Wildlife Infrastructure

Our team joined ARC Solutions, MHA Nation, and the National Park Service’s Rivers, Trails, and Conservation Assistance Program to evaluate the potential use of wildlife crossing infrastructure into the Park’s future development plans. By evaluating the topography and the target species, short- and long-term solutions were created for the MHA Nation to support the development of their National Park around improved wildlife connectivity.

In collaboration with the Center for Large Landscape Conservation (CLLC) and the Western Transportation Institute, our team supported the wildlife connectivity assessment that prioritized mitigation efforts for approximately 100-miles of highway in Gallatin Canyon near Big Sky and West Yellowstone, MT. The assessment evaluated safety and wildlife connectivity to prioritize locations for effective and feasible wildlife infrastructure. The site visit determined an array of opportunities that ranged from traffic calming, retrofit of existing bridges, upgrade opportunities for future bridge replacements, and the addition of completely new wildlife overpasses.

Our team participated in a design collaboration with the Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative, Ecological Design Lab at Toronto Metropolitan University, and ARC Solutions. This project helped to visualize connectivity and explored different methods and effectiveness of communicating wildlife crossings to a wide range of audiences. Our interdisciplinary team reviewed engineering solutions to portray messages to the traveling public, considered effective urban parks for educational purposes, and established a suite of other ideas to educate, fund, and construct wildlife infrastructure.

Our design team traveled to northern California to assess a 12-mile section of US-97 for wildlife crossing infrastructure. A multi-agency evaluation was completed that included Caltrans, Siskiyou County Board of Supervisors, the United States Forest Service’s Klamath National Forest, California Deer Association, California Highway Patrol, Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation, California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Fruit Growers Supply Company, and other private landowners. Together we evaluated and prioritized potential wildlife crossing locations. Life cycle assessments were completed for preliminary designs using FRP, concrete, and steel, and wood materials for the crossing and supporting infrastructure to assess the benefits of sustainable FRP materials.

This wildlife crossing design charrette was a working group hosted by the National Wildlife Federation, Ecological Design Lab at Toronto Metropolitan University, and ARC Solutions. Experts were brought in from around North America to evaluate design alternatives of the Wallis Annenberg wildlife crossing over US-101 north of Los Angeles. Our team’s design recommendations were valuable contributions to the final design and created a more effective wildlife crossing.

This wildlife crossing assessment design challenge was a working group hosted by the Ecological Design Lab at Toronto Metropolitan University, Western Transportation Institute, and Animal Road Crossing (ARC) Solutions. The goals of the design charrettes were to explore new applications of fiber-reinforced polymers (FRPs) into wildlife crossings to create innovative mitigating infrastructure. Applications of different FRP bridge structures were adapted to fit the landscape to create sustainable wildlife crossings using FRP and other sustainable and recycled materials. Results of this project were published in the journal Sustainability. (The Use of Fiber-Reinforced Polymers in Wildlife Crossing Infrastructure).