August 29 – September 2, 2005
Theme: “On The Road To Stewardship”

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Facts and Figures

ICOET 2005 will feature the following:

• Over 350 worldwide experts will attend.
• Over 125 papers and posters will be presented.
• Speakers represent Australia, Canada, France, Hungary, Ireland, India, The Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Taiwan, the United Kingdom, and the U.S.
• Canadian scientist Bruce F. Leeson, Ph.D., of the Parks Canada Agency is the conference keynote speaker.
• San Diego speakers include Janet Fairbanks of the San Diego Association of Governments.
• Caltrans is the conference co-host and lead organizer for two San Diego field trips on transportation and ecology challenges in coastal and inland San Diego County, to be conducted on Wednesday, August 31.
• UC-Davis Road Ecology Center is the conference co-host and the facilitator of a special session on acoustics ecology, examining the wildlife impacts of roadway noise.
• ICOET is a biennial, inter-agency event funded primarily by the Federal Highway Administration in cooperation with the USDA Forest Service, USDOI Fish and WIldlife Service, US Environmental Protection Agency, et al. (please see Sponsors page for complete list of official sponsors and co-sponsors).
• Six ICOETs have been conducted since 1996.

Animal/Vehicle Facts and Figures for the U.S. (unless stated otherwise):
Source information provided at the bottom of the page.

1. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) General Estimates System estimates about 222,000 police-reported crashes with animals in 1992-93 and 274,000 in 2000-2001, a 24 percent increase.
2. From 1994 to 2003, vehicle miles traveled in the U.S. rose from almost 2.36 trillion to almost 2.88 trillion annually. Compared to 1994, that’s a 22 percent increase.
3. From 1994 to 2003, human fatalities from animal/vehicle collisions rose from 253 to 367 annually. Compared to the 297 fatalities in 2002, that’s an almost 24 percent increase. Comparing 1994 to 2003, the increase is 145 percent.
4. From 1994 to 2003, animal-related crashes in the US claimed 2,978 human lives.
5. From 1998-2002, an average of 155 people were killed in animal-vehicle collisions. This compares with an average of 119 fatal crashes during 1993-97.
6. According to a March 2003 Transport Canada report, between four and eight large animal-vehicle collisions take place every hour in Canada and these types of accidents are on the rise. The same report states that “motor vehicles may be the number one predator for deer and other wildlife. If it is the case, the number of animal-vehicle collisions can only go up."
7. Over 1.5 million deer/vehicle crashes occur per year in the U.S., causing over $1.1 billion in vehicle damage, more than 29,000 human injuries and 150 deaths.
8. While the number of households in the U.S. grew by 72 percent between 1969 and 2001, household vehicle-miles traveled shot up by 193 percent.
9. In 10 percent of fatal animal/vehicle collisions, the struck animal became airborne and went through the windshield of an oncoming vehicle, killing one or more occupants.
10. More than 90 percent of animal-vehicle collisions involve deer.
11. In 2003, deer were struck in three out of four animal-vehicle collisions that caused human fatalities, but collisions with other animals such as cattle, horses, dogs, and a bear also led to fatalities.
12. Animal/vehicle collisions are the greatest directly human-caused source of wildlife mortality throughout the U.S. An estimated one million vertebrates are killed daily (a rate of one every 11.5 seconds) on roads in the U.S.
13. Animal-vehicle collisions have pushed some rare species (such as Florida black bears and panthers) closer to extinction.
14. The $286.4 billion transportation bill authorized by Congress in July and signed by President Bush on August 10 increases highway funding by more than a third.
15. An estimated 50 percent of large-animal collisions go unreported.
16. Once built, a road can act as a barrier for migrating wildlife. Species that will not or cannot cross roadways are isolated from valuable feeding, wintering or birthing habitat. When roads restrict movement, they also bar gene flow where individuals are reluctant to cross for breeding. Reducing the movement of genes among populations results in more negative effects of inbreeding or inbreeding depression that results in weak or sterile offspring.
17. Many animal/vehicle collision fatalities involve motorcycles. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety found that in a study of nine states (Colorado, Georgia, Minnesota, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Wisconsin) from 2000 to 2002, 54 percent of animal/vehicle fatalities involved passenger vehicles, 37 percent involved motorcycles, six percent involved trucks, and the remainder involved all-terrain vehicles and mopeds.
18. Average minimum cost for repairing a vehicle after a collision with a deer is $2,000.
19. The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration estimates that highway crashes cost society $230.6 billion a year, about $820 per person.
20. 4 million: Miles of roads in the U.S.
21. 230,788,000: Number of vehicles registered in the U.S. in 2003.
22. 6,238,000: Number of automobile accidents in the U.S. in 2003.
23. 50: Estimated percentage of vehicle-large animal collisions that go unreported.
24. 25,000: Number of Roadkill Bingo games sold by the Colorado company that invented the game.
25. Nationwide, 71 million acres of habitat have been lost to primary highways.
26. Roads remove two acres of habitat per mile of sixteen-foot-wide road.
27. In 2003, deer were struck in three out of four animal-vehicle collisions that caused human fatalities, but collisions with other animals such as cattle, horses, dogs, and a bear also led to fatalities.
28. From 1991 to 2000, August was the third-highest month for animal/vehicle collisions involving human fatalities in the U.S. September and November ranked first and second, respectively.
29. From 1991 to 2000, Saturday was the day of the week with the most human fatalities for animal/vehicle collisions in the U.S.
30. A four-lane, divided highway is just as effective a barrier to the dispersal of small mammals as a body of water twice as wide.

