Thirty-three volunteers from the Garnier&Garniercompany worked on placing the first two wildlife crossings in Punta Cacique, Guanacaste, the area where the first Waldorf Astoria Hotel in the region is being built.
This is an initiative that seeks to protect the local wildlife and at the same time reduce the environmental impact resulting from real estate development. In total, the Costa Rican firm will install 15 structures of this type.
The main objective of the placement of wildlife crossings is to facilitate the safe migration of various local species, promoting biodiversity and minimizing the risk of accidents on the road.
The first two steps
This first stage was carried out within the framework of the International Volunteer Day – which was celebrated on December 5 – and included two steps of 27 and 10 meters long respectively and located in Playa Penca.The remaining 13 will be installed on the public street that connects to the project.
Many features
In parallel, the development company will install an underground electrical network, speed bumps, underground wildlife crossings and vertical information signs with the type of species that transit through the area. This is so that tourists traveling in the area take appropriate precautions.For the placement of the wildlife crossings, the development firm had the technical advice of the non-profit organization SalveMonos.
SalveMonos
“We are seeking through a research project to connect the forest cover that remains in the coastal area and we are involving all the actors that are important in this process.
“During the volunteering we explained to the participants what are the main efforts we make to protect wildlife and the type of structure that is used to protect fauna along the Pacific coast,” explained Inés Azofeifa, director of field and researcher for the organization SalveMonos.
Material from Thailand
The rest of the steps will be installed in the next nine months. A group of Guanacaste women artisans wove these structures with material that was imported from Thailand to guarantee its quality.
The location of the wildlife passages was defined strategically, after an analysis that was carried out during a period of six months in the area.This included the installation of camera traps to identify the type of fauna and the areas through which the animals travel.
Marcela Cano, sustainability manager at Garnier&Garnier, explained: “the placement of wildlife crossings is just one of the actions we are carrying out as part of the sustainability strategy outlined at the Waldorf Astoria Guanacaste.
“We have also started a process of measuring the carbon footprint of the hotel and the residences, we are working on a zero waste certification and reforestation of corals due to the importance they have in biodiversity.“We also work together with other organizations in employment training training with the aim of adding value to the community in which we are present,” he said.
