When you are about to build a mountain on one of the busiest highways in the country, and when natural spaces are formed by hand waves, it is easy to envy the story of original creation.
In these stories there were no overhead wires to fill or no moving water lines. The detouring vehicle was not an underground stream that needed stabilization, the majestic oaks that had to be saved, or soil that required inoculation of local microorganisms.
But this is a looming challenge for designers and builders of the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing, the largest and most ambitious intersection in the world designed to provide wildlife with safe, natural-imaging passages on the 10-lane 101 highway in Agra Hills.
The cross structure itself is almost complete, but planting will occur this fall, but it is basically a bridge anywhere for now, running along the highway just west of the Liberty Canyon. (But – News Flash! – The first non-intaked wildlife was discovered on the bridge last week, despite not being connected to the next hill. A fence sardine to the west is bathed in the top.
The second and final stages are the installation of the connectors. This allows wildlife with bulging highways to easily cross between the Santa Susana Mountains to the north and the Santa Monica Mountains to the south.
Expanding areas where wildlife can safely roam around will increase your chances of finding companions, improving the health and genetic diversity of everything from lizards to mountain lions like P-22s.
This second phase is the most difficult part of the project, according to Robert Lock, the Chicago-based Chief Executive Officer of Rock Design Associates and landscape architect who oversees the $92.6 million project.
The wildlife crossing connectors in the south of Wallis Annenberg are placed almost exactly between the two white trailers in the photo, threaded (where possible) around a small grove of mature oak trees, and screwed (where possible) across the mountains of Santa Monica.
(Janet Martos)
Working on the South Side requires filling overhead wires near the site. It can move the water supply in the city of Lasville Genes water district, stabilize the underground creek (known as No Name Creek) running under the tunnel site to prevent erosion, and drill deep holes in the 175-foot ground to build a 54-foot Agoura Road.
When tunnels are built and concrete roofs are poured in, workers literally move small mountains of soil from the north side of the highway. There, when this 101 stretch was built in the 1950s, it was stacked, covering the tunnels and creating sloping connecting shoulders in the Santa Monica Mountains.
The final task involves planting more native shrubs, perennials and trees on the shoulders, adding two miles of galvanized steel fencing on each side of the intersection, leaking animals away from human roads and homes across the intersection.
It’s easy isn’t it? With the exception of one more detail, they must move this building and the whole earth, without disturbing the vast groves of native oak trees growing around the site.
The designers plan to preserve as many mature trees as possible as they pass through small groves of mature oaks on either side of the Agoura road and travel across the road towards Mount Santa Monica.
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
“It’s a tricky pocket,” Lock said. “We definitely screw the needle in.”
While you may need to remove some of the small trees, designers do everything they can to maintain native trees around the site. It is not surprising as the entire project focuses on recreating nature as much as possible on concrete and steel foundations, focusing on special inoculations of native plants and local fungi and microorganisms from seeds collected within the project’s radius of 3 miles to promote growth. Plants tend to be in project nursery a few miles from the site.
Ca Rasmussen Inc., a Valencia-based contractor that built the first phase of the project, also won a bid to carry out the second phase, Locke said. The delay in weather — mainly due to heavy rains in 2022 and 2023 — has pushed the final completion date of the intersection to the end of 2026. California provided $58.1 million out of its $92.6 million project as part of its “30 x 30” goal to save 30% of its state’s land and coastal waters by 2030.
Work in the final stages is expected to begin next week. Many preparatory work and tunnel construction require at least a partial closure of the Agula road, but builders must provide 30 days of notice before closure begins.
Artist rendering of how the tunnels at the Wildlife Crossing at Agula Road and Wallis Annenberg are heading southwards when the intersection was completed at the end of 2026.
(Rock Design Associates and the National Wildlife Federation)
(Rock Design Associates and the National Wildlife Federation)
Although certain closure times are still negotiated with the city of Agora Hills, Lock said he expects Agora Road to be partially closed to vehicle and bicycle traffic during the day the contractors work. The closure is expected to begin in early August and last for “a few months,” he said.
“I really can’t say [how long] Beyond the substantial impact of several months, he said, “But we hope we can do it by the end of the year.”
Some plants have been added to the soil with special cover crops of four native plants handed over in the spring: Golden Yarrow (Eliofilm Confertiflam), California Poppy (Eschschkolzia California), Giant Wildry (Elimus Condensation), Santa Barbara Milk Becci (Astragalus Tricopodus), flu-showsed with with with with with with with with with with with with with fore with fore with fore with fore with fore with fore with best with showse and other microorganisms.
Last week, at least one invasive black mustard plant also looked at the intersection. It was not surprising, as the surrounding hills were able to easily spread mustard this early spring, but contractors are supposed to keep invasive plants weeding.
Hundreds of native plants grown from nursery seeds near the project will likely be planted at intersections in October, perhaps in October, as the Regional Executive Director of the California Wildlife Federation and the leader of the Save La Cougars campaign, which oversees the project’s funding and fundraising.
The top of the Wallis Annenberg wildlife now resembles a reddish malscape, but cover crops of California poppies, giant wild rye, Santa Barbara milkvetch and native plants are sown this spring. Hundreds of large native shrubs and perennial plants grown from nursery seeds near the project will be planted at the intersection in October.
(Christina House/Los Angeles Times)
Save La Cougars sells a blend of six native seed species provided by Pacific Coast Seed (formerly S&S seeds) for those who want to grow native plants that stand out at intersections. mellifera), narrow-leaf milkweed (asclepias fascicularis), and slurping needle grass (Tipipa lepida)
You can order souvenir seeds packets online for $10. Proceeds support the project’s nursery. This is featured in a new Save La Cougars video explaining how all native plants, soil and compost in Crossing were chosen and grown.
In the meantime, recent tariffs added new funding concerns to the project. It is not yet clear whether the project will need to raise more funds to cover all the increased costs, Pratt said.
“Robert [Rock] And Caltrans has worked round the clock for redesign and value design to reduce costs. So you can proceed [with Stage 2]Pratt said. “The team’s work was extraordinary.”
While Rock’s estimates may need to raise more money to cover final costs like two miles tall fencing, which costs around $2 million, it appears that design adjustments currently include additional costs. “I don’t think we’re home because they beat them again.”
Meanwhile, all of these human issues unfold, but somewhere at an unfinished intersection, it appears that the West Fenstokage is building a home. Pratt led a small group of visitors when he spotted a small reptile, but it took a little time to process the import.
“I see the lizards on the West Fence constantly visible in my garden, and they are everywhere. They are one of the most common animals found in California,” Pratt wrote in an email. “But it hit me, “Wait, this lizard is on the bridge!!! And this is the first animal I’ve seen on the bridge!!!!” I stopped the group… and told them – “You’re seeing the first animal on the crossing itself.” Everyone cheered.
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