http://www.rssboard.org/rss-specification 720 https://escholarship.org/uc/ucd_environment_terc/rss Recent eScholarship items from Tahoe Research Group/Tahoe Environmental Research Center Publications Wed, 24 Jun 2026 21:05:50 +0000 https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9783s2tf <p>I examined the effects of road mortality on a population of western painted turtles (Chrysemys picta belli) in west-central Montana; these turtles make up the majority of road mortalities in a section of highway that bisects the Ninepipes National Wildlife Refuge. The objective of my barrier fencing experiment was to determine whether turtles were able to breach fencing designed to direct turtles towards crossing structures and thereby keep them off the road. I constructed 45.7-cm-high turtle enclosures out of 2- by 5-cm fencing with and without 10- or 15-cm-high flashing attached at the top. Turtles were placed in the enclosures, and behavior was observed for one hour. Of 124 turtles, only four (3.2%) were able to climb to the flashing. No turtles climbed over the flashing within the time allowed. In enclosures without flashing, two (3.8%) were able to breach the fencing. The results of this experiment will help in the design of appropriate barriers to keep turtles off the... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9783s2tf Tue, 13 Mar 2007 00:00:00 +0000 Griffin, Kathleen https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9jt8q85x <p>Context sensitive solutions (CSS) is a collaborative, interdisciplinary approach to a transportation project, which involves all stakeholders, early and continually, to develop a transportation facility that equally addresses safety, mobility, and the preservation of scenic, aesthetic, historic, and environmental resources and community values. Federal Lands Highway (FLH) designs and constructs highway projects within our nation’s most environmentally and culturally sensitive areas:nationalparks, national forests, national wildlife refuges, and other important Federal public lands. This long-standing mission of working in extremely sensitive areas requires the use of CSS, and, therefore, FLH is recognized as being an expert in the use of CSS. Federal Lands Highway, along with five states each representing the regions of the American Association of State Highway Transportation Officials (AASHTO), functions as a “pilot state.” In its role as a “pilot state,” FLH is charged with... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/9jt8q85x Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Tuggle, Donald https://escholarship.org/uc/item/99w4k3r2 <p>The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC), together with the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation (NYSOPRHP) and New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT), is conducting a riverine wetland restoration project at Strawberry Island. Strawberry Island is located at the divergence of the Tonawanda and Chippawa Channels of the Niagara River, near the City of Buffalo, in western New York. The majority of the funding for the project comes from New York’s 1996 Clean Water / Clean Air Bond Act, which was approved by voters and signed by Governor George E. Pataki. Additional funding was provided by NYSDOT as an in-lieu fee solution to unavoidable impacts to freshwater wetlands. The island, which was once more than 200 acres in size, has been severely impacted by sand and gravel mining as well as natural erosive forces. By 1993 the island had been reduced to less than six acres. Critical water levels, existing bottom... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/99w4k3r2 Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Spierto, Timothy J. Lazazzero, Sarah A. Nelson, Patricia L. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/96z9x1f4 <p>Wildlife movement and related road crossing strategies are becoming an increasingly important factor in the development of transportation projects in Vermont – whether these projects involve reconstruction on existing alignment or new construction. The Vermont Agency of Transportation (VTrans) and the Vermont Department of Fish and Wildlife (VDFW) have identified wildlife movement and habitat connectivity as important factors to consider in the transportation project development process from three perspectives: human safety, environmental stewardship, and fiscal responsibility. Moreover, we have begun to construct wildlife crossing structures, in collaboration with VDFW, in some recent transportation projects. Unfortunately, there is a lack of wildlife road crossing data to support the inclusion, location, design, and construction of these crossings in many parts of the state. Currently, much of the information that is used in the design and location of wildlife crossing structures... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/96z9x1f4 Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Slesar, Chris Morse, Susan C. Austin, John M. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8sh3062x <p>A primary responsibility of the New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) is to maintain a highway right of way that is safe for the traveling public. Most often, this requires removal of trees, shrubs, and other fixed objects that may stand in the way of drivers leaving the highway. For many years, the department has fulfilled this responsibility by large scale clearing and mowing of a clear zone. Roadside management practices that maintain the right of way as parkland certainly make the road safe and visually pleasing, but provide little in the way of useful habitat for wildlife. The clear zone, occupying approximately 1 percent of the state’s land area, is a landscape that has much potential for providing nesting and foraging habitat for grassland bird species. Protection of the environment being another responsibility of the department, the NYSDOT needs to advance practices that promote wildlife use of habitats along the highway, while maintaining a safe and... