Interactive Fish Passage Training Module for Transportation Biologists

Throughout California, thousands of road stream crossings have the potential to impede fish passage, greatly reducing spawning and rearing habitat available to salmon and steelhead. Unfortunately, when most culvert and bridge construction took place in California, there was little consideration to fish migration, which has lead to a legacy of fish passage problems along most California state highways. The State of California has identified improving passage at their facilities and expanding access to habitat as an essential component of recovering anadromous salmonid populations. Caltrans has been confronting fish passage problems at road stream crossing for the past decade. HDR has been assisting Caltrans develop a progressive approach that integrates both biological and engineering aspects of fish passage. Caltrans, with the support of HDR is developing interactive, animated, online training modules, including a fish passage module, to assist Caltrans staff plan, prepare, submit, and evaluate environmental documents for transportation projects. The fish passage module presents the protocols and procedures used to assess and eventually improve fish passage along Caltrans highways. More specifically, the module discusses problems associated with road-stream crossings for anadromous fish, road stream crossing designs and their effects, and the Caltrans fish passage process.