Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey said there is no “either-or proposition” in the ongoing debate on whether the state should invest funds into the West Alabama Highway corridor or to further widen Interstate 65.

“Many have tried to make the argument: Either widen I-65 or complete the West Alabama Corridor, and it is simply not an either-or proposition,” Ivey said in a statement to AL.com on Tuesday.

Her comments came on the same day a host of mayors, state lawmakers, county commissioners and other public officials gathered at a library in Thomasville to tout the widening of U.S. 43 to Linden, and the widening of Alabama State Route 69 to Moundville and create a north-south highway that ultimately connects Mobile to Tuscaloosa.

“The West Alabama Corridor/Highway 43 project is very important for this state, and I am proud to support it,” Ivey said. She has backed the project since prioritizing it during her 2021 “State of the State” address.

“We have made wise investments in our Port, and now, with the West Alabama Corridor, we will be able to connect our Port City – one of our major cities – to another major city, all while giving people in our Black Belt a chance at success,” Ivey said. “We can choose to neglect our challenges, or we can take them head on – I choose to take them head on.”

Alabama State Senator Chris Elliott, R-Josephine, who has been a chief critic of the state’s approach at funding the project, called the prospects of widening both U.S. 43 and I-65 at the same time as a “fairy tale.”

Elliott said he is concerned if the state plans on borrowing future fuel tax revenues to financed the widening of Route 43 through rural West Alabama. He said the move could harm the state’s ability to provide matching funds to other big-ticket projects in the future like the Interstate 10 Mobile River Bridge and Bayway project.

He also criticized the state for not having a concrete estimate on the overall cost of the project. He also said the state should be pursuing federal funding to pay for it.

“It’s 100 percent state funded,” he said about the West Alabama Highway. “Not a nickel of federal money when the infrastructure jobs act contains funding for rural areas. There is no reason the state DOT should not be seeking and gaining federal funding for this project. You are wasting limited resources spent elsewhere.”

Ivey’s comments also came on the eve of a scheduled meeting between Thomasville Mayor Sheldon Day and Alabama Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth, a critic of the West Alabama Highway project.

Ainsworth, in July, criticized the Alabama Department of Transportation for prioritizing the West Alabama project “with less than 1/20th of the traffic count” compared to I-65. Ainsworth, who holds the state’s No. 2 political office, has repeatedly posted pictures of traffic jams along I-65 this summer, the most recent of those coming on Sunday.

Ivey, in May, said Ainsworth’s pursuit of adding more lanes to I-65 was aimed at “making easy headlines.”

Day and other public officials — including Mobile Mayor Sandy Stimpson and Tuscaloosa Mayor Walt Maddox — argued the project was needed to support economic development at the Alabama State Docks, and with automobile manufacturing in Tuscaloosa.

They agreed with Ivey that both projects can occur separate from the other. Stimpson said the highway can serve as a key north-south alternative to I-65.

Day said praised Ivey for backing the project in recent years following the approval of a 10-cent-per-gallon state fuel tax increase. The revenues from that tax increase supports the Rebuild Alabama Act that is set up to provide funding for road projects throughout the state.

“For the last 70 years, it’s been promised,” Day said of the West Alabama Highway corridor. ” From (Gov. John) Patterson to ‘Big’ Jim Folsom and beyond. I’ve been in office 26 years. Governor Ivey made that same promise and kept it. We’ve already seen … that companies and investors are looking to this area of the state. They know this highway will bring a new era to this part of the state. We know it will happen.”