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8sh3062x Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Weiskotten, Kurt https://escholarship.org/uc/item/7bx541gm <p>Piles are integral components of many overwater and in-water structures, providing support for piers and bridges, functioning as fenders and dolphins to protect other structures, and are used to construct breakwaters and bulkheads. While treated-wood and concrete piles are commonly used for construction of these structures, there is a growing trend toward the use of hollow steel piles. In the Pacific Northwest, several recently-reported fish-kills that occurred during the installation of piles have raised concern among Federal and state agencies charged with protecting aquatic resources. Federal concern centers primarily on implementation of Section 7 of the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and the Essential Fish Habitat (EFH) provisions of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act. Injuries to fishes inflicted by pile driving are poorly studied, but include rupture of the swim bladder and internal hemorrhaging. The mechanism of injury appears to be the intense... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/7bx541gm Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Stadler, John H. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/764725mt <p>Intensity of human use (IHU) is a conceptual geographic characteristic that describes an area’s rank on the continuum from high use (e.g., urban area or active strip mine) to low use (roadless wilderness). Customary measures of IHU, such as human population density or road density, lose their utility at the low-use end of the spectrum — and it is here that human activities may have their greatest ecological effect on some ecological resources, such as wildlife habitat. Conceptually, we suggest that IHU is determined by four factors: IHU=P*D*A/C, where A is human accessibility, P is the population of potential visitors, D is attraction to a destination, and C is the dilution effect of alternate destinations. In our vehicle-centric culture, roads are essential determinants of human accessibility. Each time a road is built or opened, some area surrounding the opened road becomes more accessible, and each time a road is closed or reclaimed some area becomes less accessible.... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/764725mt Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Watts, Raymond D. Compton, Roger W. McCammon, John H. Ouren, Douglas S. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/74h8g57x <p>The Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT), the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) have recently completed a programmatic consultation under section 7 consultation of the Endangered Species Act (ESA). The consultation addresses all currently known transportation projects anticipated to affect Preble’s meadow jumping mouse (Zapus hudsonius preblei) in the Monument Creek watershed, El Paso County, Colorado. It establishes a mitigation process largely divorced from individual projects. Instead of compensating for impacts to habitat with conventional mitigation methods of replacing, restoring or creating habitat based on ratios, programmatic conservation commitments focus on promoting recovery of a listed species. Also, by establishing protocols for developing subsequent projects and site-specific biological assessments, the programmatic process provides a framework for developing highway projects along predictable schedules.</p> https://escholarship.org/uc/item/74h8g57x Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Wostl, Roland https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6c83t5ws <p>The Maine Interagency work group on collisions between wildlife and motor vehicles actively tracks the recorded occurrences of crashes of animals with vehicles. As part of its ongoing program of public education, the group first used the maps in 1999. The data are gained from crash reports filed by law enforcement personnel. The Maine Department of Transportation’s traffic statistic’s section analyses the information. The effort is then developed into map graphics by the department’s cartographic unit. Associated crash data and driving tips are also included on the maps. These are circulated to other state agencies, towns, schools and tourism facilities throughout the state and have received a variety of positive responses. Information on crash locations as mapped is utilized by the work group to determine chronic crash locales and for potential sites to install mitigation methodologies.