MTO: Big change begins along Houston Rd.

Take Ga. 247 south from Macon and get off on Houston. Drive slowly down the two-lane rural road and glance both ways. Popping up like wildflowers are for-sale signs offering commercial property and rezoning publications. Look far behind this area, and already existing are the industrial sites.

It isn't until you hit Hartley Bridge Road that you come close to a residential neighborhood. Even from here, it's another quarter mile before you see a number of houses.

This is Houston Road's fate, say developers in the area. Coming soon is the road widening from two to five lanes between Ga. 247 and Sardis Church Road. Once it begins, there's no stopping the stores, restaurants and fast-paced urbanization.

"I'd rather have two lanes, but there ain't no use worrying about it," said 85-year-old Hugh Fair. "We're going to get it anyhow. They're going to take our land whether the project is worth a damn or not."

Fair has lived off Houston Road and the surrounding area for as long as he can remember. He even recalls when the 40-foot pine trees in his yard weren't much taller than he is.

County Engineer Bob Fountain says his office has studied the street three, maybe four times.

"In south Bibb County, the growth is a product of the sewer and water that's coming in there," Fountain said. "Once that starts, there is going to be commercial and industrial uses. That means a tremendous increase is happening there anyway."

Traffic is beginning to surpass the road's capacity, Fountain says. In another 20 years, if the road isn't widened, it will be obsolete as a connector to other parts of the county.

Fountain said the county began looking at widening Houston Road before the 1994 bond referendum that narrowly approved the overall Macon-Bibb County Road Improvement Program. Analysts measured traffic and considered widening the road as well as the overpass at Ga. 247 to accommodate extra traffic.

CAUTION Macon, the neighborhood group that has challenged portions of the county roads program, doesn't agree with that. Its members and residents of the area say road officials knew but didn't share that information until after the bond referendum passed.

Now, they will take that argument to court to try to stop federal funding for the project.

"We voted on a two-lane minor widening in November 1994," Debbie Varnadore of Chriswood Drive said. "They told us it needed to be widened because it was dangerous. That we agreed on."

Varnadore said residents were told the 11-foot lanes would be expanded to 12 feet with the addition of turn lanes. It became a five-lane road project, but only after voters approved a $115 million road improvement program.

"It's been a matter of trust for us," said Shelby Neal of Houston Drive. Neal's house is one of the oldest in the neighborhood. She is fighting to save a 200-year-old red cedar jeopardized by the widening.

"If they had just told us from the start they were thinking five lanes, I might not have liked it, but I would have had more respect for them," Neal said.

Houston Road residents have known the road would be widened to five lanes since January 1995, when Moreland Altobelli took over the project, said Van Etheridge, Moreland Altobelli program manager. A one-time employee of the Georgia Department of Transportation, he says state transportation officials have always considered Houston at least a three-lane project.

"Back in 1992, the DOT took a look at the project because Bibb County requested funding," Etheridge said. "We thought three lanes then at a minimum. Bibb County copied an old design, however, and never mentioned our three-lane proposal."

The first time many residents heard about a five-lane project was probably during public hearings in summer 1995, Etheridge said.

"(Moreland Altobelli was) always clear it was going to be a five-lane project from that point," Etheridge said. "We actually only proposed five lanes to Allen Road and then three to Sardis Church Road."

Members of the executive committee who approved the project decided to extend the five lanes all the way to Sardis Church Road.

Regardless of when residents were notified, the Houston Road area is already seeing development. Commercialization, including a five-unit retail center just past Allen Road, is proof.

"I think it is already starting," said Clint Ward, superintendent of Tom Ward Homes, the company considering the retail center. "Making Houston Road five lanes is only going to make it grow faster. It's going to help the commercial part of it."

Ward says his company has already built two subdivisions in the area and is now moving to the commercial side. All of these considerations were made before the five-lane widening was announced, he said.

"We've been out there seven years and this is one of the fastest growing areas in Macon," he said. "We're 50/50 on the retail, but only because of money, not because we doubt the area.

It's possible CAUTION Macon will be able to stop the federal funding for Houston Road with its lawsuit, but it may not be possible to stop the future development. That leaves residents worried about life as they knew it. They may be forced to change with the area.

"We agree the road needs work," Varnadore said. "We're just afraid the character of the neighborhoods is being changed. Our lifestyle as we knew it will change with it."

Christopher Schwarzen can be reached at 744-4213 or via e-mail at cschwarzen@macontel.com .