Roads & Wildlife

Guiding Principles for Conducting Biodiversity Assessments for Road Projects (UK)

Source: Wildlife and Roads: The Ecological Impact
Bryan Sherwood, David Cutler, and Jon Burton,
Imperial College Press (2002)

• Avoid impacts on biodiversity and create opportunities for enhancement of biodiversity whenever possible by route selection and scheme design. Where this is not possible identify the best practical mitigation and enhancement option to ensure that there is no significant loss of biodiversity. Compensation measures such as translocation should be viewed as a last resort.
• Apply the precautionary principle to avoid irreversible losses of biodiversity, i.e. where an activity raises threats or harm to biodiversity precautionary measures should be taken even if certain cause and effect relationships are not scientifically established.
• Widen existing EIA practice to an ecosystem perspective - i.e. consider impacts of a road scheme on biodiversity and possible enhancements of biodiversity in the context of local and regional ecosystems, not just the immediate vicinity of the road.
• Safeguard genetic resources by protecting the higher levels of biodiversity (i.e. individuals, populations, species, and communities, etc.) and the environmental processes which sustain them.
• Consider the full range of impacts on biodiversity e.g. indirect and cumulative impacts not just the direct impacts such as species and habitat loss.
• The study area of the scheme should reflect the impact type (e.g. indirect effects will often extend throughout a watershed) rather than taking a fixed width corridor approach.
• Evaluate the impacts of a road scheme ob biodiversity in local, regional, national, and, where relevant, international contexts i.e. an impact could be minor locally but significant at a national level e.g. where the locality has a very high proportion of a nationally rare biodiversity resource.
• Retain the existing pattern and connectivity of habitats e.g. protect natural corridors and mitigation routes and avoid artificial barriers. Where existing habitat is fragmented implement measures e.g. tunnels, bridges to enhance connectivity.
• Use buffers to protect important biodiversity areas wherever possible.
• Maintain natural ecosystems processes in particular hydrology and water quality. Wherever possible use soft engineering solutions to minimize impacts on hydrology.
• Strive to maintain/enhance natural structural and functional diversity e.g. ensure that the quality of habitats and communities is not diminished and wherever possible is enhanced by road scheme.
• Maintain/enhance rare and ecologically important species (key species) - i.e. protected species, SAP species, characteristic species for each habitat as loss of these may affect a large number of other species and can affect overall ecosystem structure and function.
• Decisions on biodiversity should be based on full information and monitoring must be part of the EIA process. The results of monitoring should be available to allow evaluation of the accuracy of impact prediction and should be widely circulated to help improve future road scheme design and mitigation.
• Implement on-going management plans for existing and newly created habitats and other mitigation, compensation and enhancement measures.

Bethanie Walder's Background continued from page 1...

Assuming that the forest service simply protected our forests, she was surprised to learn about timber programs and road construction programs that seemed contrary to the goal of protecting forests. Eager to learn more about forestry and forestry issues, Bethanie enrolled in the Environmental Studies graduate program at the University of Montana. As she was completing her thesis on natural and human disturbance effects on forest ecosystems, Bethanie landed a job as co-director of Wildlands CPR – which, at that time, was called ROAD-RIP.

The organization was founded in 1994 as a clearinghouse for research and information on road and off-road vehicles impacts to the environment. Today Wildlands CPR maintains a 10,000 citation database on the ecological effects of roads and off-road vehicles and offers a multitude of guide books on monitoring road impacts, road removal, and inventory of existing roads. In addition, Wildlands CPR has trained over 1,000 people around the country in these techniques and works closely with numerous land management agencies to advance more restorative and beneficial care of the land.

Interview with Bethanie Walder, Wildlands CPR

(... continued from page 1)

How do roads impact wildlife habitat?

The major impacts are habitat fragmentation, animal mortality (road kill), sedimentation that pollutes our waters, and the spread of non-native and invasive species – which is a significant problem along road right-of-ways.

