Coyotes Cross Ahead of a $114 Million Wildlife Bridge

By James Calloway

SFGate reported that a coyote became the first large mammal recorded on the $114 million Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing on October 28, the world’s largest wildlife crossing in Agoura Hills, California. A western fence lizard had crossed the structure technically first, and a second coyote followed the next day. Both coyotes were caught by recently installed remote wildlife camera traps.

The $114 million project includes two bridges across the 10-lane Ventura Freeway, with the crossing set above Highway 101. Construction remains underway, the structure has not technically opened, and an official ribbon-cutting ceremony is not scheduled until early December. The National Wildlife Federation and Santa Monica Mountains Fund began raising money for the project in 2014.

That chronology matters because the camera frames document use before the infrastructure formally opens. For scientists, the images begin a multi-year test of whether the crossing reconnects an ecosystem divided by the freeway for decades. For award-winning wildlife photographers, the traps show how field photographs can serve documentary and scientific ends at once.

How did wildlife find the crossing?

The Facebook account for P22 Mountain Lion of Hollywood addressed the question directly: “To everyone who wondered how wildlife would know where to go without signs… apparently, they’ve figured it out.” P22 was an influential mountain lion euthanized in 2022, and its conservation legacy helped inspire involvement in projects including this crossing.

The coyote sequence supplies visual evidence for the account’s claim, although it does not document how the animals located the structure. For photographers, that limit matters: the images record arrival and crossing, rather than the animal’s route through surrounding habitat. The distinction preserves the evidentiary precision of the camera-trap record.

What has already crossed?

The project includes 13 acres of habitat restoration, including growing reclaimed habitat above the busy highway. Birds and insects have already used that habitat, while the western fence lizard became the first animal on the bridge surface. The two coyotes then became the first large mammals recorded there, creating a chronological sequence rather than a single isolated sighting.

Nearby observations extend beyond the structure itself. A mountain lion with two cubs, a mule deer and bobcats have all been seen walking next to the crossing, but those sightings do not place them on it. This distinction keeps the bridge crossings separate from the surrounding animal activity.

What will the cameras measure?

“This is more than just about whether animals use the crossing,” said Seth Riley from the National Park Service’s Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area team. “We want to understand how effective it is in reconnecting an ecosystem that has been divided by the freeway for decades.”

“That is a much bigger scientific question and answering it will take years,” Riley said. Riley and his colleagues have placed cameras on and near the crossing, and the public will see many resulting photographs.

For security reasons, however, the project will not provide real-time public feeds from the site. The monitoring programme will examine wildlife diversity, genetic diversity and habitat evolution, alongside the effects of light and sound on animals.

Those questions move the bridge beyond transport infrastructure and into a long-term study of ecological repair. Monitoring can test whether animals not only traverse the structure but use the 13 restored acres around it. That distinction separates measurable connectivity from a visually convincing photograph of passage.

How does the sequence function as photography?

The trail-camera sequence offers a clear model for treating evidence as narrative: a lizard establishes first use, two coyotes establish large-mammal use, and wider sightings establish other species around them. Its force comes from chronology and repetition, not from an artful angle.

For practitioners, each frame becomes cumulative evidence, with identity, order and setting carrying as much weight as composition. The approach places wildlife photography inside an institutional frame, with public access to images accompanying National Park Service monitoring. It also explains why these photographs retain documentary value while construction remains incomplete.

Following the early-December ceremony, the cameras will continue the crossing’s multi-year ecological study, testing whether two bridges and 13 restored acres can reconnect habitat divided by the freeway for decades. The next chapter will be measured through repeated images, public access to photographs and scientific findings, rather than the ceremony alone.