![\"Sarah](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/SarahKuta.png\")
<\/p>\nConstruction on the $20 million bridge in Siskiyou County began last year and is expected to be complete by this fall, with miles of eight-foot-high fencing along the highway to help funnel animals toward it<\/p>\n
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Sarah Kuta<\/a><\/p>\n | Daily Correspondent<\/p>\n June 11, 2026 4:40 p.m.<\/p>\n Crews are wrapping up work on a new wildlife crossing in northern California. California\u2019s first wildlife bridge isn\u2019t finished yet, but that hasn\u2019t stopped animals from using it.<\/p>\n Mule deer have been photographed wandering over an in-progress overpass in Siskiyou County, located in far northern California near the Oregon border.<\/p>\n Construction on the $20 million bridge started in July 2025 and is expected to wrap up by this fall. Nearly 100 cameras have been installed in and around the crossing and, in late May, one of them captured three mule deer using the structure.<\/p>\n The curious ungulates ambled across the overpass just 15 hours after crews wrapped up work for the day, according to the California Department of Transportation<\/a> (Caltrans).<\/p>\n \u201cWhile the contractor is still completing final touches, it\u2019s incredible to see wildlife already embracing the new structure, even with workers still in the area,\u201d the department wrote in a recent social media post. \u201cSeeing animals use the structure this quickly is an exciting sign of the positive impact this project will have for both wildlife connectivity and public safety for years to come.\u201d<\/p>\n Beyond deer, the crossing is expected to benefit other species, too, including mountain lions, black bears and gray wolves. A bobcat may have also already used the bridge in January, but officials can\u2019t confirm that crossing, per SFGate<\/a>\u2019s Anna FitzGerald Guth.<\/p>\n Three mule deer were caught on camera using the in-progess bridge in May.<\/p>\n UC Davis Road Ecology Center<\/p>\n The bridge goes over a dangerous stretch of State Route 97, a two-lane highway where more than 50 deer and 16 elk were hit and killed by vehicles between 2015 and 2020, according to data<\/a> from Caltrans and the Road Ecology Center at the University of California, Davis. One reason that section is so deadly is because it passes through an elk and mule deer migration corridor.<\/p>\n \u201cThe primary problem on the highway was the mortality,\u201d Fraser Shilling, who directs the Road Ecology Center, tells SFGate<\/a>. \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>\n Officials hope the project will help make the highway safer for both animals and motorists. The bridge itself is roughly 100 feet long by 140 feet wide, and it\u2019s being paired with a concrete box culvert under the road to give wildlife another option. Key to the project, officials are also installing some eight-foot-high fencing along the highway to help funnel animals toward the safe crossing.<\/p>\n \u201cWildlife crossings by themselves do not stop roadkill,\u201d Shilling tells the Guardian<\/a>\u2019s Roque Planas. \u201cIt\u2019s the fencing associated with them that stops roadkill.\u201d<\/p>\n In a June 2024 report<\/a>, researchers with the Road Ecology Center estimated that drivers killed more than 48,000 mule deer across California in 2023, more than double the number slayed by hunters in 2019. In 2023 alone, vehicle collisions wiped out more than 10 percent of the state\u2019s total mule deer population.<\/p>\n \u201cRoadkill is a preventable natural disaster,\u201d researchers wrote in the report.<\/p>\n In addition to the Siskiyou County bridge, numerous other wildlife crossings are in the works in California and beyond. The now-$114 million<\/a> Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing over Highway 101 in Los Angeles County is expected to open in December after delays, reports the Los Angeles Times<\/a>\u2019 Caroline Petrow-Cohen. The 210-foot-long overpass<\/a> will cross eight lanes of traffic on a busy section northwest of Los Angeles.<\/p>\n Additionally, two crossings are planned for sections of State Route 62 near Joshua Tree National Park. Three crossings are also being built on heavily trafficked sections of Interstate 15 between Los Angeles and the Nevada border, per the Los Angeles Times.<\/p>\n Quick facts: More wildlife crossings<\/p>\n
The recent surge in wildlife crossing projects reflects a broader shift toward infrastructure that\u2019s good for both people and animals.<\/p>\n \u201cThe national momentum around wildlife movement and connectivity has increased, and this issue has been pulled more into the spotlight,\u201d Rachel Wheat, the wildlife connectivity coordinator for the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife, told the Salem Statesman Journal<\/a>\u2019s Rose Shimberg last year. \u201cWe\u2019re starting to see more political [and] public support and awareness.\u201d<\/p>\n Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Construction on the $20 million bridge in Siskiyou County began last year and is expected to be complete…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357443,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8],"class_list":["post-357442","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357442"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357442\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Construction](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/overcrossing_construction_c_uc_davis_road_ecology_center.jpeg\")
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\n UC Davis Road Ecology Center<\/p>\n![\"Three](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/deer_crossing_siskiyou_sr_97_c_uc_davis_road_ecology_center.jpeg\")
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\n\tColorado recently completed a new $15 million overpass<\/a> over Interstate 25 near Monument, roughly 50 miles south of Denver. The structure is 200 feet wide by 209 feet long and links 39,000 acres of privately protected habitat with more than one million acres of Pike National Forest.
\n\tOregon has a new wildlife underpass beneath a stretch of U.S. Highway 30 northwest of Portland designed specifically for northern red-legged tree frogs<\/a>.
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