Fayette and

Coweta County officials will continue to meet with state

transportation officials to iron out the details of an

agreement reached last week that would hasten the

widening of Ga. Highway 54 west of Peachtree City.

County

commissioners last month formally alerted the Atlanta

Regional Commission and state Department of

Transportation that ARC's 25-year transportation plan

didn't place the Hwy. 54 project high enough on the

priority list to suit local officials.

It's the

number one priority locally, said the commission, and the

Coweta County Commission and Peachtree City Council added

their voices to that chorus.

Two weeks

ago, a delegation that included Fayette County Commission

Chairman Harold Bost, Peachtree City Mayor Bob Lenox and

Coweta County Commissioner Vernon "Mutt" Hunter

met with state officials and secured an agreement to

schedule the project for 2005, five years earlier than

the proposed Regional Transportation Plan had designated.

The RTP, if

approved by ARC early next spring as planned, will guide

transportation construction in the Atlanta region through

2025. Approval of the plan by ARC and by the federal

Environmental Protection Agency would end a moratorium on

transportation projects that has been imposed by EPA

because of alleged poor air quality in the region.

"We

anticipate that as soon as the moratorium is lifted and

the transportation plan approved, they will start to move

ahead" with construction of the Hwy. 54 project,

Bost told The Citizen this week.

Officials

in the next week or so will talk with DOT engineers who

plan projects for the south metro area, Bost said, in an

attempt to get agreement that the first order of business

will be construction of a new, wider bridge over the

railroad tracks on 54 just west of Peachtree City.

Traffic

going from Peachtree City into Coweta County gets jammed

up as it crosses the bridge, Bost said, because that's

where the highway abruptly narrows from four lanes to

two. And as that traffic backs up, it creates a jam

throughout the intersection of 54 with state Highway 74.

"We

feel that if we can get that bottleneck relieved, it's

the single biggest problem," said Bost.

Bost gave

credit for working out the agreement with ARC and DOT to

Coweta County's Mutt Hunter. Hunter, Fayette's former

public works director, has long had a good working

relationship with state DOT Commissioner Wayne

Shackleford, Bost said.

"It's

on the fast track now," Bost said of the Hwy. 54

project. If officials had waited until the 25-year plan

was approved to push for the change, he added, "It

would have been much harder to get it done after

that."