{"id":494,"date":"2026-06-04T23:02:52","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T23:02:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sanfranciscomovingguide.com\/?p=494"},"modified":"2026-06-04T23:02:52","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T23:02:52","slug":"multimillion-dollar-wildlife-bridge-in-norcal-gets-first-travelers-before-it-opens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sanfranciscomovingguide.com\/?p=494","title":{"rendered":"Multimillion-dollar wildlife bridge in NorCal gets first travelers before it opens"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Why did three mule deer just cross Route 97 in Siskiyou County? The answer: California has built a new $20 million overpass dedicated for wildlife.\u00a0<\/p>

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The deer,\u00a0caught on a trail camera in late May, are the first confirmed animals to travel the wildlife overcrossing, which Caltrans is slated to complete by the fall. A bobcat may have padded across the unfinished project in January, but the footage of the passage wasn\u2019t definitive.<\/p><\/div>

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The California Department of Transportation and a big group of partners designed the wildlife bridge, which is approximately 100 feet long by 140 feet wide, to address the high rate of cars killing deer and elk on the two-lane highway.<\/p><\/div>

\u201cThe primary problem on the highway was the mortality,\u201d Fraser Shilling, who participated in the project as the director of the\u00a0UC Davis Road Ecology Center, told SFGATE. \u201cThere\u2019s truck traffic that goes through there, and they don\u2019t slow down. They hit whatever\u2019s on the road, so a lot of deer and elk were getting killed.\u201d<\/p><\/div>

Route 97, which begins near Weed \u2014 about 20 miles south of the project area \u2014 and stretches all the way through Oregon and Washington into Canada, bisects migration corridors for elk and mule deer, according to Caltrans.\u00a0<\/p><\/div>

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Vehicles killed over 50 deer and 16 elk in the area between 2015 and 2020, Caltrans reports. Prior to that, former state game warden Rennie Cleland kept meticulous records of the animals hit in the region. That data helped to inspire and inform the construction of the new overcrossing, according to Wesley Stroud, an environmental program manager for Caltrans who worked on the project.\u00a0<\/p><\/div>

The initiative also\u00a0includes about 3 miles of 8-foot-high wildlife fencing along the highway and an additional concrete box culvert under the road that acts as an alternative way for wildlife to cross.<\/p><\/div>

\u201cIt\u2019s nice to see all the hard work that everybody\u2019s put into this paying off, and that\u2019s what those deer showed me,\u201d\u00a0Stroud told SFGATE. \u201cYou build these things in the right location where the animals want to be, and you\u2019re going to get usage.\u201d<\/p>

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The combination of the fencing and the crossings is expected to safeguard not only deer but the rest of the area\u2019s abundant wildlife, including mountain lions, black bears, Rocky Mountain elk and a local pack of gray wolves.<\/p><\/div>

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