Starting Jan. 4, visitors to Stone Mountain Park and commuters who work downtown will be able to ride express buses to and from Atlanta.

The Georgia Regional Transportation Authority, which partners with 12 metro Atlanta counties on the regional commuter coach service, said this week that its new Route 424 will serve Stone Mountain Park area commuters from a park-and-ride lot at 1475 E. Park Place Blvd. in Stone Mountain.

The lot, located in the old Cub Foods parking lot in the former Eastmont shopping center, is near the intersection of Stone Mountain Freeway and East Park Place Boulevard.

Route 424 is expected to help relieve congestion on heavily traveled U.S. 78, also known as the Stone Mountain Freeway. It also will provide another option for riders using the Route 418 from Snellville and Hewatt Road.

The service joins 28 other routes operated by Xpress coach service that connect commuters with the MARTA rail system.

GRTA spokesman William Mecke said Tuesday that the new route is part of a $145 million expansion of Xpress service announced in June. GRTA plans to spend $105 million constructing new park-and-ride lots and $40 million on new buses to increase its fleet to 219 coaches from 112.

The expansion also includes increasing the number of Xpress routes to 47 from 28. A new $5.5 million park-and-ride lot, under construction on Salem Road in Conyers, is part of that expansion.

That lot, which is scheduled to open in the fall, will serve Xpress Route 425 commuters between Conyers and downtown Atlanta.

Xpress Route 424 will run six morning trips between 5:30 and 8 and six evening trips between 3:37 and 6:10 from the Civic Center MARTA station on West Peachtree Street.

The trip to and from the Stone Mountain Park area is expected to take 50 to 60 minutes via U.S. 78, I-285 and I-20 East.

Two morning and two evening reverse-commute routes also will be provided, departing at 6:15 and 6:45 a.m. from the MARTA Civic Center station, and at 4:40 and 5:10 p.m. from the Stone Mountain park-and-ride lot.

Fares for the new route will be $3 one way and $5 round trip. Twenty-ride, 40-ride and 31-day unlimited ride passes are also available at $45, $85 and $80.

Fare passes may be purchased online at www.XpressGa.com or from Breeze Card vending machines in MARTA stations, at MARTA ride stores or the GRTA office in Peachtree Center.

On its morning trips, Route 424 will travel a new routing plan through downtown Atlanta, primarily using Martin Luther King Jr. Drive and Spring Street from the Capitol to the Five Points MARTA station to the Civic Center MARTA station and on to Spring Street just north of Linden Avenue.

In the evening, Route 424 will begin service on the northbound side of West Peachtree Street at the Civic Center MARTA station, travel north to North Avenue and then south on Spring Street, stopping just north of Linden Avenue. It will work its way down the west side of downtown and back to the Capitol before returning to the Stone Mountain Park area.

A complete schedule with a list of morning and afternoon stops is available at www.XpressGa.com or by calling 404-463-4782.