Feds to study roadkill thanks to highway bill

By WALT WILLIAMS Chronicle Staff Writer

The federal government will take a hard look at why roadkill happens thanks to a provision in the transportation bill recently passed by Congress.

The Bozeman-based conservation group American Wildlands is praising the study as a starting point in mitigating the effect of roadkill on wildlife populations.

The group led an effort to get 38 environmental groups in 10 Western states to back wildlife-friendly provisions in the bill.

The study is the first national effort of its kind, the group said.

"We're not going to remove the highways, but we can do things to make it easier for wildlife to get from one side (of the road) to the other," Joshua Burnim, lands program coordinator for American Wildlands, said Monday.

Last week Congress passed a $286.4 billion highway bill that will pay for new roads and road improvements. Plus, it is full of pet projects that have little to do with highways, but are meant to shore up support for lawmakers back home.

There also are several mandates government agencies must follow. In addition to the roadkill study, there is a provision allowing hybrid vehicles in carpool lanes, according to news reports.

For the roadkill survey, the bill directs the U.S. Department of Transportation to study the causes of wildlife-vehicle collisions and the impact they have on the environment. It also must study methods to prevent the accidents from happening in the first place.

The results must be presented to Congress in two years. After that, the agency will develop a "best practices" manual to support state efforts to reduce wildlife-vehicle collisions.

The agency won't conduct its own research, but instead compile data from various sources to come up with the report.

More than 1 million animals are killed by motorists on the nation's highways every year, Burnim said. It's a serious problem for wildlife, particularly for endangered species that already have low populations.

"Just hitting a few can be a problem," he said.

The Montana Department of Transportation collects roadkill data through road crew reports and Montana Highway Patrol records, spokeswoman Charity Watt Levis said. The agency contracts a private consultant when it needs a more detailed analysis on a particular stretch of road.

The state already has some mitigation projects up and running, she said. It has installed some 40 wildlife crossings along U.S. 93, and it is converting a former railroad bridge into a crossing on Interstate 90.

"It's a growing trend across the U.S. and definitely Montana," she said.

The transportation bill doesn't set any money aside for the roadkill study, but the agency is still mandated to do it.

Walt Williams is at wwilliams@dailychronicle.com

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