</p> https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6c83t5ws Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Van-Riper, Robert https://escholarship.org/uc/item/5cb8m05r <p>The 1999 listing of Puget Sound (PS) chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) in Washington State was the first time a listing of a threatened or endangered species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973, as amended, affected a metropolitan area. Since that time, transportation officials, as well as other entities, have had to retool their processes for environmental permit acquisition because of the addition level of review requirements specified under ESA. The initial short-term solution for both action and regulatory agencies was to hire more staff. However, despite the additional staff at Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) and National Marine Fisheries Service (NOAA Fisheries), project review for ESA consultations under Section 7 remains a very complicated, and thus prolonged process. Therefore, in 1999, WSDOT submitted a programmatic biological assessment (PBA) for a full programmatic consultation with NOAA Fisheries. The objective of the PBA... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/5cb8m05r Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Wood, Barbara https://escholarship.org/uc/item/4dd8c6tw <p>Bluebird boxes were attached to the back of small road signs and are maintained by the maintenance sign crew with minimal time away from their primary duties. Because locations were chosen where bluebirds had already been seen, success has been 100% since the project started in 2001. In 2002, 120 bluebirds were fledged and approximately 120 tree swallows as well. So far in 2003 there have been 30 pair of nesting bluebirds. We have had more problems this year with English sparrows killing bluebird chicks. Last year two boxes suffered from raccoon predation but that has not been repeated since the sign poles were greased. Costs were for materials only, boxes were built by the winter night crews when they were not plowing.</p> https://escholarship.org/uc/item/4dd8c6tw Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Kahn, Amy Wicks, Jim Wicks https://escholarship.org/uc/item/49p7v4h3 <p>Funding source: Florida Department of Transportation Total Budget: $407,000 Project Period: April 2001 – April 2004 The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) has documented an increase in the number of transportation-related bear deaths (roadkill) since the late 1970’s. In addition to impacts on bear populations, vehicle collisions with bears often are traumatic for the people involved and may cause significant collateral damage and personal injury. For these reasons, and because of the lack of definitive information on the subject, the FWC partnered with the Florida Department of Transportation to design a project that would quantify the impacts of roadkill on bear populations in Florida. Our study design incorporates two main features: population size enumeration and range delineation for bears in six core areas across Florida. As genetic analyses have improved and laboratory costs decreased, DNA techniques have been used for a wide variety of studies on... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/49p7v4h3 Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Simek, Stephanie L. Eason, Thomas https://escholarship.org/uc/item/34k8982t <p>In many fragmented agricultural regions of south-eastern Australia, roadside vegetation provides important refuges for threatened native fauna and isolated populations of plant species. However, as roads are transport corridors for humans and their vehicles, species survival is affected through destruction and modification of remaining habitat by human activity. The effects of soil disturbance from roadworks on the structural dynamics and spatial patterning of roadside Acacia populations was investigated in the Lockhart Shire study area, NSW, Australia. Classification and ordination of size structures of Acacia pycnantha, A. montana and A. decora showed distinct groups of colonising, stable and senescent populations. Soil disturbance from previous roadworks was recorded in 88 percent of populations, and there was a significant relationship between major recruitment pulses and roadworks events in Acacia populations. Spatial pattern analysis using the Network K-function showed... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/34k8982t Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Spooner, Peter https://escholarship.org/uc/item/2rv5s902 <p>Over the past decade, western Washington has experienced rapid growth in population and development. Recently, the listing of a variety of salmonid fish species under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) has heightened the need to integrate the needs of listed species and people, as continued growth is predicted for the area. Currently, transportation infrastructure projects are reviewed for compliance with the ESA and National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) on a project-by-project basis. Considering the complexity and speed of which urbanization is occurring in western Washington, this approach presents multiple problems, including: missed opportunities for minimizing impacts, inadequately analyzed indirect and cumulative effects/impacts, significant permitting delays, and uncoordinated review and conservation. The traditional project review/permit acquisition processes is not well suited for dealing with ESA-listed species in quickly urbanizing environments. Without an adequate... