Cougar passage rises over a deadly Southern California freeway

LOS ANGELES — Chalk one up for the cougars.

When conservationists first announced plans to raise $30 million for a wildlife crossing over a deadly 10-lane stretch of the 101 Freeway in Agoura Hills, critics snickered and said “good luck.”

Now, 10 years later, the dream of building a bridge that would help mountain lions escape an “extinction vortex” by providing them safe passage to food and mates is becoming a reality.

On Friday, Earth Day, hundreds of conservationists and legislators will gather on a weedy hill overlooking the Liberty Canyon Road exit to break ground on the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing.

“We did it!” shouted Beth Pratt, regional executive director of the National Wildlife Federation. “For years to come, this wildlife crossing will be admired and studied as proof that humans and wild animals can co-exist,” she said as she raised her voice over the din of traffic streaking past.

With completion scheduled for 2025, the wildlife crossing ranks among the most ambitious apolitical campaigns ever waged in Southern California.

More than 5,000 individuals, foundations, agencies and businesses from around the world contributed expertise and donations totaling more than $77 million — including $25-million challenge grant from Wallis Annenberg and the Annenberg Foundation.

Partners include the National Wildlife Federation, the National Park Service, Caltrans, Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy, the Resource Conservation District of the Santa Monica Mountains, and the architectural firm Living Habitats LLC, among many others.

Because the project spans an interstate, Caltrans will oversee design and construction — but the transportation agency is not providing funding.

The 200-foot-long, 165foot-wide bridge will be the largest of its kind in the world and will serve as a lifeline for small, isolated populations of cougars in the Santa Monica Mountains to the south, and in the Simi Hills and Santa Susana Mountains to the north.

These 12 to 15 mountain lions have the lowest genetic diversity documented for the species aside from the critically endangered Florida panther. Scientists say they face extinction probabilities of 16% to 28% over the next 50 years.