Hundreds of people are expected in downtown Commerce Saturday for a festival that promises to offer something for everyone.
A farmer’s market and road race will kick off the City Lights Downtown Festival at 7:00 and 8:00 Saturday, while a pre Fourth of July fireworks exhibition at dusk will end it.
In between, visitors will find a car show, food, arts and crafts booths, music, games and other entertainment all day long.
The first event — the Star Chase 5K Road Race — will start and end at Willoughby Park on Clayton Street, a new venue. Most of the race will be along Broad and Elm streets downtown.
“The public needs to recognize that there may be a delay in traffic for half an hour Saturday morning along that route,” advises Hasco Craver, executive director of the Downtown Development Authority, which hosts the festival.
Everything else takes place in or adjacent to Spencer Park, located on South Elm Street.
More than 30 booths are due to be open by 8:00 a.m., offering all sorts of food from barbecue to Jamaican, from funnel cakes to snow cones, not to mention oil paintings, purses and pocketbooks, hand-blown glass, wooden objects, baskets, potted plants and plant containers. There will be an “animal encounters” exhibit as part of a “kids’ zone” in the city parking lot across Pine Street from Spencer Park.
The number of food booths was trimmed back this year in recognition of what’s already available in the downtown.
“We’ve got three restaurants now,” Craver noted. “People are going to want to drop in for food and for air conditioning during the festival.”
Music begins at 11:00. Groups to be featured include The Solstice Sisters, Athens, a folk, country bluegrass band; Peter Aland and Some Good, Athens, an acoustic jazz band; Curley Maple, Athens, featuring bluegrass/Americana music; 16 Tons, Athens, a bluegrass group; The Healers, Athens, a traditional blues band; Fatback Deluxe, Atlanta, an acoustic blues band; and Tommy Crain and The Crosstown Allstars, an Atlanta band that plays the blues and classic Southern Rock.
The car show will take up all parking spaces on South Broad and South Elm streets from Central Avenue to below Spencer Park, Craver notes.
“We have plenty of off-street parking. Look for the signs,” he advises.
