California starts building urban wildlife crossing

Construction has begun on what's billed as the world's largest wildlife crossing for mountain lions and other animals caught in Southern California's urban sprawl.

Officials held a ceremony Friday to mark the start of construction of a $90 million bridge over a freeway and feeder road near downtown Los Angeles.

The bridge will stretch 200 feet over the U.S. 101 to give big cats, coyotes, deer and other wildlife a safe path to the nearby Santa Monica Mountains.

It is expected to be completed by early 2025 and will be named the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing for the philanthropist whose foundation donated $25 million.

The star of the fundraising campaign to build the bridge was mountain lion P-22 .On Thursday, a mountain lion was struck and killed on a nearby freeway. J.P. Rose, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, said these deaths are preventable if the state invests in more wildlife crossings. Wildlife crossings — bridges and tunnels — are common in Western Europe and Canada.