The unseemly haste with which the $25 million Bowling Green TriModal Transpark bond issue was approved can only increase suspicion and cynicism among the project's critics.

Objections from opponents apparently weren't considered, or even circulated, before the state's County Debt Commission endorsed the bonds. That made the group's action look a foregone conclusion, rather than a considered decision.

The members of this commission are not a bunch of low-level operatives, who might be expected to rubber stamp politically greased proposals. They are the state's governor, lieutenant governor and treasurer, and the secretaries of Transportation, Finance and revenue. All ought to know better.

The Transpark may be a worthy venture. Advocates say it will promote growth and expansion in and around Bowling Green (which already is a boom town). But if they're right, why needlessly raise doubts about the project by speeding it along like something that can't survive full and open scrutiny?

Environmental advocate Tom FitzGerald says that he filed timely exceptions to the bond issue, but that the commission's chairman ran roughshod over state law and due process by ruling that they didn't have to be considered.

Mr. FitzGerald will appeal in circuit court, and Bowling Green boosters presumably will condemn him as anti-progress and pro-tree. Only the latter accusation is proven.

This project would be no small intrusion into Warren County's productive farmland, sensitive watershed and fragile karst terrain. It's a 4,000-acre land grab, helped along by both the Patton administration and Kentucky's congressional delegation. It may be justified, to give this area a nice industrial park and a new airport, as well as a civic ego-boost. But it also may prove to be ill-conceived and ill-advised. By then the money will be committed or spent, the environmental impact felt and the issue moot. That is no way to do the public's business.