The Santa Monica Mountains are home to around 450 species of mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians that roam a range packed with native plant varieties. But cut off by the US 101 freeway, the mountains have become something of a genetic island. “It’s like old royalty,” jokes Beth Pratt, California regional executive director with the...
The Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing was always going to be a bold experiment—an attempt to stitch back together a landscape long severed by the Ventura (101) Freeway. Now, as the project progresses, it has also become something else: a flashpoint. Critics have seized on rising costs and shifting timelines. Originally pegged at roughly $90 million...
As supporters of the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing in Agoura Hills gear up for an Earth Day celebration atop the bridge over the 101 Freeway on April 22—exactly four years since the official groundbreaking—the project has come under fire for delays and cost overruns. Some of the crossing’s backers say the surge of criticism online...
The giant bridge over US 101 in Agoura Hills should be complete later this year Last week, the newly launched California Post ran an opinion piece headlined “California’s unfinished wildlife ‘bridge to nowhere’ tops $100M.” The authors, both with the conservative think tank the Manhattan Institute, dedicated roughly 750 words to attacking the Agoura...
In 2024, the nonprofit National Wildfire Federation began its plan to build a bridge over the 101 freeway in Agoura Hills to help mountain lions and other wildlife facing “genetic isolation” caused by the freeway. The Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing is expected to be finished this year, but already small creatures are making the bridge their home...
To the 300,000 drivers who stream through Agoura Hills on the 101 Freeway every day, the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing looks relatively unchanged from last summer, except for some leggy native shrubs growing along the outer walls. While activity seems to have halted on what is touted to be the world’s largest wildlife crossing, there’s...
Native plants are being placed on the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing Tuesday, marking another milestone for what officials say will be the largest bridge of its kind in the world. Over the next few months, about 5,000 more plants are expected to be installed along the bridge — which stretches over all 10 lanes of...
The Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing Native Plant Nursery has only one function: to grow hyperlocal native plants for the world’s largest wildlife crossing over the 101 Freeway in Agoura Hills. Back in 2022, nursery employees wandered the hills around the crossing collecting a million seeds from native plants. Those seeds have been planted, replanted, nursed...
AGOURA HILLS, Calif. — Standing at a trailhead next to one of the busiest freeways in the nation isn’t where you’d normally find story time, but this story is one of a kind. “Please gather round,” Genie Tuttle told a group of early risers one Sunday morning. “I want to tell you the story about...
Steve Winter P-22 was found roaming the Hollywood Hills, miles away from other mountain lions. Scientists fitted the puma with a radio collar which recorded his location (Credit: Steve Winter) Inspired by a mountain lion isolated from potential mates, the world’s largest wildlife bridge is being built in Los Angeles to allow animals to roam...
