PULASKI -- A proposal to allow golf carts on town roads died Tuesday evening after town council members said studying whether streets could safely handle the vehicles would be too costly.

Some council members had expressed tentative support for the proposal at an Aug. 19 meeting, and directed staff to find out how much a study of town roads would cost.

But after Town Manager John Hawley told the council that a study could cost as much as $1,000 a street, support evaporated. Mayor Jeff Worrell said the council would halt deliberations on the proposal.

Councilman Morgan Welker said last month that adopting regulations for golf carts "could work if we do it right."

But on Tuesday, he backpedaled, saying, "I'm starting to feel that maybe we should just put this aside.

"In the coming five to 10 years, we're going to see a lot of other commercial electric vehicles," Welker said. "By the time we got our studies done and passed this, it might be obsolete."

The council considered adopting regulations for golf carts after business owners Patricia Weeks and Heather O'Dell proposed that allowing carts would bring relief from high gas prices.

State law allows localities to adopt regulations for golf carts if the area has its own police department, but the state bars golf carts from being operated on roads with speed limits above 25 mph. That would present logistical problems in Pulaski, which is intersected by several roads with 35 mph speed limits.