From an aquatic perspective, roads completely change how water interacts with land. A perfect example of this is U.S. Route 41 (also known as the Tamiami Trail), which runs from Miami to Tampa, through the Florida Everglades. Route U.S. 41 functionally acts like a dam in the Everglades. You have all of this sheet (water) flow across the Everglades and it just hits the road and can’t get across. As part of an Everglades restoration plan, there is a proposal to elevate an 11- mile section of Route 41 up above the Everglades. Should this come to fruition, it would be such an amazing restoration opportunity that would result in 11 miles of virtually complete connectivity. To keep abreast of the progress of this project visit: www.build-the-skyway.com

What types of crossings are being used to mitigate the impacts of roads on wildlife?

There are both terrestrial and aquatic mitigation structures.

Terrestrial:
Underpasses – Large concrete structures or metal pipes or arches are used to create a tunnel under the road. In addition, regular culverts that are used to pass water under a road can be retrofitted with little ledges along the length of the culvert, above the water line, so small mammals can cross on the ledge.

Overpasses – or eco-ducts or wildlife bridges are constructed with dirt and vegetation to create contiguous habitat across the road. This type of bridge has been in use in Europe for many years and has been proven to be incredibly effective. They've also been used in Banff National Park (Canada). Researchers have found however that it takes time – sometimes several years - for wildlife to become acclimated to using these bridges.

Extended bridges – When you build a bridge across a river, for example, instead of finishing the bridge just at the water's edge, you keep that bridge raised for another 5 yards to 100 yards or more so that there is a natural land embankment for wildlife to travel under that road. This kind of crossing is really fantastic because it is so natural and you are maintaining complete connectivity across that part of the wildlife habitat.

A good example of all three of these types of crossing structures is here in Montana on Highway 93 which is being re-constructed from Missoula to Polson. The highway is increasing from a two-lane to a three/four-lane highway in most areas. There will be 42 wildlife crossing structures – a combination of overpasses, underpasses and extended bridges – installed along this 45-mile stretch.

Aquatic:
Retrofitting or Replacing Culverts – The U.S. Forest Service and many state agencies are upgrading culverts to install larger and better engineered culverts that are retrofitted for fish passage. Many older culverts were designed and constructed solely to pass water and not fish. These create a barrier when fish are trying to get upstream to their spawning grounds. If the existing culvert isn't designed at the original stream bank level, it can create a waterfall at the edge of the culvert. For certain fish, these waterfalls are too significant of a barrier for them to pass through. Also, because culverts confine a whole stream into what is essentially a small tube, it dramatically increases the velocity of the water and that too can create a problem for the fish – even if the culvert is level with the stream bank bottom.

One technique being used is essentially squashing culverts – leaving the top like a regular culvert yet flattening out the bottom to create more of a natural gradient like a stream bottom. In some cases they are using half culverts to create less expensive bridges. In these examples, the natural stream bottom is maintained to pass macroinvertabrates and fish – with no interruption whatsoever.

A good example of a successful culvert retrofit is one completed by the Clearwater National Forest in Idaho about two years ago. A stream in which they had not seen steelhead trout for about 50 years, had signs of the return of this species just one year after the retrofit.

It is very important to point out, however, that there is not one sure fit solution for all circumstances. In some places, culverts have actually prevented invasion of native fisheries from non-native fish. Culverts can block passage for both native fish and non-native fish. There are some places where the land manager may determine that the risk to the native fishery is greater if you replace the culvert than if you leave it there. So, as you can see, connectivity is not always a straight forward thing.

How does wildlife know to use these crossings?

They don't always use them. That's why fencing is used to guide wildlife to the crossing structures. Scientists have found that animals learn where these crossing structures are and they use them more frequently. Over time, scientists and ecologists have made many improvements to wildlife fencing. “Escape ramps” have been created on the road side of the fence – for example a 5' hill of dirt – which a deer could use to walk up and jump over the fence to the other side so that they can get out of the right-of-way. These seem to work better than “one-way” gates that an animal can push through in one direction but not in the other.

