Winter 2020

Newsletter Archive

New paper in Conservation Science and Practice

New paper 'Prioritizing human safety and multi-species connectivity across a regional road network' in Conservation Science and Practice

When people think about roads and wildlife they think about the risk of striking an animal while driving. It is not a surprise that motorist safety risk (areas of high animal vehicle collisions) is a priority criterion in where to invest in road mitigation. But does this address species that are rare and sensitive to traffic volumes, who may avoid roads? Species that tend not to show up in the animal vehicle collision data which is driven by deer. In Alberta we share the landscape with many large mammals (pronghorn, elk, moose, bighorn sheep, grizzly bears, black bears) but deer are the most common species involved in animal vehicle collisions. Our new paper identifies road sections where animal vehicle collision hotspots and connectivity values for rarer species align and road mitigation would reduce the risk of animal vehicle collisions while enabling safe passage for species of concern. This paper presents a framework for prioritizing road mitigation that can be used in other jurisdictions.

Thank you to Alberta Transportation, Alberta Environment and Parks, The Calgary Foundation - Glavin Family Fund, Wilburforce Foundation and Woodcock Foundation.