"This structure fits right into the riverfront community," Mr. Dickhoff said of the building, which will boast wraparound porches on two floors and a rear veranda. "The key is to get people to walk down here, especially at night, and this is going to help."

Mr. Dickhoff, who heads NF Management Inc. in Aquebogue, has built condos in Greenport as well as townhouses and other commercial buildings elsewhere in Riverhead.

This will be his first commercial project in the struggling downtown, and one that is highly touted by town officials.

"I think it's a smart project that's innovative and will take full advantage of the riverfront," said Riverhead Supervisor Phil Cardinale. "I'm excited about getting it completed. It's also a home-grown developer and I think that's very healthy."

Mr. Dickhoff, whose plans for the project were approved about two years ago, said it took the actions of another local developer to prevent him from scrapping the riverfront concept altogether.

"What's really going to help is Jimmy Bissett's plan with the hotel," he said, noting that his decision to move forward was based on plans of Mr. Bissett of Atlantis Marine World LLC to break ground on a sprawling riverfront hotel and resort.

"I'm looking forward to seeing him going forward, and I know he's going to do it," Mr. Dickhoff said of the hotel, which will also encompass the existing aquarium. "The hotel is a big thing because people will be spending the night here. They're not going to sit in their rooms, so that will bring the needed foot traffic at night."

Mr. Dickhoff purchased the vacant Peconic Avenue building, parts of which date to 1885 in 2002. He had originally planned to renovate the building, keeping its then-barbershop and two apartments, while adding a hot dog stand to face the rear parking lot, he said.

After some urging from town officials, he decided to rebuild.

His proposed plans for the new building were approved relatively quickly, Mr. Dickhoff said, but he had stalled on breaking ground until he could get an idea of the direction in which the town was headed. Chiefly, he wanted to see what Apollo Real Estate Advisors -- the investment group designated the downtown area's master developer in 2005 -- would build on Main Street, he said. The firm has yet to put a shovel in the ground.

"Apollo has gotten me to the point where I haven't moved forward, two and a half years of them doing nothing," Mr. Dickhoff said. "Jimmy Bissett is a real person, and I'm ready to go full force now.

"He's already got that whole end of Main Street hopping. All we have to do is get people to walk up and down. I feel the time has come."

Mr. Cardinale also said he feels downtown is on the cusp of a long-awaited overhaul, though he defended Apollo Real Estate Advisors as an integral part of the revival efforts.

"I know it's been said before, but I truly believe that downtown is on the brink of redevelopment and revitalization," he said. "Whether it's comprehensive redevelopment or individual development is, in the final analysis, an insignificant fact, as long as it occurs.

"I think each of the individual developers is looking for others to join in, and I can attest to the fact that Apollo is no different."

He noted that other proposed projects, such as a five-story hotel at the site of a former Ben Franklin Crafts building, will be expedited thanks to the East Main Street Urban Renewal Plan Update, a study paid for by Apollo.

The study is expected to be adopted next month, opening the floodgates for proposed plans to become brick and mortar in short order, he said.

"When we moved forward with the comprehensive development concept, as a result we really kind of put the brakes on for two years in order to get the study out of the way," Mr. Cardinale said. "But that study will make those projects go very quickly once the site plans are approved because they will not have to do environmental impact studies.

"That's going to help turn a year-long process into a few months."

Equally optimistic, Mr. Dickhoff said downtown Riverhead will be the first stop for visitors to the North Fork and no longer a town to be avoided because of empty stores, vagrancy and roads in need of repair.

Of his vision for downtown, he said: "You should be able to find out, for instance, what's going on at the wineries. If you're out golfing, then you come here afterward for dinner or drinks.

"This project can be a big part of that."

In the meantime, he's met with potential retail tenants for the western half of his building, and he said that an East End restaurateur, whom he declined to name, will open an Irish-American pub and restaurant in the eastern half.

"It's going to be designed like a microbrewery, though it's not big enough to actually brew beer," he said of the restaurant. "They'll always have some kind of music. People could come in right off the bay and say, 'Hey, they've got a live guy over there every weekend until 5. Let's go in.'"

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