A meeting between county planners and Gaithersburg and Washington Grove leaders has put the brakes -- at least temporarily -- on the county's plan to replace the aging "Humpback Bridge" on East Deer Park Drive.

The county Historic Preservation Commission is also recommending that the 60-year-old bridge be designated as a historic structure and that could further curb the county's plans.

Although last month's meeting was not "entirely satisfactory," Washington Grove Mayor John Compton said the meeting signaled the county's willingness to consider the town's and city's concerns.

In the May 24 meeting, the county Department of Public Works and Transportation and city and town leaders agreed to gather more information about the possibility of rehabilitating the bridge, before the department makes a recommendation to the county Planning Board.

The county had been hoping to make the recommendation this month.

Gaithersburg and Washington Grove will talk to CSX Corp., which owns the railroads under the bridge, about making concessions on some of its regulations.

One of CSX's requirements is that a new bridge must be 23 feet high-- four feet higher than the Humpback Bridge.

Washington Grove also plans to hire an engineer to get a "second opinion" on the bridge's life expectancy, Compton said.

According to a county public works study, the bridge is only expected to survive another two to five years.

Meanwhile, the county will look into how much it would cost to repair the bridge, which was last fixed in 2000.

The meeting highlighted what Compton called a "disconnect" and City Manager David Humpton called a "divide" between Washington Grove and Gaithersburg and the county.

County planners maintain that a larger bridge could better handle the projected traffic growth and improve other safety concerns.

Gaithersburg and Washington Grove leaders and residents argue, instead, that a larger bridge would bring more traffic and higher speeds to the town and the East Deer Park neighborhood.

Restoring the bridge will only delay the inevitable, said Jeri Cauthorn, a senior transportation planner for the county, who says that the bridge can only be repaired so many times.

"We're still going to have to rebuild the bridge in 10 to 15 years," she said.

The day after the meeting, the Historic Preservation Commission voted to recommend to the county Planning Board and the County Council that the bridge be made a historic structure.

"They found that it was a landmark, that it was an established visual area, that it had a historic relationship with the railroad," said Clare Cavicchi, a historic preservation planner and Washington Grove resident.

Although the existing bridge has only been there since 1945, it resembles the original bridge from the 1880s, Cavicchi said, adding that a structure has to be at least 50 years old for HPC to consider it historic.

If the bridge were designated a historic site, the public works department would have to submit plans for a new bridge to the historic planning commission, which could place restrictions its look and design, said Holger Serrano, an engineering service specialist.

The Montgomery Village Foundation is looking at a recommendation to change its security service to better compliment existing service in several neighborhoods in the Village.

Homes corporations in the Village choose their level of security coverage -- some, like Patton Ridge, pay nearly $80,000 a year, while others, like Eastgate, have no security service at all.

The foundation has a separate $56,800 contract for security at its parks and community centers.

Meanwhile, American Protective Management Service of Gaithersburg took over the contracts for Patton Ridge, North Village and Northgate on March 1.

At a May meeting of the foundation's management advisory committee, made up of residents representing 10 homes corporations in the Village and a liaison to the foundation's board, the committee unanimously passed a motion to recommend to the foundation that it switch to American Protective.

Jeanne Powell, a representative of the North Village Homes Corporation, made the motion, she said in an interview, because having the foundation and homes corporations using different security companies for varying amounts of coverage can be amount confusing and inefficient.

"North Village and most of the other homes corporations have switched to American Protective and we felt that having a different service for just the parks... was inconsistent and was not working very well," she said.

She referred to a recent example where security guards from American Protective witnessed an incident at William Hurley Park but could do nothing to intervene because it was outside the boundaries specified under the North Village contract.

The foundation's board discussed the recommendation in closed session at its May meeting.

John R. Zakian, the foundation's executive vice president, said that there are "a couple of dilemmas" with switching to a new security company, but the foundation is considering the idea.

He added that the foundation is also working on several initiatives where different security companies could work on joint initiatives in the area to address public safety.