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Beloved greater Decatur QuikTrip on Lawrenceville Highway reopens

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Beloved greater Decatur QuikTrip on Lawrenceville Highway reopens

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The QuikTrip near North DeKalb Mall has reopened. Photo by Dan Whisenhunt
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The day before the QuikTrip gas station on Lawrenceville Highway near North DeKalb Mall reopened, longtime store Manager Tiffany Madden texted her regular customers to let them know.

After spending three years in charge of the store, she’d gotten to know many of them by name. And they knew how to reach her, texting her during the store’s renovation wanting to know when the QT would reopen.

“Oh, I have videos,” Madden said, laughing.

In the videos, her loyal customers filmed the store’s progress and said, “The store is almost open! The store is almost open!”

“I’m like, I know,” Madden said. “Two more months.”

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The big day finally came on Thursday, Dec. 5 when the store opened its doors for the first time since July 19 when it closed for the renovation project. It was a tough wait for her loyal clientele, Madden said. It was a long wait for her as well. She moved around to various stores during the renovation.

“Wherever they needed me,” she said.

QuikTrip Manager Tiffany Madden. Photo by Dan Whisenhunt

The renovation included a store expansion to offer more food options. There’s a restaurant inside where customers can order sandwiches and coffee drinks. The station’s owners moved the fuel canopy and parking farther away from the neighborhood and placed entrances on three sides of the building.

Everything inside the store shined like a new car, and outside a surveillance camera kept watch, marked by a sign that said “Safe Place.”

Photo by Dan Whisenhunt

As part of negotiations with the neighbors in Medlock Park over the permits for the project, QuikTrip agreed to install a new 10-foot wide sidewalk around the edge of the property, a new eight-foot wide multi-use sidewalk to Harrington Drive, a new painted crosswalk at both entrances and re-striping of Orion Drive as it leads up to the intersection.

As soon as QuikTrip reopened, those neighbors were cheering the news on social media.

During the renovations, neighborhood Zoning Chair Theresa Same said, “People do love that QuikTrip.”

Madden says it’s the neighborhood, not the store, that makes the greater Decatur QuikTrip location so revered among the locals.

“It’s a good neighborhood, good community,” she said. “Most of my customers live near here.”

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She paused the interview to greet people walking through the door. “Hello, welcome in.”

“They’ve been living here for years,” she said of her regular customers.

The day of the reopening, business was slower than normal, but Madden said that would change once the word gets out.

“Tomorrow it’ll be extremely busy,” she predicted.

QuikTrip, located at 1910 Lawrenceville Highway in greater Decatur, is open 24 hours a day. The kitchen opens at 6 a.m. every morning except Sunday, when it opens at 7 a.m. The kitchen closes every night at 10 p.m.

Photo by Dan Whisenhunt

Photo by Dan Whisenhunt

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