It's also important to note that the dimensions of wildlife crossings influence how successful they are. Different wildlife species prefer different types of structures. For example, if you are trying to get deer or elk across a road, you'll need a different sized structure than if you are trying to get smaller mammals across a road. Smaller, prey species prefer a confined space because they don't want to be out in the open. Whereas ungulates – like deer and elk – prefer a big open space because they want to be able to see around them. So it may be necessary to use a wide variety of crossing structures along a stretch of road.

While crossing structures seem to work for nearly every type of animal, it can be expensive to retrofit old roads. For example, thousands of Common Toads in England have been killed by cars while trying to cross roads. During breeding season in late March or early April, Common Toads have a strong urge to return to their birth pond and are killed while crossing the road. Though amphibian tunnels would allow frogs to cross roads on their own, they can be expensive to install. While advocating for such crossing structures in particular areas, environmental organizations like Froglife have also formed “toad patrols” – groups of volunteers who go out during breeding season and literally collect all the frogs in buckets and carry them across the road. Even in rural areas with very little road traffic, the mortality rate can be nearly 100%. For this reason they also advocate for amphibian tunnels to allow frogs to cross the roads on their own.

What can you tell us about wildlife detection systems?

This is an emerging field in wildlife mitigation – and it does not require the use of fencing, which may in fact contribute to habitat fragmentation. However wildlife detection systems may also be combined with fencing or other mitigation measures such as wildlife underpasses and overpasses. There are a number of different types of technologies being tested to determine which one will be most effective in which situations.

Animal detection systems inform drivers that animals are present in the immediate vicinity, instead of relying on “deer crossing” signs that are posted all the time, regardless of the immediate presence of animals. Some systems being tested use a “break the beam” type technology that trigger lights to blink if an animal breaks an infrared, laser or microwave radio signal beam. There is also a system that relies on radio collared elk on the Olympic peninsula in the state of Washington. Since this resident herd of elk travels together, the dominant animals have been radio collared to activate blinking road signs when they are in the vicinity of the road. The Western Transportation Institute at Montana State University is conducting some of the research on animal detection systems.

In our survey we asked readers about their use of mass transit as a means to mitigate transportation hazards to wildlife. But mass transit is clearly not a practical solution, or even available, for everyone. What are your thoughts on mass transit?

If you're living in an urban area good mass transportation options are a critical step, but major urban areas also tend to contain little viable wildlife habitat. But let’s look at the need for mass transit from another perspective. There's been a lot of discussion about electric cars, hybrid vehicles, hydrogen powered cars, etc. – but that individual form of transportation only necessitates more roads. It would be great if we could reduce air pollution by reducing the amount of gas we use, but it won't reduce the congestion and road construction if our society continues to be based on individual modes of transportation. This makes long-term approaches to mass transportation even more important.

There are a couple of really good books on this topic. One book, written by one of the founders of Wildlands CPR, Katie Alvord, is called “Divorce Your Car: Ending the Love Affair with the Automobile” -- it deals with these larger issues of the effects of an individual car culture on the environment as a whole. Another great book on this subject is by James Howard Kunstler called “The Geography of Nowhere: The Rise And Decline of America's Man-Made Landscape” and it's about how our society at the turn of the century shifted very deliberately from a mass transit based society to an individual car culture. Who was behind that change? The auto industry of course. This shift greatly reduced our country's investment in mass transit, while concurrently increasing our investment in road and highway construction.

One brilliant solution for people who live in cities is “car sharing” which originated in Switzerland in the late 80's. There are more than a dozen such programs in the U.S. (e.g. Madison, Wisconsin) where individuals pay a small fee to have access to a fleet of cars that are shared by a large number of people. It’s a great way to save money on car ownership and do something good for the environment at the same time.

Which states are most pro-active in addressing road removal and mitigating road impacts on wildlife?