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/2rv5s902 Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Teachout, Emily Quan, Jennifer Avery, Jon https://escholarship.org/uc/item/14t5v5g8 <p>Wildland road removal is a common practice across the U.S. and in some parts of Canada. The main types of road removal include ripping, stream crossing restoration, and full recontour. Road removal creates a short-term disturbance that may temporarily increase sediment loss. However, research and long-term monitoring have shown that road removal both reduces erosion rates and the risk of road-induced landslides. Research is needed to determine whether road removal is effective at restoring ecosystem processes and wildlife habitat. We propose several research questions and the types of studies needed to further road removal efforts. With greater understanding of the impacts of road removal, land managers can more effectively prioritize which roads to leave open and which roads to consider for future road removal projects.</p> https://escholarship.org/uc/item/14t5v5g8 Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Switalski, T. Adam Bissonette, John A. DeLuca, Tom H. Luce, Charles H. Madej, Mary Ann https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0qh342hr <p>In 1999, The New York City Transit’s (NYCT) Department of Capital Program Management achieved ISO14001 certification- Environmental Management Systems. Today, sustainable design is an integral part of all design, construction, procurement and operations and maintenance activities. This paper outlines NYC Transit’s adoption of sustainable business practices which exposed significant opportunities to reduce the impact to ecologies. These practices encompass high-performance building designs, renewable energy applications, conservation of energy, water and natural resources, waste reduction, recycling and reuse, environmentally responsible procurement and total life cycle analysis. A cause-and-effect benefit is then demonstrated for many of these sustainable practices encompassing both local and geographically distant ecologies. Some examples include the inadvertent procurement of Azobe (an unsustainably over-harvested tropical hardwood from Africa) used as rail ties in the design... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0qh342hr Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Singh, Ajay Ramdahin, Dennis Topielski, Bogdan Raman, Ramesh Raman https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0hb2c17z <p>The Florida Department of Transportation has developed a completely new process for how the State of Florida plans transportation projects and accomplishes environmental review and consideration of sociocultural effects. The new process for transportation decision making was developed by FDOT working in conjunction with federal and state agencies to develop an entirely new process that efficiently meets statutory requirements and delivers projects which respect and protect Florida’s resources. The new process is called “Efficient Transportation Decision Making” or the ETDM Process. The objectives of the multi-agency working group that developed this process were outlined by Congress in Section 1309 of the Transportation Equity Act for the 21st Century (TEA-21): • Provide early and continuous involvement of agencies and the public in the review process. • Integrate environmental review and permitting processes. • Establish coordinated time schedules for agency action. • Establish... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0hb2c17z Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Turton, Thomas https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0g6621z3 <p>Congress is in the process of reauthorizing TEA-21, the six-year, $300 billion transportation bill, providing an excellent opportunity to integrate many of the ideals brought forth in ICOET into transportation policy. With appropriate federal guidance, such best practices in the areas of wildlife, fisheries, wetlands, water quality, and overall ecosystems management could become the standard. Likewise, without support within the new bill, many states and practitioners will find it more difficult to continue making positive strides in stewardship and resource protection. Reauthorization issues that promise to be of interest to ICOET participants include: 1. Environmental streamlining 2. Transportation enhancements 3. Impact mitigation 4. Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ) 5. Continuation of University Transportation Centers (UTC) 6. Cooperative Environmental Research Program (CERP) 7. Habitat connectivity across transportation corridors (aquatic and terrestrial) 8.... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0g6621z3 Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 White, Patricia A. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0dw501wf <p>The New York State Department of Transportation operates and maintains approximately 16,500 miles of highway that occupies approximately 1 percent of the state’s land area. Due to the tendency of the highway system to follow streams, coastlines and other natural landscape features, this 1% of land is located within, over and adjacent to many very sensitive and important environmental areas. Considering that NYSDOT, like most transportation departments, is now shifting its efforts more and more towards improving, operating and maintaining the existing transportation infrastructure, as opposed to building large-scale new alignment projects, the role of incorporating environmental improvements into maintenance and operational programs is increasing in importance. The project objective was to Proactively reach out to internal and external partners to identify priorities anddevelop multi-agency strategies and projects that improve environmental conditions along NYSDOT’s rights-of-way... https://escholarship.org/uc/item/0dw501wf Wed, 6 Dec 2006 00:00:00 +0000 Williams, Kyle