.m. and Saturdays from 9-1p.m.