BERRYVILLE — Acquiring safety improvements for the stretch of Va. 7 (Harry Byrd Highway) on Blue Ridge Mountain ultimately could be an issue of who has more political clout in Richmond.

Is it Clarke County, a small agricultural community of roughly 15,000 residents? Or, is it Loudoun County, an affluent suburb of Washington, D.C., with a population of about 420,000?

Clarke failed in its attempt, so county officials are letting Loudoun try.

Tuesday afternoon, the Clarke County Board of Supervisors adopted a resolution in support of Loudoun County applying for Smart Scale funds to improve the Va. 7/Route 601 (Blue Ridge Mountain Road/Raven Rocks Road) intersection and surrounding area.

A four-lane, divided highway, Va. 7 is a major commuting route between Winchester and Washington. Having both hilly and level stretches, the highway has many short sight distances and is prone to speeding drivers. Adding to those problems, officials say, is the limited ability of the Clarke County Sheriff’s Office and Virginia State Police to regularly patrol the highway because of their limited resources.

The Route 601 intersection actually is in Loudoun, but just a few feet east of the Clarke line. Heavy traffic and speeding make it hard for Appalachian Trail hikers in Clarke to cross Va. 7 near the intersection. And, drivers have trouble making left turns to and from 601, which sees backups — especially on weekends — because of customer traffic from a nearby brewery, officials contend.

County resident Bradley Cook told the supervisors he recently noticed the Sheriff’s Office patrolling Va. 7 more. Still, he said even more patrols are needed.

“A lot of people go with the flow,” Cook said, and “they don’t realize how fast they’re traveling.”

Smart Scale is a Virginia Department of Transportation (VDOT) program in which proposed highway projects are ranked for funding consideration. Factors influencing the rankings include how much the projects are anticipated to improve driver and pedestrian safety, reduce congestion and help with economic development efforts.

VDOT earlier rejected a funding application submitted by Clarke. Officials don’t know why, but they believe the estimated $2 million cost toward just planning improvements was a factor.

Loudoun, which also has recognized that improvements to the intersection are necessary, supported the application to no avail.

At that time, “Loudoun County asked us to be the applicant because they had higher priority projects already in the pipeline,” Clarke County Administrator Chris Boies told the supervisors.

Yet “both counties have worked collaboratively” on designing improvements to the intersection, the resolution mentions.

Proposed improvements are based on recommendations by VDOT’s Staunton District office, which studied the intersection.

They include adding a northbound right turn lane on Route 601 and extending current turn lanes onto Va. 7 for vehicles traveling east from that road, east from the Route 734 (Snickersville Turnpike) intersection in Loudoun and west from the Route 679 (Pine Grove Road) intersection in Clarke.

In addition, pavement markings to indicate turning movements at the three crossovers are proposed.

Clarke is in the Staunton District, but Loudoun is in the Northern Virginia District of VDOT.

Boies said he understands that Northern Virginia uses some different criteria from Staunton in analyzing proposed projects.

“Let’s hope it works” on Clarke’s behalf, said David Weiss, the supervisors’ chairman and Buckmarsh District representative.

Amid the new attempt to get the project funded, at least “we’ll find out about the political power” of Loudoun, Boies said.

VDOT officials usually attend the supervisors’ regular monthly meetings and address the board about transportation matters. None were at Tuesday’s meeting, though. Boies said he didn’t know why.

Loudoun has allocated $500,000 for the project. Clarke hasn’t allocated any money, and it doesn’t have to, said Boies.