Once the sun goes down, lights will sparkle in downtown Chatham.
Connie Beneteau, office administrator and project coordinator for the Historic Downtown Chatham BIA, said beautification lights will brighten the downtown core. Although some residents may have noticed the white and yellow lights over the weekend, Beneteau said the remainder of the lights will be up by Tuesday.
However, the lights are not specific to the upcoming holiday season.
"We will have them up all year round," she said. "So that helps give that mystical feeling downtown all year long and not just at Christmas but we did want to make sure we got them up for the Santa Claus Parade."
The beautification lights may bring on some déjà vu for residents as the lights used to hang over downtown Chatham but Beneteau said they were taken down after some were damaged during construction work in the area.
"When the sidewalk [work] and construction started, the tree lights got damaged and cut through so we've been working on getting them back onto the trees again," she said.
"Construction forced us to have to replace them all and it took us a little while."
Funding for the beautification lights is primarily taken out of the BIA's budget, however, Beneteau said since the lights were damaged during construction, the municipality has agreed to assist in some of the costs of getting working lights back up.
Beneteau said most of the lights are connected to the street lights so once the lamp posts turn on, downtown Chatham will twinkle a little more.
-With files from Cheryl Johnstone.
