Batesville city officials on Tuesday shifted strategy in their efforts in seeking relief for east/west traffic congestion on Highway 6/278.

For years — starting in the late 1990s — we’ve been focused on “the” bypass, that ambitious four-lane highway construction project that would give drivers the option of going around Batesville on a 10-mile southerly loop that would start near Good Hope Road on the east, pass south near Courtland before rejoining the present route of Highway 6/278 near Chapeltown Road.

On Tuesday, after years of studies, surveys and hearings, Batesville’s mayor and aldermen decided it ain’t gonna happen, not in their lifetimes, anyway.

Instead, they’ve asked Northern District Highway Commissioner Mike Tagert to determine the feasibility of enhancing the existing 6/278 route through Batesville.

Enhancement would include constructing five lanes from Bates Street to the west city limits and replacing the railway overpass.

Meanwhile, east/west traffic in Batesville grows more and more congested.

Back in the 1990s, when times were flush and one casino after another was under construction in Tunica, state highway officials and legislators were rushing to build roads to accommodate them.

So they asked the good people of Panola County to wait their turn, wait until sufficient progress had been made in road construction to handle traffic to the casinos. I think that the first projected completion date for the bypass I heard back during the early stages was 2011.

But once those casino roads had been constructed, along came Hurricane Katrina and we were again told to wait our turn. Storm damaged roads and bridges in south Mississippi had to be repaired. Of course, we understood.

Somewhere about then, I heard another projected bypass completion date: 2017.

Then in 2008 came the economic downturn that curtailed revenue for everything, including allocations for roads and bridges and alas, bypasses.

We’re still being told to wait our turn, but “not in our lifetime” is now the only projected completion date being tossed around the board table at City Hall.

So now, city officials are making an effort just to get some relief by widening the present route and replacing the venerable but very narrow railway overpass. They will be asking the county, schools, the Partnership and anybody else to join them in pleading for something to relieve east/west traffic congestion through Batesville.

As for that grandiose other alternative that was presented to us in engineers’ renderings?

Forget about that.

We’ve already been bypassed.