Conservationists push for wildlife bridge across I‑10 to reconnect Tucson and Tortolita mountains

Jessica Moreno, conservation science director with the Coalition for Sonoran Desert Protection, outlined ongoing monitoring and planning work aimed at reconnecting a key wildlife linkage between the Tucson and Tortolita mountains and urged coordination with Pima County and state agencies to build a large crossing near the I‑10 corridor.

Moreno said the coalition’s earlier work at Oracle Road in Oro Valley — which included a wildlife bridge, an underpass and funnel fencing installed during a road‑widening project — demonstrated that crossing structures can “work” and provide multiple benefits. “Wildlife crossings, basically, we’re able to prove with this first bridge and underpass that they work and that they’re successful. So they’re a win win solution for everyone,” Moreno said.

The presentation summarized monitoring results and next steps. The coalition began camera monitoring in 2012 at the Oracle Road linkage and later expanded a separate study, begun in 2017, across I‑10 that now uses stratified camera sites on both sides of the highway to compare species presence. Moreno said the I‑10 corridor currently offers only one potential safe crossing — an abandoned railroad underpass near Avra Valley Road — and that multiple obstacles remain, including the interstate, frontage roads, a railroad, fencing and a soil‑cement levee at the Santa Cruz River.

Moreno described…