VIDALIA — The recently completed bridge lighting project could soon brighten another thing for Vidalia residents — their cable signal.

Currently, Cable One has to send the signal for cable customers to a tower across the river from Natchez to Vidalia.

This has proven problematic when there are changes in weather, Cable One General Manager Bobby McCool said.

“When we have storms and rain, it interferes with our signal, and having fiber optic cable would eliminate that,” he said.

The problem heretofore has been that no structure existed through which fiber optic cable could be strung across the river.

“(Cable One) has been trying for a long time to see about getting fiber optics across the bridge, but with the Mississippi Department of Transportation and the City of Vidalia, they are going to be able to bring fiber optics from the Mississippi side to the Louisiana side,” Vidalia Mayor Hyram Copeland said.

Bringing the cable across the bridge is now possible because new electrical conduit was placed on the bridge for the bridge lighting project, Copeland said.

But McCool cautioned that, while the agreement has been worked out that would allow Cable One’s fiber optics cable to cross the bridge, it’s not a done deal just yet.

“We had to see if we could get permission to do it first,” he said. “Now we have to explore what all the costs are going to be and if we can justify it.”