Athi River has a railway station built in 1920 along the Mombasa - Nairobi line. The Daystar University has a campus in the town. The town is named after Athi, the first part of the Athi-Galana river system.
Athi River town is adjacent to and three kilometers from Kitengela town, but is part of the Machakos District in Eastern Province, while Kitengela belongs to Kajiado District in the Rift Valley Province.
Mavoko carved off the Nairobi County Council in 1963, when the latter was disbanded. Mavoko municipality has six wards (Athi River West, Katani, Kinanie/Mathani, Makadara, Muthwani and Sophia). All these wards belong to Kathiani constituency, which has a total of ten wards. The remaining four wards are within Masaku County Council