Two that stand out are Montana and Florida. Within the last couple of years, Montana has really taken a lead in this field. Case in point -- the example I gave earlier with Highway 93 which is being done through a memorandum of agreement between Montana Department of Transportation (MDT), the Salish Kootenai Indian Tribe, and the Federal Highways Administration. And in Florida, the DOT built culverts under I-75 for panther crossings.

We are starting to see more and more states getting interested in wildlife crossings – though in some instances they may be more concerned about road kill than habitat connectivity. Highway departments tend to be more interested in safety, human mortality and costs. Road kill is very expensive in terms of human lives and insurance costs. So there are different motivations in different places for addressing the issue of wildlife crossings.

What is being done in other countries to mitigate the effects of large roads or highways on wildlife?

This field it is in its infancy in the U.S., but it is at least in its adolescence, if not young adulthood, in many other countries. The Netherlands is certainly a leader in this area. I had attended a conference in Belgium and the thing that amazed me the most was the work being done by some of the eastern European countries like Slovenia and Bulgaria which are relatively poor countries. Some of these countries have incredible habitat and they're spending money on crossing structures to maintain habitat connectivity across highways to a much greater extent than in the U.S. At these conferences, the people giving the presentations about the importance of crossing structures were the Transportation Ministers vs. the researchers and conservationists here in the United States who are making the case for crossing structures in this country to the transportation officials. In other countries it is an integral part of their transportation planning, yet it is only just becoming a part of our transportation planning here in the U.S.

One forum that provides a great opportunity to learn from shared research and information is the International Conference on Ecology and Transportation (ICOET). This conference is held every other year and it is THE conference at which road mitigation is discussed. This year's conference is in San Diego, August 29-September 2.

You spoke about Wildlands CPR's work on road removal in U.S. forests. Why is this so important?

The Forest Service has more than $10 billion in road maintenance backlogs that needs to be carried out in order to prevent further erosion, sedimentation, and landslides. The road system costs more money than taxpayers can afford to maintain. Removing roads makes more sense economically and ecologically.

We have no qualms about the roads that are needed to move people but presently there is an unsustainable level of roads in the national forests. There are 380,000 miles of official forest service roads. If you add in city, county, state and federal roads – like a U.S. highway – plus the roads that were created by off-road vehicle users but that are not on any map – you actually end up with more than 500,000 miles of roads on Forest Service lands. This is many, many times the size of the U.S. interstate highway system.

So there is a need both to mitigate and fully maintain the roads that the Forest Service needs to keep and to remove the roads that they don’t need anymore. And what the Forest Service has found is that 80% of the use of the roads on national forest lands occurs on 20% of the roads – that’s only about 60,000-70,000 miles that are really needed to meet most forest transportation needs. This provides an excellent opportunity to save money, employ highly skilled workers and protect the environment by removing roads.

What are the motivations for road removal in more urban areas?

It really comes down to safety and money. The city of Seattle is spending $6 million over the next 20 years to remove roads to protect their municipal watershed. The alternative – the building of a water filtration system – would cost $120 million plus ongoing maintenance costs. By removing 10 miles of dirt roads in forested areas each year, they remove the main source of sediment into their municipal watershed. So by spending money to remove roads, they are saving money. They are keeping their water clean; they are putting people to work in high skilled, high wage jobs, and saving the taxpayers money.

What else can Leaf Litter readers do to educate themselves on this issue?

They can contact their state DOT's to find out what work is underway or being proposed. In a number of states there are transportation centers affiliated with local Universities that are conducting research and offering educational programs in this field.

They can also visit Wildlands CPR website and learn about both the impacts of roads and off-road vehicles and the different ways that mitigation and restoration address those impacts. I also invite your readers to become members of Wildlands CPR.

"You Said It" Responses to Survey

On average those of you that responded drive about 15,000 miles per year (MPY). The driver with the highest average annual mileage drives 88,000 MPY – time to rethink that job – and the lowest MPY reported was 100.

Nearly a third of you have struck a wild animal with a vehicle at least once or twice a year. The most common vehicular encounters mentioned were with deer. Not surprising. The Insurance Information Institute estimates that nearly half a million deer strikes occur annually in the U.S. alone, resulting in approximately $1 billion in related claims.

