Wildlife vehicle collisions (WVCs) widely impact human safety, wildlife health, and the economy. They also graphically illustrate how roads act as barriers to intact landscapes, which wildlife must cross when attempting to reach breeding and feeding grounds, or access quality habitat. In the US, more than 365 million animals are killed, 29,000 humans injured, and $8.4 billion in damages incurred each year.
Wildlife crossing infrastructure has been shown to help mitigate collisions and protect wildlife. Yet transportation departments often lack the funds, human resources, and momentum required to collect the comprehensive WVC data that can improve spatial models required to confidently predict viable wildlife crossings. With the global scope and severity of WVC impacts, data regarding this issue remain largely unavailable or insufficient. This limited understanding has inhibited the effective design and placement of road projects, such as overpasses and speed restrictions, to successfully mitigate such impacts. To fill this gap, Adventure Scientists, a nonprofit dedicated to equipping partners with otherwise unobtainable data, initiated a global effort in 2012. To date, over 750 volunteer cyclists have made nearly 10,000 observations on species ranging from bobcats and beavers to cottontails and copperheads. Dispersed internationally, this effort enabled the organization to recognize existing data gaps, design a targeted approach to address this issue at a finer scale, and enable data-driven decision-making.
In this presentation, we will discuss how an initial global effort guided the development of a Montana-focused project. This Intermountain state, with the nation's second highest WVC rate, abundant wildlife, and intact bioregions, offers a prime opportunity to enhance the quality and availability of data. Adventure Scientists will recruit, train, and manage hundreds of volunteer cyclists to survey approximately 11,000 miles of Montana state highways for roadkill and wildlife congregations near roadsides. These data will be gathered systematically at least four times per year for three years, offering a baseline to identify and prioritize the location and type of WVC mitigation infrastructure. While early in the project, we will describe our current progress, and how these data will position decision makers with the information needed to plan safer roads for humans and wildlife. In addition, we will highlight how partnerships and robust volunteer-collected data are crucial within this Montana-based project to influence decision-making and improve wildlife connectivity. We will conclude by reflecting on how other transportation agencies have begun to see this model as useful to address similar issues across the US and internationally.