ATTLEBORO -- A three-hour hearing on a controversial plan to put up a traffic signal at the intersection of North Main and Holden streets revealed that there are no easy answers to one of the city's most vexing traffic problems.

Speaker after speaker trooped to the podium and spoke passionately about saving a historic and unique neighborhood they believe will be destroyed by installing a light and by widening approaches to the intersection. They said the improvements will result in more traffic, especially truck traffic. The improvements will physically and emotionally divide the neighborhood and create dangerous conditions, they said.

Some called for the city and state to back off the plans and look for an alternative.

`` We've got to look at something different,'' said Bob Johnson, a Holden Street resident and a member of the city's traffic study commission.

But the few in favor warned that safety concerns are not being taken seriously enough and that the intersection is already dangerous. An inevitable growth of traffic will force work at some point, they said. At least 150 people, mostly residents of the North Main and Holden area, crammed into city council chambers at city hall Monday to speak at a public hearing run by MassHighway, the state's highway department, which would build and pay for the new intersection.

Most attendees came armed with arguments against the $2.5 million project that would not break ground until at least 2010. At one point a speaker asked for a show of hands from those who opposed the project and nearly everyone raised their hands.

But while the state's highway department would build the intersection, that includes reconstruction of about 1 mile of road on North Main, it's the city's project and ultimately the fate of the project is in the city's hands, officials said.

Last week a MassHighway spokesman said the project won't be done if the city does not want it, and other officials said Monday that acquiring land needed for the project is the responsibility of the city.

If the city council chooses not to acquire the land needed for the project it would die, they said.

State project manager Michael O'Dowd said MassHighway is reluctant to build where there is not unanimous support for the work.

While the overwhelming majority of the speakers were against the work, citing the destruction of a unique, close-knit, historical neighborhood where everyone knows everyone else and which is still populated by young families, the four that spoke in favor said safety needs and growing traffic make it imperative to rebuild the intersection.

Public Works Superintendent John Clover said improved safety is the reason he supports the road work.

And Gretchen Robinson, who lives north of the intersection on North Main, said her main worry is safety.

`` I believe there needs to be a light there for public safety,'' she said. While some residents worry that a light will increase speeding and `` cut through'' traffic on side streets and endanger youngsters living there, Robinson worries kids in cars going through the Holden and North Main intersection will get hurt in accidents.

`` All the people here who are against this are not thinking about the one or two kids in the back seats of those cars,'' she said. `` Are they going to be able to look at themselves in the mirror if those kids get hurt?''

And Keith Merkle, chairman of the city's traffic study commission, said the work needs to be done because the traffic is not going to get better.

`` Traffic isn't going down,'' he said. `` They are going to develop (the former) TI property and the redevelopment authority is planning to develop downtown,'' he said. `` Is this the best plan? Maybe and maybe not, but we have to do something. I'm in favor of this plan.''

Merkle took issue with statistics offered by opponents arguing that the intersection didn't make the top 100 most dangerous list in the 27-community Southeastern Regional Planning and Economic Development District. Its rank was 154.

`` That's not bad if there are only 300 intersections in the region, but there are thousands, he said. `` It's a dangerous intersection.''

And Jim Hadfield, a traffic engineer for SRPEDD, echoed Merkle.

`` When the TI land is used again this intersection is going to be a problem again and it will have to be addressed,'' he said.

Like residents opposed to the work who concede there's a problem with the intersection, he conceded there's a legitimate concern about the neighborhood, but said he saw no way to avoid the work.

`` If I lived in the immediate area I would be concerned as well, but I don't see an alternative,'' Hadfield said.

GEORGE W. RHODES can be reached at 508-236-0432 or at grhodes(at)thesunchronicle.com.