MACON, Ga. — Theater Macon is right on Cherry Street, off Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
Annette Anderson, the theater's business manager, says trucks speeding through downtown is one problem. "The heavy truck traffic on Martin Luther King Jr. has been omnipresent for as long as I've been coming downtown, which is about 30 years."
One of the other problems is noise.
"We've had outdoor theater events in the park on Poplar Street where even microphones didn't help drowning out the noise of the truck traffic," Anderson said.
The county is putting together a plan to cut down on the number of logging trucks and semi trucks, passing through downtown. They call it the Seventh Street Corridor.
County engineer David Fortson says, "Seventh Street is a parallel street to MLK Jr. Blvd, but it's an industrial area, it doesn't come through downtown."
Seventh Street begins at Central City Park and continues straight to Eisenhower Parkway. It misses downtown altogether, which means fewer drivers could get stuck behind a utility truck.
But there is a railroad track that goes right through Seventh Street, often creating long wait times.
To avoid that, Fortson says their plan calls for two news bridges to help cars and trucks over those crossings. "We would build two bridges over railroad tracks. The main bridge would go over the entrance to Brosnan Yard, which has lots of trains going through it every day."
The proposal is still in its beginning stages, but the county hopes it will be a reality soon.
Fortson says for now, they are not sure how much the project will cost or where the money will come from.
He and the Macon-Bibb County engineering department will have an open house for the public this Thursday from 5 p.m. - 7 p.m. at the Elaine Lucas Senior Center.