Costa Rica Enacts Mandatory Wildlife Crossings in Public Infrastructure

On 4 August 2026 the Costa Rican Legislative Assembly voted unanimously to amend the Organic Environmental Law (Law No. 7554) by adding Article 31 bis. The amendment obliges all public infrastructure projects to incorporate wildlife crossings or other mitigation measures whenever scientific studies demonstrate that ecological connectivity is threatened. The law requires these measures to be planned from the earliest design stages, with costs for construction and long‑term maintenance included in project budgets and approval obtained from the National System of Conservation Areas (SINAC). Existing roads are not required to be retrofitted immediately, but any major maintenance, widening or rehabilitation must also consider wildlife mitigation.

Specialists from the conservation group Panthera warn that implementation is urgent, especially in the Guanacaste region where the Cañas‑Limonal corridor – dubbed the “death stretch” – sees an estimated 16 000 wildlife roadkills each year, including many threatened species. They call for functional crossings and proper signage to reduce mortality and preserve genetic flow across habitats.