It’s been delayed for close to three years, but the opening of a Lowe’s home-improvement store in Iwilei will finally happen on Thursday.

The 117,000-square-foot store with an adjacent 31,500-square-foot garden center along Nimitz Highway and Pacific Street is scheduled to open at 5 a.m.

The Iwilei store also is positioned for extremely close competition with Home Depot and City Mill, which are within a few hundred feet of each other.

Originally, Lowe’s Companies Inc. confirmed plans for the store in 2005, and anticipated an opening in 2008. But unspecified issues pushed back the timetable.

"This one has been a long time in the making, but we are excited to see this store come to fruition," said Lowe’s spokeswoman Chris Ahearn.

The store will be the fourth in Hawaii and second on Oahu for Lowe’s, which operates stores in Kahului, Kona and Waikele. Lowe’s said the new store will employ about 125 people.

Industry analysts have noted that it’s not unusual for Lowe’s, the world’s second-largest home-improvement retailer, and its bigger rival Home Depot to develop stores adjacent to each other or smaller competitors on the mainland.

Mooresville, N.C.-based Lowe’s has about 1,725 stores in the United States, Canada and Mexico. The company entered Hawaii in 1999 with its purchase of Eagle Hardware & Garden, which operated stores in Waikele and Kahului. Lowe’s opened a third store in Kona in 2003.

The retailer bought the roughly 14-acre Iwilei property in March 2005 for $35 million, according to property records.

The site previously was primarily used for fuel storage tanks, a petroleum truck filling station and warehouse operations by ConocoPhillips.