The orange construction barrels that have greeted visitors to Dowagiac’s downtown the last several months will soon be a thing of the past, as the city prepares to take the wraps off its long awaited overhaul of Commercial Street next week.

Crews are checking off the final items on their construction checklist as the project to transform Commercial and portions of Division Street enters its final phase. City officials expect the project to wrap up next week, with Commercial finally opening to traffic Thursday, Dec. 1, said City Manager Kevin Anderson.

To celebrate, Dowagiac Mayor Don Lyons, members of the city council and other local officials will host a ribbon cutting ceremony for the construction project at 1 p.m. that day, inside the new parking lot and plaza outside Beckwith Theatre. Several business owners Commercial and Pennsylvania Avenue area are expected to participate in the ribbon cutting.

“We expect the first cars to pass through the street during the ribbon cutting,” Anderson said.

Before then, contractors will wrap up the remaining tasks, which includes laying down some additional brick paving on Commercial, doing some landscaping around some of the structures and decorations and performing electrical work, Anderson said.

“There are still a lot of small items left to finish, but all the big stuff is behind us,” he said.

The opening wraps up a construction project that has gone on since the middle of summer — as well as realizes a vision that city leaders have had for the Division Street corridor for the past several years.

Among the new sights visitors can expect to see are a new parking lot and plaza, located next to Beckwith Theatre, as well as new brick road paving, which not only improves the aesthetics for pedestrians on Commercial and also slows down incoming traffic. A new island has also been built at the intersection of Commercial and Division, which will improve visibility and traffic flow.

Several new decorative posts have been built on Commercial as well as other spots along Division Street, which will be decorated with public art. A wall has also been installed on the former grounds of the Goerlich Building near Railroad Street, which will have space for artwork.

“It will be a real enhancement to the downtown, a continuation of what happened 30 years ago when the Downtown Development Authority rebuilt the streets and made a commitment to the city’s core and surrounding areas,” Anderson said about the project.

Between the construction of the new Commercial Street parking as well as improvements to parking lots located adjacent to Front Street and Pennsylvania Avenue on Division Street, the project creates 37 new parking spaces for downtown visitors, Anderson said.

“There is no on-street parking allowed overnight in winter, so people who live downtown can find parking a challenge this time of year,” Anderson said. “Hopefully these new spaces will help alleviate that problem.”