Welcome to Newnan: a newcomer's guide to the City of Homes

Newnan sits about 35 miles southwest of Atlanta along Interstate 85, and it is the county seat of Coweta County. The city covers roughly 19.5 square miles and had an estimated 44,940 residents in 2023, by the city's own count. Plenty of people arrive for the interstate and the jobs along it. They tend to stay for something older: a courthouse square, streets of porches and a town that has called itself the City of Homes for generations.

This guide is for anyone settling in, and for longtime residents who like being reminded why they stayed.

How the city is laid out

Newnan was planned on a grid in 1828, with a nine-block business district built around the courthouse. Its early streets took the names of famous Americans, so you will find Jackson, Jefferson, Washington and Madison within a few minutes' walk of each other. The courthouse itself dates to 1904, a Neo-Greek Revival building with a dome and clock that you can see from most of downtown.

Around that core, the city's historic districts radiate outward. College-Temple, laid out the same year as downtown, has tree-lined streets, churches and the old academy grounds. Greenville-LaGrange follows two of the main roads south and west, lined with some of the oldest and largest houses. Cole Town grew up around the R.D. Cole Company, the manufacturer whose woodwork shaped so many local homes, and the Newnan Cotton Mill and its village sit along East Washington Street. Platinum Point, north of downtown, was built as cars became common, which is why so many of its houses have garages and outbuildings. In January 2026 the National Register added Chalk Level, a roughly 261-acre district in southeast Newnan where African American residents built homes, churches, schools and businesses during segregation.

Beyond the historic neighborhoods, newer subdivisions and shopping stretch east toward the interstate. Most people drive, but the city runs a free trolley loop from Friday through Sunday afternoons, linking City Hall, the Wadsworth Auditorium, Ashley Park and the public parking on East Washington Street. It runs rain or shine, carries bikes and has wheelchair lifts.

Life through the seasons

Newnan gets rain all year rather than in a single wet season. NOAA normals for a reporting station just west of town put the annual total at a little over 51 inches, with March and December the wettest months and October the driest. That makes fall a favorite time for being outdoors, and it is when the downtown calendar is busiest.

Main Street Newnan's Market Day fills the courthouse square on the first Saturday of every month from March through December, with more than 50 booths of produce, honey, baked goods, plants, pottery and crafts. At the same hours, Pickin' on the Square gathers acoustic musicians on the courthouse lawn. In summer, the Coweta County Farmers Market sets up on Saturday mornings at the Asa M. Powell Sr. Expo Center on Temple Avenue. Greenville Street Park, a gathering spot just off the square, gained an upgraded stage with sound and video equipment and more seating in July 2026. December brings the city's Christmas Parade through downtown, set this year for Saturday, December 12, at 6 p.m.

Places that define the city

The Carnegie Library on LaGrange Street opened in 1904 with a $10,000 grant from Andrew Carnegie, after a 17-year-old local asked him for one. It served as the library until 1987, and the city later restored it and brought library services back downtown. Today it has books, children's programs, meeting rooms, an art gallery and a StoryWalk.

North of the square, the McRitchie-Hollis Museum on Jackson Street tells the story of Newnan and Coweta County inside a 1937 house next to the University of West Georgia's Newnan campus. On East Broad Street, the new Bicentennial Park opened in October 2026 beside the historic train depot, the first piece of the city's run-up to its 200th birthday in 2028. An archway, murals and historic markers are planned for a second phase.

The square is also where newcomers find their regular spots. Leaf & Bean on West Court Square pours coffee and tea from early morning and stays open into the evening at the end of the week. Redneck Gourmet, family-owned on North Court Square since 1991, serves breakfast, lunch and dinner in a building that started out as a bank. Newnan Book Co. on Jackson Street, the city's independent bookstore since 2022, runs book clubs and a Friday morning preschool storytime. And on Jefferson Street, Meat N Greet serves burgers made from its own blend of chuck, brisket and short rib, and will text you when your table is ready so you can wander the square while you wait.

Getting settled

City Hall is at 25 LaGrange Street. The city's website handles sanitation accounts, permits, agendas and an online form for reporting problems such as potholes or broken streetlights, and its Leisure Services department books parks, gyms and the auditorium. The city is also writing its Comprehensive Plan for 2026 to 2046 and asked residents for their views in a survey this year, a useful way to learn what is planned for your corner of town.

For books beyond the Carnegie, the Coweta Public Library System has its Central Library and its A. Mitchell Powell Jr. branch in Newnan. For local news, The Newnan Times-Herald has covered the city since its first issue in September 1865 and now publishes twice a week.

Give it a Saturday. Walk the square on a Market Day morning, take the trolley out and back, and look up at the courthouse dome on the way home. Newnan makes more sense on foot.