An intensive lobbying campaign is under way to ensure the proposed Dublin-Waterford motorway or dual carriageway is routed through Carlow and Kilkenny.
A delegation of Carlow county and urban councillors will meet the National Roads Authority tomorrow to put their case for the N9 (Dublin-Carlow-Thomastown) to be the selected route, in line with the commitment given in the National Development Plan.
The chairman of Kilkenny County Council, Mr Jimmy Brett, and two local Fianna Fail TDs, Mr John McGuinness and Mr Liam Aylward, will meet the Taoiseach next Tuesday to discuss the route.
Mr Brett is also organising a joint declaration on the issue by council chairmen and mayors in the south-east, who will be meeting in Kilkenny tonight.
Mr Brett says he is concerned that an apparent division between Carlow and Kilkenny on the issue will result in the National Roads Authority, which is expected to make a decision on the route on February 8th, opting to site the highway on the existing N11 route on the east coast.
Carlow politicians and business leaders insist the route must include an eastern by-pass of the town: otherwise, they say, a "once-in-a-lifetime opportunity" to attract investment to the county will have been lost.
A western by-pass would bring the motorway/dual carriageway away from Carlow and into Co Laois.
A suggestion by Mr McGuinness that such a by-pass would benefit both Kilkenny and Carlow has angered Carlow representatives.
Mr Walter Lacey, the vice-chairman of Carlow County Council and a member of the Progressive Democrats, said the option favoured by Mr McGuinness would "spell disaster" for Carlow.
"As it stands, 70 per cent of traffic travelling on the Dublin-Waterford route uses the N9 through Carlow. The Moone by-pass is imminent, and progress has been made on the Carlow by-pass itself. To suggest rerouting this traffic doesn't make sense."
Mr Brett says, however, there is no real difference in the two counties' positions.
He says the "battle of today" is to ensure the east coast route, which would leave a large swathe of the south-east without a motorway/dual carriageway, is not selected.
On Carlow's preference for an eastern by-pass, he said: "I don't mind. It doesn't matter to us in Kilkenny which side of Carlow it goes on.
"It should be whatever is most advantageous to Carlow. We have no interest in influencing whether it's east or west."