The National Roads Authority is expected to announce tomorrow that it will locate the new Kinnegad/Athlone motorway, carrying traffic west, close to Tullamore.
The announcement is likely to bring to an end the row between Tullamore and Mullingar over the route of the new motorway which will carry Dublin/Galway traffic.
So confident is the Tullamore committee, set up to lobby the authority to opt for a route close to the Offaly capital, that the drinks for the celebration party in the Tullamore Court hotel have already been ordered.
The NRA decision has been well signalled politically. Last week the Westmeath Minister, Mrs O'Rourke, on a visit to Tullamore, indicated that she was going to support the Tullamore option.
Although the Minister for Public Enterprise stressed she was speaking in a personal capacity, Mrs O'Rourke said she felt that Route 5, which would run between Kilbeggan and Tullamore, would be the best one for a large area of the Midlands, including the south-western part of Co Westmeath as well as Co Offaly.
Her support was music to the ears of the North Offaly Roads Action Group, which is made up of members of the Tullamore Chamber of Commerce and Edenderry Business Association.
However, last Monday the issue seemed to have been put beyond doubt when the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Cowen, said he was confident that the Tullamore option would win out.
"I am conscious of the efforts of many people within the county to draw attention to the merits of selecting the Route 5 option and I am very hopeful that our considerable efforts will be rewarded when the decision is announced," the Minister said.
"I expressed my own confidence about this outcome at the time of the launch of the National Development Plan last year. "When the NDP was being drawn up, I advocated the necessity to factor in regional development objectives in assessing major infrastructural and transport projects," he said.
"As a result of those policy discussions, the Government made regional development the primary objective in the National Development Plan," he added.
"While it is important to have a solid weight of support backing this option, and it is clear that this is the case with route 5, it is equally important that the case made for this option be robust enough to stand up to the rigorous analysis to which the proposal was subjected by the National Roads Authority," he said.
"I have no doubt that the case for Route 5 is substantial, well thought out and has been well made. I am confident that this will also be the view of the NRA and I look forward to the formal announcement of the decision this coming Friday," he concluded.
Naturally, with the issue which has become known as the "road rage war", there is gloom around Mullingar where the chamber of commerce led the campaign to have the motorway routed in its direction.
However, Mullingar, which still has the advantage of having the main route to the north-west running past it, is unlikely to be very happy with the attitude taken by the local Minister, Mrs O'Rourke.
It could create problems for the local Fianna Fail party, which Mullingar people claim never fully got behind the campaign to route the road in favour of Mullingar.
Only Senator Camillus Glynn came out in favour of the Mullingar route.