Almost every day when Blair Painter drives the scenic Rocky Mountain highway near his home, the gray asphalt is stained red somewhere along the way.

And Painter, the mayor of Crowsnest Pass, says it’s hard to find a driver who hasn’t had at least one close contact with wildlife in the region’s busy transportation corridors.

But he hopes Alberta’s growing network of wildlife overpasses and underpasses will make the city safer for everyone.

The Crowsnest Pass, connecting Alberta to British Columbia via Highway 3, is the latest area in a growing provincial network of fences, underpasses and overpasses funneling wildlife through their natural habitat, but at sheltered from the constant flow of trucks and cars. .

“It’s something we should have considered years ago. I think they’re invaluable,” Painter said in an interview.

Work on the underpass to the east of the community is well underway.

This is critical, Painter said.

“I think (Crow’s Nest Pass) is one of the highest animal collision zones in the province. I was at an out-of-town meeting recently and almost had one there,” Painter said in an interview.

“At night, especially, they come out. There are a lot of them. There are red spots on the road every day when you cross, so it’s a very common phenomenon.”

Five years ago, the Alberta government announced $20 million for the Crowsnest underpass and a new overpass, outside Banff National Park, east of Canmore.

This viaduct is almost complete and workers are putting the finishing touches along the busy Trans-Canada Highway.

The section of TransCanada inside Banff National Park is bordered on either side by 2.4 meter high reinforced metal fences. There are six wildlife overpasses and 38 underpasses to protect humans and animals.

The Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative, a longtime animal protection advocate, said the new overpass has been used by deer and elk since last fall, keeping about 30,000 of them away. cars and trucks that circulate there daily in summer.

“As early as last fall, when the fence was completed, surveillance cameras installed by Alberta showed wildlife using this crossing, even before it was completed,” said Tim Johnson, landscape connectivity specialist for Y2Y.

Johnson said the area has seen numerous vehicle collisions involving deer and elk, with catastrophic consequences on both sides of the windshield.

“With larger animals, deer, elk, moose, you often kick their legs under them and then they head for the windshield or the roof of the car and that doesn’t end well for people and for wildlife,” he said.

Johnson said Banff National Park is known around the world for taking the lead in finding ways to make roads safer for people and wildlife since building its first underpass in the 1990s. At that time there were around 120 collisions per year.

“If you look at the collision toll, collisions with deer and elk are down 96 percent. On average across all species, that number is about 80 percent in the national park,” he said. he declared.

Near Canmore, work on about 10 kilometers of wildlife fencing, from the eastern entrance to Banff National Park to the Bow River Bridge, is expected to begin next year.

Canmore Mayor Sean Krausert said it’s welcome infrastructure given it’s common to see herds of elk crossing the road, but he also said he wants to make sure that this does not harm the ability of wildlife to make their way through the Bow Valley.

“We also need to ensure that wildlife connectivity remains intact so that they can move through the valley as freely as possible,” he said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published November 3, 2024.