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Not even a slow down sign !
Lets try to understand why its critical to slow down here. The local traffic is very heavy. Cars and Trucks trying to pull onto the highway. Sometimes so packed you have to wait for several oncoming vehicles and then, when the time is right floor it. Now you get passed in a double line area and then get the finger...and hear the horn all at the same time. Now that's a true multi tasker. In the summer, traffic flow multiplies. Its hilly here, up and down so at night your headlights aren't often focused on the obstacles ahead. So seeing wildlife soon enough is not applicable here. Also the road curves left and right, up and down, again headlights aren't on the road sufficiently to slow down in time . Picture this if you may….. Your coming from the North The road is wide, your making good time, open vistas, scenic landscapes. Travelers using their cruise control and cruising an average speed of 70. The scent of fresh hay fields, pine in the air…… Barry Manilow on the radio….the roads are wider and flatter. the country is open fields with 30— 40 foot easements along the edges of the highway. Now the road climbs, the tall timber starts, closing in, mail boxes barely missing your mirrors, road takes a dip, hilly, then curves to the right, pavement seems to narrow but it’s the easements, only12’, so are trees closing on you, top of the hill blind spot! Someone’s entering highway! down hill now , Kids on bikes ! get the cruise off! curve to the left, bickers on shoulder! rough road, potholes, deep barrow pit if you go off the narrow pavement, soft shoulders, edges, constant oncoming cars, log truck sprays you with dirt and debris, up a hill and it continues for the next several miles. Many driveways dump onto this stretch of highway. Sometimes cows, horses, moose and bear...but why slow down? You just got a new grill guard so step on it. Look out ...it’s a sofa, railroad tie? maybe a log laying in the road! At this spot, wild life funnel, darting across from timbered forests to the fields or river. Now add in the tall grass 3’ deep, right up to the pavement. Travelers can’t focus on wildlife! Now this is in best conditions. Foul weather is ice and snow packed roads, maybe rain at night. There are constant accidents, slide offs, over corrections, seasonal soft shoulders and abrupt edges, pot holes, roll over's, hitting bickers, and kids. Many deaths in this area alone. My mom and my two small sisters on their way to church one early morning, were struck from behind on icy highway here. Then pushed head on into oncoming log truck. Mothers maverick was unrecognizable after the loaded log truck crushed them in between the rock wall and a load of logs then drug them around Spencer Lake’s dead mans curve. Where a high school friend died in 1969 several years before. Trucks all day long travel at 65 mph, log truck's, chipper trucks, service trucks, construction workers, SUV’S, farm equipment. All in a hurry in summer and thousands of tourists visiting Glacier Park. Canadians’ s coming to the states to shop, with a free pas to speed, heading north and south ,very busy. Big 18 wheelers at night want to avoid the tourists and local traffic, run through this area all night trying to beat the daylight rush hour from here to Missoula. Its a mess and seems no one is in a hurry to fix it. Slow it down and create a official Corridor
Who else use this Highway 93 ? Grizzly, Moose, Wolves, Elk, Deer, Eagles, Lions, Wolverine, Lynx
Our goal... Save lives And get the wild life across this highway safely.
