Wildlife Vehicle Collision Reduction Study

1. Wildlife Vehicle Collision Reduction Study

2. Why this Study

5. Goals of the Study

6. What We found Out

7. Annual WVCs Estimated by Insurance Industry (Data Source: State Farm Insurance)

8. Total WVCs and Total Crashes By Year Annual WVCs Estimated by Insurance Industry (Data Source: GES)

9. Monthly Distribution of WVCs 0.25 FARS HSIS GES 0.2 0.15 Proportion of Collisions 0.1 0.05 0 JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JUL AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC (Data Source: FARS, HSIS, GES)

10. 0.12 Time-of-Day Distribution FARS GES HSIS 0.1 0.08 Proportion of Collisions 0.06 0.04 0.02 0 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 Hour of Day (Data Source: FARS, GES, HSIS)

11. WVCs by Number of Lanes 100% WVC ALL 80% 60% Percent of Accidents 40% 20% 0% 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Number of Lanes (Data Source: GES).

12. WVC ALL Crashes by Average Daily Traffic 0.7 0.6 0.5 0.4 Proportion of Collisions 0.3 0.2 0.1 0 1 to 5001- 10,001- 15,001- 20,001- 25,001- 30,001- >35,000 5000 10,000 15,000 20,000 25,000 30,000 35,000 (Data Source: HSIS) ADT

13. Age Distribution for All Crashes and WVCs 0.05 0.04 All WVC 0.03 Proportion of Collisions 0.02 0.01 0 1 11 21 31 41 51 61 71 81 91 Driver Age (Data Source: HSIS).

14. Severity of Injury Distribution for WVCs vs. All Crashes All Collisions WVCs Only 0.5% 0.5% 1.7% 4.3% 0.04% 2.3% 9.4% None None Possible Possible 17.6% Minor Minor Severe Severe Fatal Fatal 68.3% 95.4% (Data Source: GES).

15. DESCRIPTION DEER ELK MOOSE Vehicle repair costs per collision $1,840 $3,000 $4,000 Human injuries per collision $2,500 $5,000 $10,000 Human fatalities per collision $1,500 $6,000 $12,000 Towing, accident attendance and investigation $125 $375 $500 Monetary value animal per collision $2,000 $3,000 $2,000 Carcass removal and disposal per collision $50 $100 $100 TOTAL $8,015 $17,475 $28,600 Estimated Costs of WVC (Deer, Elk, and Moose)

16. Solutions or Best Practices for Reducing WVCs

17. Wildlife Crossing with Fencing 87% average reduction in WVCs

18. Wildlife Fencing Reported reductions in WVCs - 80-99% Wildlife fencing along US Hwy. 93 on Flathead Indian Reservation, MT

19. VERMONT ARIZONA

21. IN-vehicle Warning

22. Reduce Speed by Traffic Calming, Reducing Design Speed 20 15 10 Roadkill per Mile 5 0 15 25 35 40 45 55 Posted Speed Roadkill by Posted Speed Limit in Yellowstone National Park Data Source: Gunther et al. 1998). Speed Bumps Used to Reduce WVCs in Australia

23. Identification of Ineffective Measures or Practices

24. Measures For Which Research or Construction Resources Should Not Be Used • Standard wildlife warning signs • Deer reflectors and mirrors • Audio signals in the right-of-way or deer whistles on vehicles • Olfactory repellants • Deer flagging models • Hazing • Intercept feeding • Wildlife relocation in order to reduce population size • Anti-fertility treatment in order to reduce population size • Seasonal road closures • Reflective collars placed on wildlife

25. Future Actions • Incorporation of WVC reduction into the early stages of planning and design • Develop and implement guidelines and standards for collecting and reporting WVCs • Develop and implement guidelines for the evaluation of mitigation measures • Evaluate effectiveness of mitigation measures PDA-GPS prototype road kill data collector

26. Make existing mitigation measures more effective Develop & apply population viability models to optimize location, type and dimensions of mitigation measures Establish national funding source for WVC reduction Technology transfer Future Actions Test site for 8 different roadside animal detection systems - Lewistown, MT

27. Performing Organization Western Transportation Institute Montana State University P.O. Box 174250 Bozeman, MT 59717 Under Contract to: The Louis Berger Group, Inc. 30A Vreeland Road Florham Park, NJ 07932 Sponsoring Agency: Federal Highway Administration Office of Acquisition Management 400 7th St. SW HAAM-30, Room 4410 Washington DC 20590-0001