Researchers Investigate 'Road Ecology'; New Book Examines Effect of Pavement on nature.(NATION)(CULTURE, ET CETERA)

Beginning of article

Byline: Josh Earl, THE WASHINGTON TIMES

Americans like going places. Every year, U.S. tires grind out more than 2 trillion miles. That's enough for 377 million round trips

from the District to Los Angeles, or 10,750 trips to the sun and back.

All that driving requires roads - 4 million miles worth.

These highways and byways are the focus of the emerging field of road ecology, which holds that the concrete-and-asphalt arteries of American prosperity have serious consequences for the environment.

A new book, titled "Road Ecology: Science and Solutions," is part of a move among ecologists and developers to find better answers to transportation problems. The book's 14 authors include leading specialists in transportation, ecology and hydrology.

"This 4 million-mile network gets into everybody's back yard," says Richard Forman, a landscape ecologist at Harvard University's design school and an author and editor of the book, due out Nov. 22. "It hit me in the face seven or eight years ago. …