Wildlife

I-70 currently crosses several traditional wildlife movement and migration routes, limiting access or creating a barrier to critical habitat. These areas are known as wildlife linkage zones (LIZs). As part of the I-70 Mountain Corridor Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS), the committee overseeing A Landscape Level Inventory of Valued Ecosystems (ALIVE) identified wildlife crossings and mitigations at critical wildlife LIZs along the corridor where wildlife movements are impeded. The ALIVE Memorandum of Understanding and the list of LIZs and their associated recommendations can be accessed for information on the agreements and recommendations developed by the ALIVE Committee. All projects in the corridor should review the LIZs to determine if the proposed work impacts a LIZ. If a project does involve a LIZ, opportunities to implement the recommendations for that LIZ should be considered.

The Evaluation Guidance details how I-70 Mountain Corridor alternatives will be evaluated. The Alternative Evaluation Guidance documents how healthy environment criteria will be used to determine how well an alternative is able to avoid, minimize, and mitigate impacts to biological resources. Criteria are provided for use at each level of alternative analysis.

During the I-70 Mountain Corridor Context Sensitive Solution Workshops, the stakeholders developed a list of critical issues to be considered during all future work on the corridor.