County Route 46 (Suffolk County, New York)
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| County Route 46 |
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| William Floyd Parkway | |||||||||
| Length: | 17.11 mi[citation needed] (27.54 km) | ||||||||
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| Formed: | 1931 (1961) | ||||||||
| South end: |  CR 75 in Smith Pt. County Park |
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| Major junctions: |
 CR 80 in Shirley NY 27 in Shirley I-495 near Shirley NY 25 in Ridge |
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| North end: |  NY 25A in East Shoreham |
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Suffolk County Road 46 is a major county road in eastern Suffolk County, New York. It runs north and south from County Route 75 in Smith Point County Park (part of the Fire Island National Seashore) to New York State Route 25A near the border of Shoreham and Wading River. The road is known as the William Floyd Parkway along its entire length.
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[edit] History
[edit] Original ambitions
William Floyd Parkway originally was going to include segments of two different formerly proposed state parkways: the Smith Point Spur and the Wildwood Spur.
- The Smith Point Spur was to begin at the traffic circle in Smith Point County Park, and run as far north as what today would be Sunrise Highway. The traffic circle was originally intended for an extension of Ocean Parkway, but instead remains for County Road 75 to this day.
- The Wildwood Spur was intended to cross over New York State Route 25A, then curve eastbound, winding through the hills of Shoreham and Wading River, until finally reaching Wildwood State Park.
[edit] The road as built
The section that was originally supposed to be a Smith Point Parkway Spur was a two lane highway with flanking frontage roads until the mid-1970's when this section was widened. Near the vicinity of the Montauk Line of the Long Island Rail Road, a series of intersections known as "The Circles" were built on the south side of the tracks.
Camp Upton Road was originally part of Suffolk CR 46, until New York State Route 27 (Sunrise Highway) was extended through the area in 1957, and an interchange was build for a realigned section. North of Sunrise Highway, the road runs near the vicinity of Brookhaven Airport.
Suffolk County Road 46A was the original designation for the alignment along the west side of Brookhaven National Laboratory between Yaphank-Moriches Road and south of the unnumbered interchange with New York State Route 25. It was eventually intergrated as part of Suffolk County Road 46 while the old Suffolk CR 46 (Upton Road) was abandoned to both the lab and private developers. The interchange with the Long Island Expressway was built at the geological center of Long Island. Few people know for certain which part of it is the center, but some believe it's located on the northeast quadrant of the interchnage. Originally it was intended to be a standard cloverleaf interchange, but the New York State Department of Transportation chose to make it a cloverleaf with collective-distributor roads instead.
The median widens at the intersection of Longwood Road (former Suffolk CR 24) and the entrance to Brookhaven Labs. This is because of a proposed upgrade to a diamond interchange that was never built. Other proposed interchanges in the area include an extension of Suffolk County Road 101, and the unbuilt Suffolk County Road 102.
North of the unnumbered interchange with NY 25 in Ridge, there was to be another interchange with Suffolk County Road 111. From there, the median widened once again, as William Floyd Parkway intersects with the eastern terminus of Whiskey Road and the west side of Brookhaven State Park, which was formerly part of Brookhaven Labs until the mid-1970's. From there the median would remain far apart, and the road would have no access to anything else but U-turns until its terminus at New York State Route 25A, which was intended to be converted into a grade separated interchange.
[edit] Bridge to Connecticut
Besides the proposed spur to Wildwood State Park, there was intended to be an extension to a new bridge across Long Island Sound to either New Haven or East Haven, Connecticut between the 1950s and 1970s. Upon completion of the bridge, CR 46 would be transferred to the New York State Department of Transportation in exchange for New York State Route 25A. The NYSDOT would then upgrade the roadway to Interstate Highway standards, allowing Interstate 91 to continue southward from New Haven, its current southern terminus, to usurp CR 46.
After plans for this bridge failed in the 1970s, the option of a connection to a proposed ferry port between Wading River and the New Haven area was suggested, but this proposal also collapsed.[1]
[edit] Miscellanea
The road is named after William Floyd, a Long Island native and a signer of the United States Declaration of Independence.
