This weeks's

wintry weather cooled down a potentially hot topic in South Fulton County.

MARTA postponed

a public hearing set for last night at the South Fulton Service Center

in College Park. Officials did not say when the hearing would be rescheduled.

The transportation

agency has already conducted three public hearings on changes it wants

to implement to help keep it financially solvent. The company is facing

a $12 million shortfall and is looking for ways to balance its budget.

The biggest

impact for South Fulton residents could be the elimination of several

bus routes.

MARTA wants

to eliminate 14 regular weekday routes, 22 limited service weekday routes,

34 Saturday services and 65 Sunday and holiday services.

In South Fulton,

the number 20 College Park would be eliminated Saturday and Sunday, along

with the 180 Fairburn/Palmetto routes on the weekends.

Other routes

axed would include the 190 Shannon Mall/Fairburn Sundays and the 173 South

Fulton/West Gate on the weekdays.

MARTA officials

said the routes were chosen because they are some of the highest cost-per-passenger

and lowest passenger-per-hour routes.

Additionally,

MARTA wants to change the fee on its monthly TransCards program. The discounted

student card would increase from $37 to $40 and the price of the discounted

monthly TransCard jumps from $42 to $49.88.

The final cut

at the agency would be changes to the rail service schedule. Weekday rail

service would be reduced to operate every 10 minutes, instead of every

eight minutes, while Saturday rail service would run every 15 minutes

instead of every 10 minutes.