Stonecrest

First established in 1856 as a crossroads with just 100 residents, Lithonia is now an Atlanta suburb with a strong community spirit. “I would say at least half of the people here grew up here. The whole community knows each other and it’s a family kind of environment,” says RaShanna Lowery, employee at Lucious Sanders Recreation Center and Lithonia native. “It’s very historic but it’s not in a bad way. It’s the new and old coming together.” Lithonia has several community centers, including Lucious Sanders Recreation Center, which sits on the old site of the Bruce Street School. “It was the only school that African Americans were allowed to go to in Lithonia back in the day. It can’t be destroyed,” Lowery says. Lucious Sanders Recreation center has summer camps, after school programs and youth sports, and it also teams up with the nearby senior center for events. “Every season we do something like trunk or treat, fall festivals, plays for the seniors, and we rent out the Porter Sanford Arts Center.” The site now has other social service facilities as well, including the Bruce Street Senior Center, Union Missionary Baptist Church and the Dekalb County Police Department. Residents can enjoy more events and music at Lithonia Amphitheater, with summer concert lineups spanning genres such as funk, soul, and R&B. Nearby Arabia National Heritage Area has 40,000 acres of outdoor space for residents to enjoy, including hiking trails and activities such as biking, camping, archery and fishing. The national heritage area encompasses historic sites, green spaces and two massive granite outcrops called monadnocks. Visitors can also see and learn about Lithonia’s historic (and some current day) granite mining at the Arabia monadnock and surrounding areas. For hikers, the Davidson-Arabia Mountain Nature Preserve and Panola Mountain State Park have multiple trails, and the Arabia Mountain PATH has 33 miles of paved paths connecting landmarks throughout the area. Lithonia Park also has multiuse fields, basketball courts, a playground, trails, and a swimming pool to beat Georgia’s summer heat. “There’s a lot of family-owned restaurants here. You go back to the same places, and you’ll see the owners' kids grow up,” Lowery says. Among other popular spots, Chou Lee’s on Panola Road serves Chinese Takeout, and Green Love Market serves smoothies and vegan burgers and sandwiches. Lithonia also has big box stores and chain restaurants such as Walmart, Chick-fil-A and Olive Garden near The Mall at Stonecrest. In the mall, shoppers find shops such as H&M and Macy’s. Lithonia’s Main Street also has more local restaurants and small businesses, including Black Dot Cultural Center and Bookstore and Flavaz Styling Team. Lithonia has several subdivisions with a variety of home styles. In addition to new traditional homes in subdivisions, Lithonia has ranches, cottages, split levels and Tudor revival homes scattered throughout. A two-story, new traditional home with three or four bedrooms typically costs between $250,000 and $350,000. Many of these homes have design features like two-car garages, brick facades and entryways with columns. Townhouses and condos in Lithonia range from $150,000 to $300,000. “They’re building up a lot of housing. Apartments, townhouses, that sort of stuff,” Lowery says. “It’s way more affordable than other parts of Atlanta.” Students attending public schools in Lithonia attend the Dekalb County School District. Students may begin at Stoneview Creek Elementary School before progressing to Lithonia Middle School and Lithonia High School. All three schools earned C-minus grades from Niche. The high school’s marching band, the “Lithonia Bulldog Band,” is a source of pride in the community. “Marching bands and music are a big thing around here. Dekalb County has, to me, the best band in the state of Georgia,” Lowery says. “The high school has competitions and people support and sell it out. I get tickets to Battle of the Bands every year,” Lowery says. Lithonia is right off I-20 and less than 20 miles east of Downtown Atlanta. “It takes 25 minutes to get to Atlanta. Anything in Atlanta is accessible, without having to live in the middle of it. You can get right on the highway.” Lithonia has limited public transit options, but residents can get to Downtown Atlanta from Lithonia via the Route 116 Redan Road bus from the Mall at Stonecrest to Indian Creek and the Blue line Marta train to Georgia State Station. Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport is also about 25 miles southeast of Lithonia, and Emory Hillandale Hospital serves residents inside the neighborhood.