· Get travel corridor recognized at highway 93 and slowing it down · Abundant big game live and travel thru this natural brushy lodgepole forest surround this funneling area, lets add to it. Protect it. Set it aside, Bridge it, Enhance it. · All wildlife uses these roads , grizzly, wolves, elk, deer, eagles, lions. wolverine, and protected birds. Give them a break. · Big game need more cover to migrate across the valley at this spot. Improve it. · At this time the highway 93 is the biggest killer of wildlife in this area. 3 x national average for human deaths. · Future Animal bridge may be necessary so lets start the planning. · Wildlife fencing for safer crossing places with wildlife sensors and lighting. · Flashing lights warring signs, lower speed limit... · Secure adjacent lands to allow wildlife friendly passage · Purchase adjacent land for the future animal Bridge access and maintenance · Who would feel they may like to sponsor this? Bonneville Power? Plum Creek? Redford? National wildlife organizations ? Anyone...anyone? We been doing all we can for the last 40 years... alone
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From Kerry R. Hubble 3015 so. 460 west, Salt Lake City, Utah 84115 rick@dolog.com
Salt lake 385-743-0906 hwy 3880 93 N. Whitefish, Montana 406-334-4750 |
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Page 3 the highway 2026 |
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U.S. Highway 93 Major Forest Wildlife Game Crossing, Glacier Part to Idaho Panhandle
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This is why they cross here the Salish Mountains at Highway 93, looking west |
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.In the news this summer three grizzlies destroyed near city limits ...why isn't any one making a path for them outa round town ? 2012 |
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Believe it or not your looking at US Highway 93… Exactly you cant see it! Taken photo from the Barn At 70 mph a lot of drivers can find it in the dark either, much less see the wildlife crossing it at night... |
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Grizzly Bear recovery Map If you were a Grizz and needed to get from the continual divide to the northwest you would have to get around rural and urban sprawl, open country, 125 long Dam, major highways for hundreds of miles, but here , only 1/2 mile. Canopy to Canopy |
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Bear crossing underneath U.S. Highway 93. Photo courtesy CSKT, MDT and WTI-MSU |
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Rick hubble photo |
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Salish mountains wildlife corridor 3880 hiway N. 406-334-4750 |
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Top of that hill is Flathead National Forest 960 ac., looking East , Beaver lakes back there a mile, and a 1/2 mile west I Tally Lake—Flathead National Forest This is why they cross here |
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Looking North, That timber ahead, is where the wildlife try to cross, then here to Canada the Highway is wider, flatter and faster and the country is populated, fenced. Speed Limit 45 to 120 seams? |
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Skyles Lake to the left, our land and US highway 93, 2011, State Forest, Spencer Lake Mountain on right. Major wildlife crossing but not part of the Salish Mountains Wildlife Corridor ... Its to late here |
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Dead man curve we called it when kids, Tally Lake turn off at Spencer Lake. My mother ans two sister head on with log truck here 1980’s |
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Major wildlife crossing and Tally Lake turn off |
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Skyles Lake on left and Spencer Lake Mountain on right, our land on Left. To late to help |
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unsafe |
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This is the place, a funnel, bottle neck that connects Bob Marshal, Great Bear Wilderness's, Glacier National Park, to the Idaho panhandle, Flathead-Kootenai-Cabinet-Yaak National forests. We are located between two Grizzly Bear Habitats, all wide roaming wildlife skirt the flathead lake, then the flathead valley low lands suburbia, where the two national forests, state forests, all come together, a 1/2 mile Bottle Neck of timber and fields here. This is where they funnel thru.. we own both sides of highway and witness the slaughter. Why do the wildlife use us to funnel here ? LOCATION, COVER, SKRITING SUBURIA, QUITER
Below, and on other pages is the area All wildlife are migrating, rooming though the secluded forest to cross the highway and dash to the mountain forests across the river and into the large Flathead and Kootenai Forests. Brushy canopy forest is what they seek for travel as they shirt the urban areas as they hunting there way to safer range. |
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All that’s left of a larger ancient migration route, between Glacier Park and the Idaho Panhandle. Where Wildlife are being forced, funneling through the Forest Canopy and then can cross the Stillwater River bottom, It’s a 1/4 mile dash from the Flathead National Forest through our area. After they cross the busy highway 93. Deer, elk, moose and predators water, feed in the tall summer grass. In winter they migrate across the valley and highway 93 again, crossing Stillwater River onto the Salish Mountains or the Tally Lake wintering area. We have the timber canopy with-in 12’ running up to the highway crossing ! Had Lincoln electric cut it down with asking! We have seen Bear, Lynx. Lions, Wolverine, Wolves, and at times Grizzly passing through. Summer We see a deer a week on the average hit and killed here. We eliminated the fences and planted windrows to help the game move freely across the fields to get to the river. The fast heavy traffic day and night is killing everything. We would like to enhance the bordering land to benefit the wild life, leaving plenty of cover and at the same time allow safer highway crossing and consider a future animal bridge for this mountain pass wildlife corridor. |
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At this Barn ...One deer a week...human loss is 3x national average, seasonally At this 1/4 mile stretch center of Salish Mountains Wildlife Corridor
On May 7, 2026 I lost my Neice and Her son 200 yards from this driveway |
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On May 7, 2026 |
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looking East to Whitefish Range |