High-wire act suiting wildlife

From August 2022 to May 2023, more than 2800 movements were recorded at the two crossings located along the Dhungala Bridge over the Murray River.

The total movements recorded include nearly 900 confirmed crossings, which were made by squirrel gliders and Krefft’s gliders — species that primarily move by gliding between trees — along with ringtail possums.

Other species to use the crossings include brushtail possums, birds and owls. The project’s crossings are made of timber poles, which reach as high as 16.5 metres above the ground, and connecting rope bridges between 35 and 75 metres long.

The bridges allow animals to cross under or over the new road, helping them to safely move across gaps in the tree canopy along the project alignment.

“The canopy bridges have been widely used by squirrel gliders and Krefft’s gliders, effectively reconnecting populations on both sides of the new bridge,” WSP Australia technical executive of ecology Rodney Van der Ree said.

“It has been a privilege to partner with MRPV and mitigate the impacts of the project while at the same time quantifying the effectiveness of different approaches and using the information learnt to inform future projects.”

In another initiative to protect local fauna, the project engaged a team of qualified arborists and ecologists to create more than 450 additional habitat hollows in trees throughout Victoria Park and along the Campaspe River, providing shelter for local wildlife and replacing hollows lost through the project.

The team will also monitor the Victorian Temperate Woodland Bird Community every six months over a five-year period.

“We specifically designed the Echuca-Moama Bridge Project to minimise our footprint on the local environment and to protect its wildlife, so it’s extremely pleasing to see our fauna crossings along the Dhungala Bridge are being regularly used by gliders and other local wildlife,” Major Road Projects Victoria project director Damian Van Dyke said.

The Echuca-Moama Bridge Project was the largest transport infrastructure project in northern Victoria, jointly funded by the Australian, Victorian and NSW governments.

It delivered a new section of road connecting the Murray Valley Hwy in Echuca, Victoria, with the Cobb Hwy in Moama, NSW, including new bridges over the Murray and Campaspe rivers, and two new flood relief bridges.

The new road opened in April 2022, giving Echuca and Moama a second crossing over the Murray River after more than 140 years of connection by a single bridge.