If you drove past the intersection of West Bacon Street and Anderson Lane this spring, you saw the barricades before you saw the reason for them. A crew from Dublin-based Garbutt Construction is working on the old TOS Theatre marquee, the Whistle Stop Market has quietly moved to a better spot two blocks over, and the row of storefronts between them has picked up enough tenants that you can actually plan a Thursday evening downtown without leaving Pembroke.
For years, the argument for spending time downtown was sentimental. That is changing on a specific schedule, in specific buildings, and this post walks through what is actually open, what is under construction, and what a resident's evening on Main and Railroad looks like right now.
The theatre is under construction, not just under discussion
The TOS Theatre has been a "one day" story in Pembroke for a long time. The city bought the theatre in 2001 intending to do exactly this kind of restoration, then acquired two adjacent buildings in 2008. The active construction phase only started this year. Work to revitalize the theatre is officially underway after Pembroke City Council accepted Garbutt Construction's bid in December.
The building's history is more interesting than the standard "restored historic theatre" pitch. The theatre owes its origins to Savino Tos, an Italian immigrant who settled in Claxton in the early 20th century, opened a bakery in 1910, ran his first movie theater in 1927, and broke ground on the Pembroke Tos Theatre in 1938. It premiered its first film in April 1939, with a partnership with the neighboring pharmacy that provided concessions for ticket holders. It hosted live performances and popular films until it closed down in the 1970s.
The estimated completion timeline is 2027, and road closures related to the work can be found on the city's website and Facebook page; the intersection of W. Bacon Street and Anderson Lane, where the theatre sits, is the one to watch. That matters if you park behind the pharmacy or cut through on your way to the courthouse.
What is going in there is not just movie nights. Elizabeth Norman, a board member of Friends of TOS Theatre, described the plan this way:
"We have talented community members whose work is known only locally. Once the theater is open, it will provide permanent display space for visual arts, opportunities for live theater, spoken word performances, and musical concerts." She envisions a local theater group emerging, summer camps for kids exploring writing, acting, and set design, and even small-scale film festivals that celebrate rural life.
She has also pointed out that the schools currently only have a gym with a stage and no lighting, meaning the theatre would give kids who aren't sports-focused a proper venue. If you have a fifth grader who wants to try theatre and does not want to try football, that is the sentence in this whole project to hold onto.
The market moved for a reason
The Whistle Stop Market is easy to miss if you are looking for it in the same place as last year. It is not there. Now in its second year, the market moved in response to vendor feedback and is located in the City of Pembroke parking lot, across the street from the TOS Theatre and the Morgan 'Gold' Block. That is not a cosmetic change. The previous spot on Church Street sat next to the theatre construction zone. The new spot puts the market directly opposite the two buildings that anchor the revival, which is where the foot traffic will eventually live.
Local vendors from Pembroke and the wider south Georgia region gather to sell food, produce, arts and crafts, and other goods. If you have not been in a while, expect a smaller footprint than the Statesboro or Richmond Hill markets and a much shorter drive. Fernanda Camacho Hauser, the city's Director of Downtown and Economic Development, has been the person actually walking the changes through, so the market's pattern will keep adjusting year to year.
A downtown evening that finally hangs together
The reason a resident should care about any of the above is that the eating options have quietly caught up. Two years ago, "dinner downtown" was one place. Now the walk from the courthouse to the theatre passes several independent kitchens, and they cover different weeknights well.
- Hot Spot Pizza Kitchen, 26 N Main Street. Pembroke's downtown pizza anchor. Best for a slow Wednesday when you want to eat, then wander.
- Taco Depot, now at 175 W Railroad Street. The restaurant recently moved a few blocks over into the Oaks Mann Plaza. Worth updating your phone's map pin if you have not been since the move.
- Johnny's Grill, Louann's Cafe, and Roosters Barn for the classic sit-down rotation, with Louann's leaning breakfast and lunch and Roosters holding steady on Southern staples.
- Higgins Place and Stoner's Pizza Joint round out the walkable options if the first two have a wait.
That list is not "coming soon." Those places are open now, and the July 2026 restaurant roundups on the usual review sites confirm the current lineup. A realistic Thursday looks like this: grab a slice at Hot Spot around six, walk the two blocks past the theatre scaffolding to the market for the last hour before it closes at eight, and end at Louann's for coffee if you did not already load up on kettle corn.
None of these are destination restaurants that will pull anyone from Pooler. They do not need to be. They need to make it possible to spend an evening in Pembroke without driving to 280 and I-16, and for the first time in a while, they do.
The bones the revival is building on
It is worth being honest about what downtown Pembroke already has and what it does not. The Pembroke Historic District is emblematic of rural Georgia in the early 1900s. The town was established as a railhead for naval stores and retains the flavor of a railroad community, with a commercial district of early-20th century buildings fronting on the still-active Georgia Central tracks. It features a historic courthouse, a restored Old City Jail, and gracious mansions from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
That is the raw material. What the current revival is doing is not inventing a downtown, it is putting a functioning first floor back on top of it. The Obelisk Flour ghost sign on Church Street, the Morgan 'Gold' Block, the courthouse, and the theatre are all within a five-minute walk of each other. When residents ask why the city is spending money on a 1939 theatre instead of a new strip center out by the highway, that geography is the answer. A strip center does not stitch anything together.
What to watch for next
Two things worth keeping an eye on as the year goes.
The first is the road impact from the theatre build. Because the property sits on the corner of a working downtown intersection, small closures will keep happening through 2027. If you use West Bacon as a cut-through, check the city's Facebook page on Sunday nights.
The second is the safety plan that will shape what downtown feels like on foot. Bryan County, in partnership with the cities of Richmond Hill and Pembroke, has been awarded a federal SS4A Planning Grant that will fund a comprehensive safety action plan, also known as a Vision Zero Plan, studying existing conditions and fatalities and serious injuries of all users of the county and city roads. The information will inform a list of projects and strategies. For a downtown that is trying to get people out of cars for a full evening, that plan is not paperwork. It is the mechanism that decides where sidewalks widen, where a crosswalk gets a signal, and how safely a kid can walk from the market to the theatre once it opens.
Everything on this list is either already open or on an approved construction schedule. That is a real change from the last decade, and it is worth walking through this fall while the market season is still running and the theatre facade is still wrapped in scaffolding. You will not get to see that stage again.
If you are thinking about what any of this means for your own house on the north side of town, or for a family member weighing a move closer to the courthouse, Devin Pickett is happy to talk through the Pembroke market in plain terms and, when you're ready, book a consultation.