We asked if you would be willing to add time to your daily commute if the road was rerouted to avoid fragmenting wildlife corridors? Although some sited the quandary of driving additional miles and adding to the greenhouse gasses that will be emitted as we drive those extra miles in order to protect wildlife corridors, 68% of you would be willing to add time to your daily commute; 29% said maybe and 3% said no. The type of species being impacted would be a determining factor for many of you. If we’re talking about species that are “numerous” or “problematic” – several mentioned raccoons – respondents were clearly less inclined to consider adding time to their commutes.

Here are some of your additional comments:

• For me this would have to be tied to improved public transportation.
• I would not be in favor of getting rid of the existing roads, but I would control the construction of proposed roads.
• More drastic measures seem premature when we've barely begun to think about wildlife underpasses, corridors, and habitat defragmentation.

While more than half of you would be willing to use mass transit in the name of eliminating roads that fragment habitat, most cited a multitude of problems with the realities of mass transit. Most comments centered on no availability of, poor access to, or the inefficiency of mass transit in their communities which would make it an unrealistic alternative to driving. Others mentioned jobs that necessitate using a car in the course of their day’s work.

Clearly the more urban the area is in which you live, the more likely you are to have decent mass transit options. Those of you from Seattle applauded your city’s system while some of you in Houston felt the system fell short saying “mass transit requires going into the downtown area and then traveling back out.”

If you happen to live in Denver, CO; Portland, OR; St. Louis, MO; or Washington, D.C., you may want to think about using mass transit if you aren’t already doing so. The Center for Transportation Excellence cited these U.S. cities as examples of transportation excellence.

Here are a few of the comments you made in response to this question:

• Much like state DOT’s prepare highway infrastructure plans, environmental agencies need to prepare habitat infrastructure plans.
• The reason my drive is so long now is to get away from the city. Extending mass transit will result in extending the city outward.
• The entire mass transit issue needs a serious injection of sensible regional goals and planning.
• Mass transit is only cost effective when the population can sustain the investment through use. Often the time to move from point A to point B, the location of pickup and drop-off points, and cost of each connector, create barriers to public acceptance.

An overwhelming 77% of you were willing to pay additional taxes to support wildlife crossings, fencing and other initiatives to reconnect wildlife corridors. With this said, however, this question provoked the most thoughtful responses out of all our questions.

Here’s more of what you had to say:

• The prudent approach is to ensure that the crossings will have the intended effect and that you’re not just installing increased culverts that won't be recognized by (wildife) as a safe crossing zone.
• I don't think that putting more money in politicians' pockets by instituting more taxes is an answer to anything. However, I do believe that education and group initiatives (voluntary) are the best way to begin doing this -- getting like minded people to get their hands dirty and 'creating' more 'like-minded' people with education.
• I think the cost of wildlife crossings would be so incidental to the total cost of a road project that additional taxes would not be necessary.
• It would have to be minimal. The total tax burden is probably about right. The choices should be among the allocation of the tax burden and provision of services. Society (politics) must make tough choices among the interests competing for the money.
• I believe that we should adopt the same practice, here in Ontario, as they have in places like Alaska. Where they have built land bridges over highways, effectively connecting wildlife and ecological areas, and protecting wildlife from the dangers of roads and the vehicles on them.
• Rural area.......waste of time & money
• There would have to be very specific, outlined projects towards which I knew the money was going. The difficulty with funding these things with taxes is making sure the money actually goes where it is intended to go. If there were some mechanisms to help ensure the money would not be taken for other things, I would support additional taxes for this.

When we asked if your town, state, province or country is doing enough to minimize road impacts to wildlife, 64% of you said no, 9% said yes and more than 27% of you said you really didn’t know. In the course of our research for this issue we came across numerous resources that can help. If you’re a U.S. resident, try visiting your state DOT’s web site to find out what work is underway or being proposed. Or visit the web site of one of the “transportation centers” affiliated with local Universities which are conducting research and offering educational programs in this field. And don’t forget to check out the organization of our featured interview guest, Bethanie Walder, Wildlands CPR.

