The debate over the Berry bypass route has split the town along north and south lines, with a southern group set up this week to counter the northsiders.

Meantime, the Roads and Traffic Authority (RTA) today winds up a three-day workshop that kicks off the process to pick the final route from a short list of seven.

It's been a long process to achieve a short list and now tensions are running high. A group in Berry's north wants the State Government to reconsider the southern bypass options, which were eliminated.

The Berry Southern Option Supporters (SOS) lobbied to get an RTA peer review of its processes, which is due to be completed this month.

This prompted residents such as Russell Baldwin to form Fair Process Alliance, which he said aimed to support the RTA and stick to the formal process.

The group accuses those in the north of lobbying politicians to start the process all over again.

"There's been a two-year process to choose the short list, we don't want it to be hijacked by some NIMBYs (Not In My Back Yard). "We're not NIMBYs because we do not advocate any route, in fact one of the routes on the short list would eliminate some of our area," Mr Baldwin said.

"If these SOS people get any headway with what they're trying to do, we think the bypass could be delayed for another decade."

An RTA spokeswoman said this week's workshop established criteria to assess each of the options, and identify where further work was required in the route selection study. Participants included representatives from government agencies, the transport industry, local councils, road users and community members.

The Berry SOS group's website calls for the township to not be divided in two by the bypass and for it to be well away from Berry.

A group spokesperson was not available yesterday.