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Interstate 495 (abbreviated '''I-495''', better known as the '''Long Island Expressway''' or '''L.I.E.''') is a 71.02 mile (114.30 km) long Interstate Highway on Long Island , New York . The route is an auxiliary route of Interstate 95 ; however, the connection between I-95 and I-495 is made via Interstate 295 . The western terminus of the route is at the western portal of the Queens Midtown Tunnel in the New York City borough of Manhattan . The eastern terminus is at County Road 58 in Riverhead , Suffolk County . ROUTE DESCRIPTION Manhattan and Queens The expressway begins at the , and the Horace Harding Expressway from said intersection to the Nassau County line, though "Long Island Expressway" often covers the length of I-495. A mile after entering Queens, the L.I.E. meets Interstate 278 (The Brooklyn-Queens Expressway ) at interchange 16. Not long after Queens Boulevard , the LIE meets the Grand Central Parkway , then immediately after, the Van Wyck Expressway (I-678). Because the two interchanges are so close together, the highway employs a Collector-distributor Road . I-495 passes the Clearview Expressway , then the Cross Island Parkway before entering Nassau County . The " Queens Giant ", the oldest and tallest tree in the New York metropolitan area, is very close to the Long Island Expressway in northeastern Queens (near the Douglaston Plaza Mall), and is visible while driving westbound. Nassau County Heading into Nassau County, the expressway sports a High-Occupancy Vehicle Lane (HOV), which runs all the way into central Suffolk County. In its run through Nassau, it is the only major east-west highway that does not interchange with the Meadowbrook or the Wantagh parkways, which end to the south at the adjacent Northern State Parkway (which interchanges with the LIE twice, although it only actually crosses once, at Exit 37A from Northern). It does, however, interchange with the Seaford-Oyster Bay Expressway like the east-west parkways do. Suffolk County Heading into Suffolk County, the LIE continues its 8-lane configuration with the HOV lane all the way out to Exit 64 ( NY 112 ). At this point, the HOV lane ends, and the expressway is reduced to 6-lanes total (3 eastbound, 3 westbound). In addition to the narrowing, the concrete "Jersey Barrier" also ends at Route 112, replaced by a wide, grassy-median. Also, the Asphalt road surface is replaced by a Concrete surface. From this point eastward, the expressway runs through rural and woodland areas on its trek towards Riverhead. Exit 70 ( Suffolk CR 111 ) in Manorville is the last full-interchange, as it is the last interchange that allows eastbound traffic on, and the first to allow westbound off. After Exit 71 (Edwards Avenue), the expressway begins to narrow as it approaches its eastern terminus. Just before Exit 72 ( NY Route 25 ), the 3-eastbound lanes narrow to two, which in turn narrow almost immediately to a single lane at Exit 73, which lies 800-feet east of Exit 72. All traffic flows off of Exit 73 onto Route 58 , marking the end of the expressway. HISTORY Because of the cancellation of the Mid-Manhattan Expressway , I-495 does not meet Interstate 95 . The LIE was constructed in stages starting in 1939, when the Queens-Midtown Tunnel was built, until 1972, when its Riverhead terminus was finished. Plans have existed to construct a Long Island Crossing that would extend the LIE across Long Island Sound to either Guilford, Connecticut , Old Saybrook, Connecticut , or Rhode Island via a series of existing and man-made islands, but a lack of funding as well as public opposition have killed these proposals. Previously, the LIE was New York State Route 495 to the east of the Clearview Expressway ( Interstate 295 ), but in the 1980s, the NY 495 signs were taken down and I-495 extended to the east end of the LIE. Originally, I-495 was to stretch from the Queens Midtown Tunnel and I-278 to I-295 , the Clearview Expressway. Plans later included creating the Mid-Manhattan Expressway across Manhattan to the Lincoln Tunnel , to connect to I-95 in New Jersey . These plans were eventually cancelled, and the NJ stretch of I-495 was downgraded to a NJ state highway. However, Long Island lobbied to extend I-495 east, upgrading NY 24 to NY 495 and then I-495, to Riverhead where it terminates at NY 25. Since I-495 extends from a city outward, it is technically a spur, which should have an odd first digit. Even first digits are usually assigned to bypasses and beltways. A proposed Orient-Watch Hill Bridge would have connected I-495 back to I-95 in Rhode Island . From 1994 to 2005, High-occupancy Vehicle Lane s (HOV) were added to I-495. Beginning with a small section in Western Suffolk County, the lanes were added in subsequent sections until their completion on June 30 , 2005 . There is one HOV lane in each direction, in the median of the highway. They now run from Exit 31 Cross Island Parkway to Exit 64 at Medford in central Suffolk County. From 6:00 am to 10:00 am and from 3pm (15:00) to 8 pm (20:00) Monday through Friday, the HOV lanes are limited to buses, motorcycles, and Clean Pass vehicles without occupancy requirement and passenger vehicles with at least two occupants. Trailers and commercial trucks are always prohibited therein. Long Island Transportation Management, Inc. - HOV Lane Information Smaller highways continue on from the end of the LIE to Greenport on the North Fork and past The Hamptons to Montauk on the South Fork. Cynics have suggested that the acronym "LIE" is appropriate since, due to the high volume of traffic on it, the term "expressway" is just that, a lie. This volume of traffic has led to the nickname of "The World's Longest Parking Lot." However, that title is now somewhat erroneous. Many Long Island residents admit, thanks in part to recently finished construction of an HOV Lane stretching from the Queens border to Exit 64, that the LIE tends to move better than the island's east-west Parkway s, the Northern State Parkway and the Southern State Parkway . Traffic jams still occur in the Queens and western Nassau sections of the LIE during rush hour. One could argue that the highway is technically only referred to as the Long Island Expressway in Nassau and Suffolk counties, while in Queens , the service roads are called the Queens-Midtown Expressway (between the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and Queens Boulevard ) and Horace Harding Expressway (between Queens Boulevard and the Nassau County line), and are generally signed as such like any other city streets. It is common to refer to the service roads by these names - particularly Horace Harding - in local usage, for instance when referring to the location of a business on that address. The names may have been intended to refer to sections of the expressway proper, but current guide signs (and Queens residents) simply refer to it as the Long Island Expressway. Horace J. Harding (1863-1929) was a finance magnate who directed the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad Company and the New York Municipal Railways System. Harding used his influence to promote the development of Long Island’s roadways, lending strong support to Robert Moses’s “great parkway plan.” Harding also urged construction of a highway from Queens Boulevard to the Nassau County Line, in order to provide better access to Oakland Country Club, where he was a member. After his death, the Queens-Nassau County section of the LIE was named for Harding. Horace Harding was not related to the former President Warren G. Harding . Suffolk County Road 48 was originally intended to become part of the North Fork extension of the Long Island Expressway. Proposed interchanges and service road configurations As the Long Island Expressway was being built across Long Island, it was specifically being designed to accommodate certain topographical conditions and proposed interchanges.
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