For those of you that felt your local government is NOT doing enough to minimize road impacts to wildlife, here are some of the reasons why:

• Must invest in more, efficient public transportation options
• Must stop building so many new homes
• Roads are designed by civil engineers who are not (typically) trained to consider nature or ecological principles.
• Need more wildlife under or overpasses; more effective long term planning for roads.
• Actually, fewer deer in the UK would be rather a good thing - perhaps Land Rovers are an inadequate substitute for the Wolf.
• Many municipal codes and practices preclude the use of sensible, cost effective, methods of achieving these goals. The irony is that better development practices will save these communities money in the long run.
• Must reduce/enforce speed limits, for a start.
• How about taxing SUV drivers up the wazoo! forbidding them to obtain Save the Bay plates
• Education and awareness are key. In Ontario, you see the occasional sign posted about the dangers of wildlife crossing for the next so-many kilometres. There needs to be more done to avoid confrontation between us and local wildlife.
• Perhaps remove Ralph Klein (Premier of Alberta, Canada) from government and stop giving industry the right of way to build roads wherever they please.
• Maryland should be focusing on mass transit and smart growth, not more highways in the suburbs and farmlands. Baltimore County has some excellent zoning regulations that prevent fragmentation of forest habitat (RC-6). However, most of the county is under zoning that does not explicitly prevent road building in wildlife habitat.
• See www.scwildlands.org for the Southern California Linkages Plan and conservation linkages for major migratory corridors.

Keep in mind that while we are shaking our collective fingers at what is not getting done or what more needs to be done, our governments will only respond if we make enough noise on the issues that are important to us. One Leaf Litter reader who works for the Washington State Department of Transportation has this to say: “I know we are doing as much as the taxpayers will allow. In most cases we are out ahead of the public on what we want to do. We have a Secretary of Transportation that endorses good environmental stewardship. We'd do more if we had the mandate and the funding.”

The majority of you – 87% – have NOT been directly involved in designing, implementing or monitoring wildlife crossings. For those of you that have, here’s a sampling of how:

• I was a park ranger in Glacier National Park. Ever seen a bear jam?
• Reviewing the design of wildlife corridors for a property that has become a new golf course.
• Sampling for fish and/or amphibians and incorporating special culverts or small bridges into a highway design.
• I am responsible for managing wildlife accident mitigation for my state.
• Working with developers to encourage them to provide safer road crossings for turtles, etc. along with sizing stream and wetland crossing "culverts" to allow for animal movement without having to cross over the road.
• I have used bottomless drainage culverts, as now required by ACOE, and similar devices as appropriate for over 30 years.
• Salamander crossing installed in road which, upon construction, separated wetlands.
• I've been actively involved with the design and monitoring of fish passage through culverts. I've also monitored wildlife crossings for large mammals (mountain lions/coyotes/bears) through culverts. Unless they are adequately designed, the animals won't use them!
• I am part of a team that is analyzing the impacts of different wildlife crossings of I-90 east of Snoqualmie Pass (Seattle, WA). We are looking at both undercrossings and overcrossings.
• University of Connecticut is currently working on incorporating amphibian and reptile crossing designs into a proposed road extension in order to protect the vernal pool species nearby.
• Two years ago I was involved with scenario planning to guide development in the Monteverde region of Costa Rica. Part of my research resulted in offering design options to facilitate wildlife movement from the cloud forest to the ocean.

How can Leaf Litter help? Most of your responses to our closing question had to do with wanting to learn more about the way in which roads impact our environment and finding good resources to educate yourselves and your local governments on what can be done. We hope that you will find our interview with Bethanie Walder, our Recommended Reading list and Recommended Web Site Links a good start. As always, thanks for reading Leaf Litter and for doing your part to “restore the earth.”