“In addition to roads, we realised that other infrastructure impacted on wildlife deaths,” says Collinson. “Railways, marine and coastal shipping, airports – the entire transport sector affects biodiversity. Interestingly, while there is an insurance offset for the loss of human life when involved in a collision with an animal, the cost to biodiversity is rarely considered.
“We’ve jumped from roads to rail and are gathering ad hoc data there, as well as undertaking a scoping report on marine and coastal shipping. This project has now expanded all over the country. We aren’t just focused on roadkill, but also on what we can do to prevent it and mitigate it.”
The work has expanded further into protected areas – wildlife are being run over in places where they should be safest. “In the parks, we are trialling solutions to reduce roadkill as well as understand and change driver behaviour. Every aspect of the work done and the data gathered has been put through rigorous processes as it has to be utterly robust before it can be used to motivate for support or change.” Read more