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One of America's most beautiful roads, the Merritt Parkway has stood up well to the test of time. Dense wooded buffers do an excellent job of separating the parkway from rapid development in Fairfield County, and trees in the median provide a canopy that makes for a pleasant ride. Many of the individually designed parkway bridges are still in place, though newer bridges built for the US 7, CT 25 and CT 8 interchanges during the 1970's and 1980's seem out of place. (More recent reconstruction projects pay more attention to the original design aesthetics, however.)
For all the beauty, there are compromises in terms of congestion and safety. The parkway needs an additional travel lane in each direction, but active preservation efforts likely will prevent this from ever happening. Acceleration and deceleration lanes should be built where appropriate to improve safety.
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