Downtown work brings Market Street closures; businesses remain open
Utility construction, part of a $9.9 million makeover for downtown Clinton, brought this week’s closure of Market Street to vehicular traffic from Monday morning to Wednesday afternoon. (photo:G. Chambers Williams III )
This is part of a $9.9 million project that began last week and is expected to last for about 17 months total in the historic area of downtown Clinton as new water and sewer lines are installed, sidewalks are replaced and improved, and landscaping is added.
This week’s Market Street closing began at 6 a.m. Monday and was projected to last until 6 p.m. today.
But the Historic Downtown Clinton Merchants Association said in a social media post that “Businesses on Market Street will be open as usual, and plenty of free parking is available in the public lot on Cullom Street.”
The group also noted that “There will be no interruptions of (utility) service and water will not be turned off.”
“While the city is working as best they can not to close the street as much as possible, this was unfortunately unavoidable,” the merchants’ group said.
Clinton Utilities Board is able to keep the water on during construction because the new water and sewer lines will be laid under the sidewalks, while the current ones, which run under the street, will not be disturbed and will be abandoned in place when the new lines are up and running, city officials said.
Brief water cutoffs will occur only as each customer is connected to the new water and sewer lines once they are in place.
Barricades were in place Monday morning at the top of Market Street where it meets Main Street, and on the other end just to the west of Cullom Street.
No work has yet begun on Main Street, but boundaries of the project are nearly all of Market Street, from Cullom to Main, then Main from Market to Broad streets; and Broad from Main Street to Lakefront Park at Charles G. Seivers Boulevard. Pearl Alley off Market Street will also be included.
“It’s going to be a mess during the construction, but we want people to know it’s going to be built back great,” Clinton City Manager Roger Houck said earlier.
“We’ve been working with our downtown merchants to help limit the impact on them, and we’ve encouraged them to plan on using their rear doors, if they have them,” he said.
“Businesses with no rear access might be closed for a day or two while work is going on in front,” Houck said.
Last week, Kathie Creasey, owner of Granny’s Attic at 370 Market St., said the downtown businesses have been kept informed about the project throughout the planning stages and up to the beginning of work on Monday, Feb. 24.
“We will have new sidewalks, and they will be doing benches and nice greenery after they get the utility work done,” she said.
“Obviously, the stores with front and back doors will have it easier; some of us down here do,” she added. “But they’re doing it a section at a time, and it sounds like they’re going to do it so it’s not terribly disruptive.”
The city and the merchants want people to know that all downtown businesses will remain open and ready to serve their customers throughout the project.
According to the Historic Downtown Clinton organization, the completed project will include:
• Level spaces at building entrances.
• Twenty-inch seat walls with flower beds that include layered shrubs, grasses and perennials.
• On Pearl Alley, “gateway to Market Street – medium and flowering trees to frame the space between buildings.”
• A “two-sided historic-looking clock.”
• “Large canopy trees” to “provide a strong impact at key intersections.”
• “Medium canopy trees [to] provide a rhythm and a constant presence.”
• “Flowering trees [to] provide visual interest.”
• “Decorative bollards at parking spaces.”
• “Updated utilities and sewer infrastructure.”
Planning began in 2019, and the project is being financed in part by two Transportation Alternative Program, or TAP, grants, totaling $4.84 million, from the Tennessee Department of Transportation; a $2.3 million federal grant from the COVID-era American Rescue Act; $1.5 million from Clinton Utilities Board; and $1.2 million from the city of Clinton.
“Water and sewer had to be improved; they’re replacing lines close to 90 years old,” Houck said just before work began.
“The TAP grants are to help make Market and Main streets more pedestrian friendly, adding landscaping, benches and other accessories to downtown.”
“We will be digging up the sidewalks for the new water and sewer lines, and the ones under the road will be abandoned,” he said.
Knoxville-based Cannon & Cannon is doing engineering work on the project, while Adams Contractors of Lexington, Kentucky, is the main contractor, Houck said.
