Michigan is making its first-ever bid for federal funds to study "hot spots" where wildlife are being killed in collisions with vehicles.
Knowing those locations could help the state develop locations for safer crossings for the wildlife.
Amanda Novak is with the Michigan Department of Transportation. She said Michigan has the fourth-highest number of deer-vehicle collisions in the nation. The big challenge with reducing those collisions is just the sheer number of places where they tend to cross roadways.
Novak said deer do tend to cross at interchanges, near structures, and where there is drainage.
"So our hope would be to identify where the highest priority locations may be, and then essentially try to funnel them to cross where we would prefer they cross."
Novak said that is typically done with fencing, with openings at the places that have been constructed to allow safe passage for the deer to cross.
Jared Duquette, a human-wildlife interaction specialist with the state Department of Natural Resources, said with deer, additional strategies are needed in addition to constructed wildlife crossings, such as working with private landowners to clear vegetation from the sides of roads so drivers can see deer about to cross, and working with municipalities to reduce speeds in areas where large numbers of deer tend to cross.
Duquette said the state also wants to reduce collisions with declining populations of at-risk species like moose, elk, Blanding's turtles, pine marten, and eastern massasauga rattlesnakes.
He said species that live in or near wetlands, like turtles and snakes, can often be encouraged to cross at new or retrofitted culverts. Those are tunnels under roads to prevent flooding or soil erosion from heavy rains.
"So we generally have an idea, hey, we could put a culvert here that has flowing water or at least some type of moist soil where they can traverse through that culvert," he said.
The state has requested $467,376 from the United States Department of Transportation's Wildlife Crossings Pilot Program.
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