Aspen highway data shows wildlife cause majority of incidents

On a six-mile stretch of Highway 82 extending from the Sinclair gas station and the Aspen/Pitkin County Airport toward town, there were a total of 410 traffic accidents reported to the police between 2013 and 2024. 

More than half of those incidents — 224 to be exact — were wildlife-vehicle collisions, according to data from the Colorado Department of Transportation.

“55% of all of our reported accidents on the stretch of roadway are wildlife-vehicle collisions,” Julia Kintsch, founder of ECO-Resolutions, told the Pitkin County Board of County Commissioners on Tuesday. “So that’s clearly an issue that we see here.” 

Kintsch was presenting as part of a Roaring Fork Safe Passages report to the BOCC to raise funds for wildlife passage designs over and under Highway 82. 

According to her data from CDOT, 96% of those wildlife-vehicle accidents that were called in resulted in some type of property damage. During that period, 113 carcases were removed from the highway by CDOT safety patrols. Some of those may be double counts from the 224 accidents reported during the period. It is also possible that some were additional incidents that were not reported. 

The RFSP report cited a study from British Columbia that found that many road-kill incidents go unreported, meaning actual numbers can potentially be even higher. 

“Elk-vehicle conflict actually accounts for a third of all those (wildlife-vehicle) collisions,” Kintsch said. “When we look at that across other stretches of roadway around the state, that’s a very high level of the elk-vehicle conflict, which is a big concern for motorists, as well, because hitting an elk is dangerous.”

Commissioners and Pitkin County Open Spaces Trails board members were considering a funds request from RFSP at Tuesday’s joint meeting. RFSP is aiming for $350,000 total: $275,000 for a feasibility study on some proposed wildlife passages and $75,000 to complete engineering designs on those passages. 

The passages would provide wildlife an alternative way over, or under, the highway. According to maps presented at the meeting, elk migration patterns frequently cross the road in that six-mile segment in the spring and fall.

However, questions about where the funds would come from bogged down the discussion. 

“Is it legal to use Open Space and Trails money for projects such as this, that really is geared to safety on the highway?” asked Commissioner Patti Clapper. 

The answer to that question and others were not clear during the Tuesday meeting. 

“If we can’t use Open Space and Trails funds for this, that kind of negates this conversation,” Clapper commented. “It would go back to the General Fund, and we’re being stretched in our general fund these days.” 

However, Cecily DeAngelo, executive director of RFSP, sees this as an ongoing partnership that will need to extend beyond funding. 

“If we are to pursue these locations in Pitkin County, we really need a partnership there and ultimately down the road,” she said. “I think Roaring Fork Safe Passages can be a strong fundraising arm, but we do have to lean on the expertise of the county in order to enact what needs to go into the creation of wildlife corridors.”