Historically, the highway/wildlife habitat interface was poorly understood. Wildlife mortality was a seemingly accepted cost of developing highways in the Province. Little had been done to assess the impact of highways on wildlife, their migratory corridors and their use of critical ranges. The implications of the absence of understanding the highway/wildlife habitat interface culminated in 1978 when the construction of the 6 km long Parksville Bypass (Highway 4) on Vancouver Island resulted in over 300 dead deer from collisions in its first operational season. The unexpected magnitude of this highway-related wildlife mortality provided the impetus to the British Columbia Ministry of Transportation (MOT) to examine the number of wildlife-vehicle collisions that were occurring throughout the Province. In conjunction with the British Columbia Ministry of Environment, MOT initiated a program to record the location, number and type of wildlife collisions. This project was nonimated for the TAC 2001 Environmental Achievement Award. For the covering abstract of this conference see ITRD number E211271.
Samenvatting