Hundreds of residents joined county officials and local leaders on Oct. 15 to celebrate the opening of a facility designed to bring all members of the Lorton community together. Mount Vernon District Supervisor Dan Storck welcomed the crowd to the ribbon cutting ceremony for the Lorton Community Center and Library and hopes the location will serve as a vital gathering place for residents of all ages and backgrounds.
“This facility combines services, resources, entertainment, education. It’s all in one place,” Storck said. “This is the Lorton hub...truly the center of Lorton as we move forward.”
About the Lorton Community Center and Library
Construction began in July 2020 on the $27.3 million project that co-locates a library with a community center for the first time in Fairfax County. The project included renovation of the existing library into a 16,000-square-foot facility with a larger children’s area, increased seating and additional meeting and study rooms along with a new 30,000-square-foot community center featuring a gym, fitness room, kitchen and art and sensory rooms.
The facility also includes the Lorton Senior Center and the Lorton Community Action Center (LCAC). The rejuvenated campus includes a new playground, fitness area, open field area, plaza and trail loop in the adjacent 1.7-acre park.
The Lorton Community Center and Library is located at 9520 Richmond Highway in Lorton. The Community Center is open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., Monday through Saturday, and the Library is open from 1 to 9 p.m. on Mondays and 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday.
“To put together a building like this...and to be able to do it as expertly as [county staff] have done it with the community in mind, it’s an amazing, amazing feat,” said Board of Supervisors Chairman Jeffrey C. McKay. “Every square inch of this building, thought and energy was put into designing it in such a way that it could accommodate the community’s need for such a long time.”
McKay also noted that the center helps fill the need of residents to “come together as a community,” adding that by creating co-located facilities such as these the county is “bringing our people together in one place so they can learn from each other.”
New Facility Just the Beginning
This grand opening marked yet another project in the larger county plan to continue growing and revitalizing the Mount Vernon area. Our Fire and Rescue Department recently moved into a new Lorton Volunteer Fire Station over the summer, and a new South County Police Station and Animal Shelter site is in progress and set to open in spring 2023.
“There’s more on the horizon for Lorton,” Storck says. “This is really just the beginning of a lot of wonderful things.”
View Photos from the Ribbon Cutting
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