ROCKVILLE, Md. - Montgomery County (web | news) officials say the computer glitch with scrambled the commute for the past two days has been fixed.

"... there was a breakthrough during the evening rush hour today in our efforts to repair the County's traffic signal computer," County Executive Ike Leggett said in a statement. "The system is fixed, but we continue to work on individual signals that are not consistently responding."

County leaders had said earlier Thursday that the problem would likely last into next week. They had made provision to manually adjust the timing of traffic lights.

"Engineers have been working around the clock, twenty four -seven, twenty four-seven, to solve this problem and they are still working," Leggett said earlier Thursday.

The problem was with a computer that tells traffic signals to extend the duration of green lights during rush hour. It failed about 3 a.m. Wednesday.

"The computer is working, the modem is working, the computer is not talking to the modem," Emil Wolanan, Montgomery County's chief of transportation technology, said earlier Thursday. "It's just like your home computer."

Thursday evening marked the fourth straight commute with traffic lights stuck in non-rush hour mode, making for snarled streets and exasperating commutes.

"How come when we're so advanced with technology and we're having these kinds of problems?" asked Gaithersburg resident Jose Rivas.

Traffic on Interstate 270 was also getting worse as commuters who normally take Rockville Pike avoid the traffic signal problems.

"Takes me about 2 1/2 hours now from Frederick when you come to Montgomery County. Everybody's on 270," said Akiba Simpson.

The county still plans on providing free Ride On buses Friday.

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