Contest Picks Wildlife Crossing Design
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Photo courtesy of Flickr.
The nonprofit ARC announced a winner yesterday for it's competition to design a wildlife crossing over I-70, near Vail and Breckenridge ski resorts, The New York Times reports.
The area marks a convergence of highway traffic with a wildlife corridor, where animals are often killed and cars damaged in collisions. Black bears, cougars, bobcats, elk, deer, and the threatened Canada lynx are among the victims.
Michael Van Valkenburgh & Associates, a landscape architecture company based in New York City and Cambridge, Massachusetts, won a $40,000 prize with their design, proposing a wide bridge made of lightweight precast concrete panels that snap together. The bridge would be covered with foliage to resemble forest, with shrubs and meadows mimicking the animals' natural environment. Fences on either side of the highway would funnel the animals to the bridge.
Colorado state officials have not committed to building the wildlife overpass, but plan to review ideas from contest entries to address the current problem.
–Nick Davidson
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