Sources for facts and figures:

1. Cornell University Cooperative Extension: http://wildlifecontrol.info/ccewdmp/Publications/Deer-Vehicle_factsheet1.pdf
2. U.S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration: http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30/NCSA/TSFAnn/TSF1999.pdf, http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/pdf/nrd-30/ncsa/tsfann/2003/cov2.htm, http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/
3. Deer-Vehicle Crash Information Clearinghouse: http://www.deercrash.com/national_data.htm
4. Deer-Vehicle Crash Information Clearinghouse: http://www.deercrash.com/national_data.htm
5. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety: http://www.hwysafety.org/news_releases/2004/pr111804.htm
6. Transport Canada Road Safety Directorate: http://www.wildlifeaccidents.ca/SiteCM/U/D/D6ACDB93DFABC8C6.pdf
7. Insurance Information Institute: http://iiidev.iii.org/media/updates/press.738295/, Cornell University Wildlife Damage Management Program: http://wildlifecontrol.info/ccewdmp/Publications/Deer-Vehicle_factsheet1.pdf
8. April 18 remarks by U.S. Rep. James L. Oberstar (Minnesota) at the Center for Transportation Studies at the University of Minnesota: http://www.cts.umn.edu/events/oberstarforum/2005/2005oberstarspeech.html
9. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety: http://www.hwysafety.org/news_releases/2004/pr111804.htm
10. Western Transportation Institute, Montana State University: http://www.icoet.net/downloads/03AnimalVehicleCollision.pdf
11. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety: http://www.hwysafety.org/news_releases/2004/pr111804.htm
12. Defenders of Wildlife: http://www.defenders.org/california/hh.html, http://www.serconline.org/trafficcongestionrelief/fact.html, http://wildlife.state.nm.us/conservation/habitat_handbook/EffectsofRoads.htm; High Country News: http://www.hcn.org/servlets/hcn.Article?article_id=15268
13. Defenders of Wildlife: http://www.defenders.org/habitat/highways/ , http://www.defenders.org/newsroom/moose.html
14. Las Vegas Sun: http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/bw-wh/2005/aug/10/081000528.html; CNN: http://premium.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/08/10/bush.highwaybill.ap/; American Society of Civil Engineers: http://www.asce.org/govrel/tea3/
15. High Country News: http://www.hcn.org/servlets/hcn.Article?article_id=15268
16. State Environmental Resource Center: http://www.serconline.org/trafficcongestionrelief/fact.html; Richard T.T. Forman, Daniel Sperling, et al., Road Ecology: Science and Solutions (Island, Washington, D.C., 2003)
17. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety: http://www.hwysafety.org/news_releases/2004/pr111804.htm
18. Insurance Information Institute: http://iiidev.iii.org/media/updates/press.738295/; State Farm Insurance: http://www.statefarm.com/educate/antlers.htm; Road Management & Engineering Journal: http://www.usroads.com/journals/rmj/9705/rm970503.htm
19. U. S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration: http://www.dot.gov/affairs/nhtsa1303.htm
20. Industrial College of the Armed Forces, National Defense University: http://www.icoet.net/ICOET_2005/www.ndu.edu/icaf/industry/IS2003/papers/2003%20Transportation.doc
21. U.S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration: http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/
22. U.S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Transportation and Safety Administration: http://www-fars.nhtsa.dot.gov/
23. Road Management & Engineering Journal: http://www.usroads.com/journals/rmj/9705/rm970503.htm
24. High Country News: http://www.hcn.org/servlets/hcn.Article?article_id=15268
25. New Mexico Department of Game and Fish: http://wildlife.state.nm.us/conservation/habitat_handbook/EffectsofRoads.htm
26. New Mexico Department of Game and Fish: http://wildlife.state.nm.us/conservation/habitat_handbook/EffectsofRoads.htm
27. Insurance Institute for Highway Safety: http://www.hwysafety.org/news_releases/2004/pr111804.htm
28. Louisiana Transport Research Center: http://www.ltrc.lsu.edu/TRB_82/TRB2003-000187.pdf
29. Louisiana Transport Research Center: http://www.ltrc.lsu.edu/TRB_82/TRB2003-000187.pdf
30. D. J. Oxley, M. B. Fenton, and G. R. Carmody, Journal of Applied Ecology 11, 51 (1974).

For more information on ICOET, please visit http://www.icoet.net/ICOET_2005/www.icoet.net/icoet2005.asp.

(Compiled by the Center for Transportation and the Environment. For changes or additions, please contact Neil Koomen at 919-515-8623 or [email protected].)