DOWNTOWN CLINTON

Sidewalks taking shape, mayor says they’ll be ready for festival

February 18, 2026 by G. Chambers Williams III

Construction workers are busy pouring the concrete for the new sidewalks on Market Street in Historic Downtown Clinton as the city pushes to get them finished in time for the Clinch River Spring Antique Festival May 1-2.

“We should have the sidewalks ready and all store entrances open by the time of the festival, and we plan to have Market Street open for the street vendors, even though the paving probably won’t be done yet,” Clinton Mayor Scott Burton said late last week.

And despite some confusion about the upgrades on social media, the new sidewalks and store entrances will all be handicapped accessible as promised, Burton said.

Several Market Street merchants have posted over the past two weeks or so that they were having to close for a few days to allow the pouring of concrete for the sidewalks in front of their businesses – the ones that don’t have rear entrances available.

Burrville antiques at 355 Market Street was closed for several days while sidewalks were poured, but reopened Friday.

“To celebrate the new sidewalk in front of our store, we’ve washed the tile and cleaned the vestibule (for the first time in months)!” the store posted on its Facebook page Thursday, also announcing that the store would be open on Friday and Saturday.

Downtown merchants continue to remain optimistic about their businesses and the future as work gets closer to completion on the major upgrades to Market Street, which has been closed to traffic for extensive reconstruction since last March.

Clinton City Manager Roger Houck said in late December that he believed the street and the sidewalks would be ready in time for the Spring Antique Festival, but he acknowledged that the completion dates would depend on the weather.

With two winter storms coming through in mid-January, the sidewalks were not finished by Feb. 1, as Houck had predicted on Dec. 23.

“We’re at Day 335 of 546 days of construction, Houck said at that time. “That’s a little over 60% done. After the first of the year, weather permitting, we will begin drilling to install bases for new light posts.”

After the pouring of concrete is completed, “We will be working on the planters for the street, and in early March, we should begin planting the 200 or so trees and plants that will go on Market Street,” he said.

“There will be new asphalt laid on Broad, Main, Market, Commerce and Cullom streets,” Houck said. “We also hope to put new asphalt on the public parking lot on Commerce Street. It’s been 40-plus years since new asphalt was laid there.

“There’s just a lot of small stuff that’s got to be done,” he said. “As for broadband (Wi-Fi) for downtown, the conduit is already in for it.”

When that’s installed and up and running, there will be free public Wi-Fi available all over the downtown business district, according to plans.

Even with the design changes to the street and sidewalks, Houck said there will still be on-street parking available on Market Street, and that some on-street parking also is being added to Cullom Street.

As for the downtown parking meters, “We’re still undecided,” he said.

The construction is part of a $9.9 million project that began in February 2025, and was expected to last for about 17 months total in the historic area of downtown Clinton as new water and sewer lines are installed, sidewalks replaced and improved, and landscaping is added.

The Historic Downtown Clinton Merchants Association has reminded people all through the project that, as far as possible, businesses on Market Street would be open as usual, except for brief periods at stores where sidewalk paving might block their only entrances for a few days.

“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 has been able to keep the water on during construction because the new water and sewer lines are going under the sidewalks, while the old ones, which run under the street, were not to be disturbed, and will be abandoned in place when the new lines are up and running, city officials said.

Kathie Creasey, owner of Granny’s Attic at 370 Market St., said at the beginning that the downtown businesses had been kept informed about the project throughout the planning stages and up to the beginning of work last Feb. 24.