Clinton Market Night set for Saturday
Historic Downtown Clinton merchants will hold their first of three 2026 summer “Market Night” events from 5-8 p.m. this coming Saturday, June 13.
Two additional Market Nights are scheduled for July 11 and Aug. 8.
Conducted by the merchants’ group, the Market Night events will include street vendors set up along Market Street, along with food trucks and trailers.
The merchants will stay open late to accommodate the crowds, which could be rather large this year as Market Street comes back to life after a shutdown for major sidewalk reconstruction and other improvements over the past year-and-a-half.
Even though the street won’t yet be reopened to vehicular traffic, at least for this Saturday’s event, the new sidewalks and other improvements along Market Street are ready to accommodate people on foot.
Visitors are expected to crowd the street just as they did for the Spring Clinch River Antique Festival earlier this month.
Free parking is available in the city’s downtown parking lots, including the large one on Commerce Street and the new one on Main Street across from Knight’s Flowers.
City Manager Roger Houck said Monday that he expects Market Street to be reopened to vehicular traffic by the end of June, when repaving should be completed – “weather permitting.”
“Right now, we’re doing wiring and landscaping,” he said.
That includes putting trees in the new planters along the sidewalk, which Houck said began last week.
“They’ll start preparation for paving sometime next week, but Market Street only,” he said. “They will be milling the existing pavement and filling some of the trenches.”
Meanwhile, repaving of Main Street “will be another six weeks down the road,” Houck said.
“They’re still putting in sewer lines. That’s what we’re waiting on.”
Two blocks of Main Street just south of Commerce Street have been closed to vehicles for about three weeks straight, after several months of rolling shutdowns as water and sewer lines were being replaced.
