, Ph.D.
Chair, Endangered Species and Wildlife Committee, Angeles Chapter
Member, National Sierra Club Wildlife and Endangered Species Committee (WESComm)
President, The Canada Goose Project

Photo courtesy Darrell Longmore Build it and they will come! Exit from Banff on to Highway 1 (east to Calgary or west to Lake Louise (58KM) - notice the elk and other animals crossing at their own walkway. After the highway was built there were far too many accidents but it didn't take the animals long to learn that this was their 'road.'

As the Chair of the Endangered Species and Wildlife Committee, Dr. Rosemarie White is in the habit of speaking out on behalf of those who cannot speak for themselves. What she's advocating for these days is a wildlife corridor.

That monstrous freeway I-405 is about to get even bigger, and many, including Dr. White, are arguing that expanding the highway should include a corridor for the safe passage of wild animals traveling from one side of the road to the other. While there is a plan in place for a Wildlife Passageway at the Skirball Overpass, controversy is brewing because there is no plan for extending the passageway to include the western side of I-405. Wildlife can travel in safety as far as Sepulveda Boulevard, but then they are left to cross that busy street - and it's not only at their own peril, as Dr. White has pointed out. Without the extension of the Skirball Overpass Extension, the animals crossing Sepulveda Boulevard also pose a serious threat to the drivers on that street.

As the divisiveness of this issue intensifies, it's been getting increased exposure in the media and the public forum. The week of October 8 alone, Dr. White spoke at an L.A. City Council meeting, the radio station KABC interviewed her, and on October 10, the L.A. Times quoted her saying that failure to extend the corridor to include Sepulveda Boulevard would be like 'signing a death warrant.'

Those not in favor of the wildlife corridor object to it on principally fiscal grounds. If traffic is this horrible and funds to ameliorate it are so limited, goes the argument, then why spend money on improving the lot of wildlife? Opponents of the proposal claim there's no guarantee that if we build the corridor that the wildlife will come. But the elk pictured above did!

On June 26, 2007, the Sierra Club Executive Committee of the Angeles Chapter passed an Environmental Resolution, titled I-405 Wildlife Corridor Resolution.

'The Sierra Club strongly urges the City of Los Angeles to work collaboratively with CALTRANS, the SIERRA CLUB, and other environmental groups to find solutions for the protection of wildlife attempting to cross the I-405 Freeway and Sepulveda Boulevard, to include a separate vegetated bridge and vegetation on any new/reconstructed overpass. We also urge CALTRANS and City DOT to employ ecologists to be involved with the determination of native vegetation appropriate to the immediate region.'

We wish to point out that the proposed 'wildlife corridor' is not a necessary detail of the redesigned Skirball Overpass Bridge. Rather, it is an opportuntiy given by virtue of the redesign, to establish a 'safe passage' for the extensive wildlife seen and documented for years in the Santa Monica Mountains National Park Areas. This opportunity is golden, for it means that Los Angeles will take her place beside the other great cities of the United States as an environmental beacon, clearly stating by example that our communities value native wildlands and habitat. It sends a message to all that our citizens will lead in the challenged to protect and save our natural world, which is now under threat.

This proposed addition to the Skirball Overpass is not some romanticized idea of saving a few fuzzy bunnies. The Sierra Club is not in the business of taking a stand on issues, backing our point of view with scientific realities, and spending precious time, dollars, and legal fees because of some overly sensitive 'do-gooders.' The fact is the natural world - plants, animals, open spaces where human healing takes place - is disappearing. We who are looked to as leaders need to pay attention, and begin the task, sometimes inconvenient, of saving our natural world.

This Overpass needs to be redesigned, and designed properly. There are experts known to CALTRANS, who have designed the extensive series of overpasses and undercrossings in Alberta, Canada. There are experts in the Humane Society of the United States who have worked with European engineers on just these situations. Furthermore, the City of Los Angeles (DOT) needs to collaborate with CALTRANS to extend a much more modest addition to the Overpass which will take the migrating animals across Sepulveda Boulevard, either over or under.

The direct quote from city and state officials, that 'the animals are used to crossing Sepulveda anyway, so they can continue to get across that way' indicates that the real problem is not being addressed. The Sierra Club and other envirnonmental organizations want to save the animals, not provide an easier way to kill them.

To this end, we appreciate the opportunity to communicate our point of view; a letter is not time enough to give the facts, and cite scientific data. We would like to stand as partners, not adversaries. We would like to help solve the situation with a realistsic view of what the true problem is: to save what is left of a struggling wildlife population, for the benefit of all.

Take Action!

Send letters to both CALTrans and the L.A. Department of Transportation.

• Contact Deputy District Director Ron Kosinski, CALTrans Division of Environmental Planning, 100 South Main Street, MS-16A, Los Angeles, CA 90012.
• You may also write to Ken Husting, P.E., Senior Transportation Engineer, Department of Transportation, 100 South Main Street, Los Angeles, CA 90012.

Urge them to help give Southern California's wildlife a chance!