1. Transportation and Wildlife: Policy and Practice
People, Economics and Forest Carnivore Management
Trisha White, Defenders of Wildlife

2. …is dedicated to the protection of all native wild animals and plants in their natural communities.
New approaches that keep species from becoming endangered
Protect entire ecosystems and interconnected habitats

3. 1. Proactive
2. State-based
3. Incentive-driven

4. WHY TRANSPORTATION?

10. 1. Reduce the impact of roads and highways on wildlife and habitat.
PHOTO CREDIT: Alex Levy, FHWA

11. 2. Incorporate wildlife conservation into transportation planning.
OBJECTIVE 2: Incorporate wildlife conservation into transportation planning.
Are there any planners in the crowd?
Better planning is a win-win solution. Plan for conservation simultaneously with transportation. Finite resources, finite space in a finite world. It only makes sense to plan ahead.
Florida – Filling the Gaps

13. Integrated Planning
Conservation Banking
Interagency Coordination
Wildlife Crossings
Public Lands
Native Vegetation

14. Integrated Planning
Transportation and metropolitan planners should utilize existing landscape-level conservation plans in their own planning efforts.
Training
Monitoring
Outreach

15. State Wildlife Grants Program
Comprehensive Wildlife Conservation Strategies by Oct. 1, 2005
State Fish & Wildlife Agencies
Block grant with non federal match requirements
Fluctuating funding $65 - $85 million per year

16. State Wildlife Grants Program
Wildlife Status
Habitat Status
Threats Analysis & Research
Prioritized Actions
Monitoring Status and Actions
Plan Review & Update
Coordination with Agencies
Public Participation

17. Oregon Conservation Opportunity Areas
So what can we do with these maps?
What does this have to do with transportation?
Here’s what they DON’T do:
don’t guarantee protection for these lands
Don’t threaten private property rights
What we CAN do:
Prioritize conservation dollars
Steer development away from these areas
Use them to inform transportation planning
Avoid these areas (steer clear)
Minimize damage to these areas
Find suitable mitigation
Source: Oregon’s Living Landscape, Defenders of Wildlife, 1998

18. Oregon’s Conservation Opportunity Areas

19. Oregon’s Roads and Cities
This is a map of Oregon’s major roads and cities.

20. Conservation Opportunity Areas with roads and cities
This is the same map of Oregon’s roads and cities to which we have added conservation opportunities areas (Oregon Biodiversity Project).

21. Oregon’s State Transportation Improvement Plan
To make the road projects more visible, we have changed their color to red. So, if the roads themselves are blue, then all the red on this map are future road projects.

22. STIP Project # 03551

24. Use conservation banking to mitigate those impacts that cannot be avoided, and when consolidating mitigation is ecologically preferable to onsite mitigation.
Revolving fund
Use existing plans
Strategic sites
Conservation Banking

25. CASE STUDIES
NCDOT’S RED COCKADED WOODPECKER HABITAT BANK
Old growth pine forests of the southeast are home to hundreds of species, specialized to this unique ecosystem. RCWs nest for several generations in the same place and support other species, such as chickadees, raccoons and flying squirrels.
RCW habitat has been decimated by timber and paper-pulp, clearcuts. Pru Timber owned 9732 acres, slated for commercial logging. USFWS recommended NCDOT purchase - $16.3 million. The Conservation Fund, non-profit, manages the site as a conservation bank. Credits may be used only when a state highway project has an unavoidable impact on the woodpecker and NCDOT can demonstrate that there are NO alternatives for avoiding or minimizing the impact.
COLORADO’S SHORTGRASS PRAIRIE INITIATIVE
At 683 million acres, grasslands and shrublands comprise the largest ecosystem type in the U.S., and the most mistreated. One-third of rangelands have been converted since European settlement; 11 million acres between 1982 and 1997 alone. Led to a decline in grassland birds, prairie dogs, burrowing owls and swift fox.
CODOT, USFWS, CODivofWildlife and TNC looked at 20 year state plan, anticipated future impacts, mitigate in advance. Partners signed a memorandum of agreement. TNC and other “bankers” will acquire targeted lands, easements. In order to receive mitigation credits, project partners must develop management plans that will benefit the species that are included in the planning efforts.
In recent years, conservation banks have been used more widely outside of California as well. Among recent conservation "bankers" are private ranchers in Texas and Arizona whose ranchland provides habitat for rare cacti and songbirds, state highway departments in Colorado and North Carolina that anticipate future road projects that will require endangered species mitigation, a forest products company that is restoring endangered red-cockaded woodpeckers to some of its land, and a municipal sewer and water commission in Alabama that is managing habitat for the threatened gopher tortoise on buffer land around a drinking water reservoir. Even the government of the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a U.S. Commonwealth Territory, has established a conservation bank for the endangered nightingale reed-warbler.

26. Interagency Coordination
Coordinate with resource agencies early, substantively and continuously throughout transportation planning and project development.
Consult
Trust
Support

27. TRANSPORTATION SPENDING

28. FWS transportation-related workload increase between 1998 and 2000
77%
FWS transportation-related workload increase between 1998 and 2000

29. 1%
FWS budget increase

30. Build wildlife crossings where necessary to repair ecological damage and restore habitat connectivity.
Research
Retrofit
Monitoring
Wildlife Crossings

34. Public Lands No new roads Alternatives Signage/speed limits
Maintain roads on public lands in a manner consistent with the management of surrounding natural resources, including wildlife, both terrestrial and aquatic.
No new roads
Alternatives
Signage/speed limits
Keep scenic roads scenic
Public Lands

35. Native VEGETATION
Use only native species in roadside vegetation management.
Inventories
Training
Rewards

36. Executive Order called for the prevention of the introduction of invasive species and provide for their control and to minimize the economic and ecological impacts of invasive species. State DOTs should move toward the exclusive use of native species in roadside vegetation management.
(LEFT) Here is the "traditional" wildflower mix that is filled with nonnative garden flowers, but marketed as wildflowers....on a roadside in Maryland. These were unwittingly planted by some DOTs and the public began to expect splashy, colorful "wildflowers". But neither the legislation that requires the planting of native wildflowers nor Mrs. Johnson ever had this result in mind. I have spent the last 9 years trying to undo this image in the public's mind.
(RIGHT) We are trying to move the public expectation to something more realistic like the attached. This is possible the first year with native grasses and wildflowers that are matched to the regional biodiversity. Mrs. Johnson wants each region to have its own identity. That just happens to coincide with an ecological approach...no more garden plantings!!! We are strengthening the legislation this fall to support natives, not garden plants.
Source: Personal communication with Bonnie Harper-Lore, FHWA
Native Vegetation

38. History of Transportation Policy in the U.S.

39. By the Numbers TEA3 = $247 – $375 billion INTERSTATE 1957-1969
12 years
$25 billion
ISTEA
7 years
$150 billion
TEA-21
6 years
$218 billion
Just to give you a fast overview of the history of transportation policy in the US:
Interstate system
ISTEA – revolutionary, new way of thinking about roads and highways
TEA-21 – continued the revolution
TEA3 = $247 – $375 billion

40. What? Six year authorization Finance Safety Environment Planning
Research
Highway Programs
Public Transportation

41. Calls for consultation with resource agencies and coordination with land use and conservation plans
Encourages conservation banking
Makes wildlife crossings eligible for safety funding
Funds alternative transportation on public lands.
Provides for removal of invasives and restoration of native vegetation on roadsides.
What about Wildlife?

42. What now? TEA-21 expired September 30, 2003. Extensions Funding level
Elections

43. Questions? Trisha White Habitat & Highways Campaign 202.772.0236