One day, a restaurant at John Rivers’ new educational farm in Orlando’s Packing District neighborhood could serve fish raised there with vegetables grown on the property fertilized by the same fish’s waste.

That intense farm-to-table dining experience is still a while off at the 18-acre 4Roots farm under construction off John Young Parkway, but the greenhouse where hundreds of tilapia will be raised in tanks and vegetables will grow is reaching completion.

A classroom building has also sprouted up. It will be topped with solar panels producing more energy than the building will use, all while rainwater will be collected in cisterns for irrigation and flushing toilets.

“The entire farm is a closed loop system,” said Rivers, who is founder of the 4 Rivers Smokehouse restaurant chain. “Everything from energy collection, water collection, fertilization, growth of food, growth of protein, and it’s all used and it goes in one big circle around. So there’s zero waste.”

The first seeds for lettuce, tomatoes, zucchini, broccoli, and other vegetables would be planted in November, if everything works out with power and irrigation installation and there are no other holdups, inside the roughly 15,000-square-foot greenhouse, said head farmer Josh Taylor.

The greenhouse will feature windows while limiting people inside to protect the crops from pests or disease.

The 7,700-square-foot educational building, with four classrooms, is targeted for completion in December with students there in January, Rivers said. It will feature windows looking out on the farm.

“We wanted them to feel like they were immersed in the farm while they’re actually learning about agriculture,” Rivers said as he showed the Orlando Sentinel around the under-construction building on Thursday. “It’s not just [school] students that we’re going to have in here. There’s family groups. There’s cooking classes. There’s groups of Medicare patients that will be brought in and taught how to cook.”

The second phase of the project is currently under design, and it will include community destinations such as an events center and the restaurant. Rivers hopes those pieces could be under construction next year.

The farm is one of the latest developments to come online in the 200-acre Packing District project from Dr. Phillips Charities. The massive development is on Princeton Street, Orange Blossom Trail and John Young Parkway, northwest of downtown Orlando and just west of the College Park neighborhood.

A 31,000-square-feet, $17 million YMCA opened as part of the Packing District earlier this year. The Grove park, Orlando Tennis Center and apartments have also opened.

A new Publix at Princeton Street and Orange Blossom Trail is expected to open in March, possibly sooner, and a 22,000-square-foot food hall is slated for April, said Ken Robinson, president and CEO of Dr. Phillips Inc.

A replica of a juice stand that was once part of Philip “Doc” Phillips’ citrus operations will house Foxtail Coffee Co., Ravenous Pig Brewing Co. and Kelly’s Homemade Ice Cream and is also expected to open around the end of this year or early next year.

The one-of-a-kind work being done by Rivers and his team at the 4Roots farm is what “thrills” Robinson’s organization the most, he said in a statement.

“The opportunity to teach children, high school and college students about agriculture and sustainability in the heart of Orlando is amazing,” Robinson said. “Dr. Phillips himself would have loved everything about it: the innovation, the education, the sustainability, and most of all helping those most in need in our community.”

For Rivers, every visit to the farm is more exciting as the project first envisioned in 2015 takes shape.

“To watch it becoming real, it’s like one of your children that you think about, and you pray about for so, so long actually coming to life,” Rivers said. “I can’t tell you how exhilarating it is.”