The present invention provides for giving preference to a specific media gateway in the selection of the next circuit so that in a multi-media-gateway soft-switch where a call may take any of many possible paths, an outgoing circuit on the same media-gateway as the incoming circuit is preferably selected, so if one is available, the need for using more bearer ports on media gateways to bridge the two sides is eliminated. Instead of interconnection, the same facilities can be provisioned to the bearer interface between the soft-switch and the rest of the network. This invention maximizes the bearer capacity of a distributed media gateway for external network access.