Proceedings of the National Institute of Ecology of the Republic of Korea

National Institute of Ecology (국립생태원)
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Factors Influencing Roadkill Hotspot in the Republic of Korea

  • Kim, Kyungmin (Wildlife Disease Respond Team, National Institute of Wildlife Disease Control and Prevention (NIWDC)) ;
  • Yi, Yoonjung (College of Biology and the Environment, Nanjing Forestry University) ;
  • Woo, Donggul (Ecological Space Research Team, Division of Ecosystem Assessment, National Institute of Ecology) ;
  • Park, Taejin (Ecological Space Research Team, Division of Ecosystem Assessment, National Institute of Ecology) ;
  • Song, Euigeun (Ecological Space Research Team, Division of Ecosystem Assessment, National Institute of Ecology)
  • Received : 2021.06.08
  • Accepted : 2021.10.13
  • Published : 2021.11.01
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Abstract

Road structures play an important role in collisions involving vehicles and wildlife. Our study aimed to determine the effect of various types of road structures on the risk associated with roadkill. We surveyed 50 previously identified roadkill hotspots, ranked from one to five according to roadkill density. We collected nine types of road structure data on each hotspot road section. Structures with similar characteristics were grouped together, resulting in five categories, namely, median barrier, high edge barrier, low edge barrier, speed, and visibility. We examined the existence of each road structure category at each hotspot rank. The cumulative link model showed that the absence of bottom blocked median barrier increased the roadkill hotspot rank. Our study concluded that a visual obstacle in the middle of roads by the median barrier decreases wildlife road crossing attempts and roadkill risk. We suggest that future roadkill mitigation plans should be established considering these characteristics.

Keywords

Acknowledgement

This work was supported by a grant from the National Institute of Ecology (NIE), funded by the Ministry of Environment (MOE) of the Republic of Korea (NIE-C-2021-28).

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