§172 Wildlife-vehicle Collision Reduction and Habitat Connectivity Improvement

Summary

The Secretary must study how people and agencies try to cut down accidents between cars and wild animals and how roads affect animal homes and movement. The study must update the 2008 reports and best-practices manual. It must look at what causes wildlife-vehicle collisions, how those crashes hurt people and animals, how roads and traffic block movement for land and water species, and what solutions work best. To do this, the Secretary must review research and data, survey current Department of Transportation and State DOT practices, and talk with experts. The Secretary must send Congress a report on the study within 18 months after the Surface Transportation Reauthorization Act of 2021 is passed. That report must describe causes and impacts (including effects on endangered species, state-priority species, species in state plans, and medium and small species), give an economic look at costs and benefits of fixes (including effects on jobs, property values, and local economies), offer prevention recommendations and best practices, and give guidance for voluntary joint statewide plans to address collisions and improve connectivity if States and Tribes want to join. Based on the study, the Secretary must make in-person and online training courses within 3 years after the Act is passed. The courses must teach how to reduce crashes and improve habitat connections, be offered to transportation and wildlife professionals, and be updated at least every 2 years. The Secretary, through the Federal Highway Administration, must also create a reliable, standard way to collect and report location-accurate wildlife collision and carcass data for the National Highway System, checking existing systems and fixing limits, and consulting federal, State, Tribal, local, and other stakeholders. A report describing that method must go to Congress no later than the later of 18 months after the Act or 180 days after the method is finished. Four years after the Act, the Secretary must report on how states are using the system, whether it helped cut collisions or improve connectivity, how much it helped, and any further study recommendations. Finally, the Secretary must give voluntary guidance to States on when a highway should be checked for possible mitigation, using criteria such as human-safety collision counts, road-related wildlife deaths (including listed and state-priority species and medium/small species), and the road’s barrier effect on movement.