State transportation officials are experimenting with an electronic “intrusion-detection” system along a stretch of U.S. 160 near Durango to warn motorists that deer and elk might be crossing the highway.
The $1 million project includes running a buried cable on each side of a 1-mile stretch of the highway between Durango and Bayfield that is a busy migration corridor, said the Colorado Department of Transportation.
The cable, buried 1 foot deep about 30 feet from each side of the highway, generates an electromagnetic field that can detect the presence of large animals along the road right of way, said CDOT spokeswoman Nancy Shanks.
Sensors, in turn, trigger a “Wildlife Detected” message on electronic warning signs along the roadway.
The test project is aimed at getting motorists to slow down when wildlife is near to help avoid collisions, she said.
For a 10-year period ending in 2003, there were about 25,000 animal-vehicle collisions on Colorado’s roads, resulting in the deaths of 23 people, 8,400 deer, 1,612 elk and 16 mountain lions, according to CDOT statistics.
Officials use other techniques to prevent these collisions, including high fences, special underpasses constructed to allow for animal migration, and earthen ramps that give animals that somehow get trapped on the highway side of a fence a one-way leap back to the safer side
Fences, underpasses and ramps aim to control animal behavior, Shanks said, while CDOT wants the underground animal-detection cable to force changes in human behavior.
“If it is not reducing speed, then this may not be working,” Shanks said of the system, which will be tested for several years to collect enough data.
To gauge drivers’ reaction to the wildlife warnings, CDOT is installing radar detectors to record motorists’ “base speed and reaction speed” inside and outside the test zone, the agency said. The radar devices will not include cameras that could assist in speed enforcement, Shanks said.
CDOT uses still more techniques to reduce animal-vehicle collisions on state highways, including brush clearing along the right of way to give motorists more warning that animals are nearby, as well as lights along the roadway that illuminate when sensors detect the presence of large animals.
The agency also has used “deer guards” — resembling cattle guards, only bigger — at highway entrance and exit roads.
Jeffrey Leib: 303-954-1645 or jleib@denverpost.com
