CELPIP Reading Part 3 Practice Test: Banff Highway Wildlife Crossings

Paragraph A

Every year, millions of vehicles travel the section of the Trans-Canada Highway that passes through Banff National Park, Canada’s oldest national park. For the elk, bears, wolves, and other animals of the Bow Valley, this busy road was once a serious hazard. As traffic grew in the 1970s and 1980s, so did the number of animals killed by cars and trucks, and collisions with large animals such as elk put drivers at risk as well. When Parks Canada began widening the highway from two lanes to four, it decided to tackle the problem directly. The result is one of the most extensive networks of wildlife crossings in the world: six overpasses and 38 underpasses spread along roughly 80 kilometres of highway.

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The crossings come in a range of designs because no single structure suits every species. The overpasses, the first of which opened in 1997, are bridges about 50 metres wide, covered with soil and planted with native grasses, shrubs, and young trees so that, to an animal, they look like a continuation of the forest. Earth banks along their edges block the noise and headlights of the traffic below. The underpasses range from large open-span bridges to narrow metal culverts. None of these structures would work without fencing, however. A wire fence about 2.4 metres high runs along both sides of the highway, keeping animals off the pavement and guiding them toward the nearest crossing.

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Since the first structures opened, researchers have kept a close watch on how animals use them. With motion-triggered cameras, beds of raked sand that record footprints, and strands of barbed wire that snag a few hairs for DNA testing, they have documented hundreds of thousands of crossings. The data reveal clear preferences. Grizzly bears, wolves, and elk favour the wide, open overpasses, while cougars and black bears are more comfortable in narrower underpasses with cover nearby. Some animals also needed time to adjust: grizzlies took about five years to use the structures regularly, and scientists believe mothers then passed the habit on to their cubs. The hair samples revealed an even more important benefit. Bears from opposite sides of the highway are now breeding with one another, which keeps the population genetically healthy.

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Together, the crossings and fencing have cut collisions between vehicles and large animals by more than 80 percent, a result that benefits motorists as much as wildlife. Not everyone was convinced at first. Each overpass cost several million dollars, and some critics argued that the money would be better spent elsewhere in the park. Supporters respond that the savings in vehicle repairs, medical bills, and lost wildlife add up quickly. Today, the Banff crossings are studied by transportation engineers and conservation groups from around the globe, and similar projects in British Columbia, Alberta, and the western United States have drawn directly on lessons learned in the Bow Valley.