Monitoring climatic impacts on the moisture uptake of the first Swiss wildlife bridge made of wood

Abstract

Wildlife bridges represent a major component of any sustainable strategy to counteract the negative consequences of cutting the natural habitat of wildlife into disconnected parts by motorways and rail. This is especially true for a small and densely populated country such as Switzerland with diverse wildlife scattered through its territory. Up to now all wildlife bridges in Switzerland have been made of concrete with steel reinforcement. The wildlife bridge under investigation here is the first one in Switzerland made of wood-based materials. The idea of building a wildlife bridge by using wood-based materials represents besides a challenging technological endeavor also an ecological progress regarding embodied energy. A further advantage which resulted after realizing the construction, was the short interruption time it needed for installation on a motorway in operation. The most urgent question with respect to the wood-based elements is their moisture uptake when subjected to weather conditions. The present paper reports on a long-term monitoring of this wooden wildlife bridge over a period of approximately 2 years. Different kind of sensors, data from a nearby meteorological station, data regarding hourly number of different kind of vehicles passing beneath the wildlife bridge as well as lab measurements have been used to enable a robust and reliable statement on wooden wildlife bridges subjected to Swiss flatland weather conditions.