Your article on the new road to Central City struck a
tone that might give your readers a faulty impression about the
construction of this badly needed road and the potential impact on
wildlife (HCN, 6/21/04: Mining town gambles on a road to riches).
Prior to construction of this new parkway, the Central
City Business Improvement District’s parkway consultants met
with state wildlife officials to discuss methods of mitigating
wildlife impacts during construction and after the opening of the
Central City Parkway. A number of helpful suggestions were adopted
from that meeting including:
- The
elimination of median barriers to prevent trapping animals in
traffic lanes;
- The addition of concrete jersey
barriers strategically placed alongside the road to keep large
animals, such as bighorn sheep and deer, off the roadway, and to
permit escape routes for small animals from the roadway;
- The addition of several large culverts in natural
drainages to permit passage of animals under the roadway;
- Use of plant species disliked by bighorn sheep for
revegetation of roadside slopes so as not to provide an attractive
food source for wildlife and lure them near the road.
We will continue to work with the Division of
Wildlife as we progress with completing construction and opening
the new parkway in November.
Joe
Behm
Central City, Colorado
The writer
is chairman of the Central City Business Improvement
District.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Central City road is wildlife-friendly.
Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.
