However, they differ greatly when it comes to roadkill.
Between 2011 and 2021, Parks Canada reported that 1,007 animals, coyote-sized and larger, were killed on roads in Jasper National Park. This includes 425 white-tailed deer, 161 elk and 125 bighorn sheep killed on roads in the national park. The total is nearly four times the number in Banff, where 272 animals were killed, even though that park has more highway miles. “It’s a lot higher than we’d like to see,” said David Argument, resource conservation officer at Jasper National Park. Most of the deaths are caused by commercial trucks, he said. Jasper has a higher fatality rate because the main highway through the park is not twinned, fenced or equipped with wildlife overpasses, unlike its neighbor, Argument said. And it’s not just on the highways where animals die. Over the past decade, more than 600 animals have died on the railway in both national parks, according to Parks Canada. The routes are not fenced and there are no wildlife crossings.

The Banff success story

In response to the high number of animal deaths in Banff National Park, work on the twinning of Highway 1 began in the 1980s. As of 2014, the fenced road had 38 wildlife underpasses and six overpasses. These moves have reduced vehicle collisions with wildlife in the park by more than 80%, according to Parks Canada. Many biologists consider Banff a conservation success story. “Whenever someone wants to implement wildlife crossing infrastructure somewhere else in the world, they often come to Banff to learn,” said Adam Linard, Alberta program manager for Yellowstone to Yukon, a conservation nonprofit. Why the same structures aren’t found in Jasper National Park is partly due to geology, Argument said. Highway 1 through Banff is largely straight. By comparison, Highway 16 in Jasper meanders. It snakes along rivers and lakes, slides under many rocks. Elevated arterial wildlife crossings are expensive, costing up to $4 million each. There are six overpasses and 38 underpasses on Highway 1 in Banff National Park. (Parks Canada) For example, when driving from Edmonton to Jasper, Disaster Point is the first rocky point where the highway squeezes between rocky bluffs and the Athabasca River. The location is popular with bighorn sheep as it allows them to escape predation, Argument said. “We have quite a bit of sheep mortality at this location,” he said. Because of the terrain, building an overpass would be difficult and dividing the highway nearly impossible. “We have to be careful about where we put these things to make sure they’re in a place where the wildlife we’re trying to help can actually use them,” Argument said. 7:22 Summer traffic in the mountains poses a danger to wildlife It’s summer and that means more road trips in the mountains. But extra cars on highways can also pose a greater threat to wildlife. Edmonton AM’s Liam Harrap compared wildlife road deaths for Jasper National Park and Banff National Park, two of the busiest national parks in Canada.

The problem with the roads

Animals are drawn to the streets for many reasons. The ditches are perfect for dandelions, which love to eat, said Seth Cherry, Banff National Park’s conservation director. Recently, bears in the park have learned to climb the fences along the highway to get at the nutrient-rich flower. “We’re looking at ways to improve the fencing design, maybe put in an electric wire in some locations,” Cherry said. Additionally, the salt added to roads in the winter to make them passable acts as a wildlife attractant. “Roads are an important component of human impact on Earth’s ecosystems,” said Adam Ford, a biologist at UBC Okanagan. The highways also pass the animal areas. In a study, Ford discovered that muskrats rarely cross roads. “There is no forest. The terrain is different,” he said. “It doesn’t matter in traffic.” An image captured by a wildlife camera shows a mother grizzly bear and two cubs heading towards an underpass to cross Highway 1 in Banff National Park. (highwaywilding.org)

“Something has to be done”

Chris Smith, northern parks coordinator for the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, a non-profit organization dedicated to conservation, said Jasper needs to do more to reduce wildlife road deaths. If Jasper maintains the status quo, Smith said, wildlife population numbers could be at risk. For now, Parks Canada said roadkill in Jasper is not causing an overall decline. “It’s an unfortunate source of loss, for sure, and we don’t want to see them get hit,” Argument said. Wildlife road fatalities could be dramatically reduced, he said, by people driving more alertly and more slowly, giving wildlife plenty of space. A bull during mating season near Jasper, Alta., in 2019. In the past 10 years, 425 white-tailed deer, 161 elk and 125 bighorn sheep have been killed on roads in the national park. (Nancy Hammond/Provided by Brian Keating) Since 2011, no caribou have been killed on Jasper roads. Three grizzly bears died. Grizzlies are listed as threatened in Alberta, while caribou are listed as endangered. Earlier this summer a toddler was orphaned after his mother was killed by a truck. A 2016 Parks Canada report estimated that up to 10 per cent of moose in Jasper die on roads and railways. “We want wildlife to roam freely in our national park. That’s why they exist,” Smith said. “Something needs to be done to Jasper… this is unacceptable.” There is also the human cost of roadkill. In 2020, there were more than 35,000 collisions between vehicles and wildlife on Canadian roads, injuring nearly 2,000 people and killing 17, according to Transport Canada.

Jasper’s future

Fencing, twinning and adding wildlife overpasses in Jasper would significantly reduce road deaths, Argument said. But he has concerns. He said fencing alone is not a solution, as animals must cross roads to find food and mate, making overpasses and underpasses important. Another concern is that predators could use fences to collect prey, but in a follow-up email with Banff National Park, Parks Canada said it had no examples of that happening. Lynard said reducing wildlife mortality in our national parks must be a priority. “We have somewhat higher expectations of Parks Canada than anywhere else,” he said. “We know they can do it.”