Crayfish Endangers Hurricane Evacuation Route

Here's the "Biological Status Report" (April 2006) for the Panama City Crayfish, which is an attempt to document the rationale for upgrading it to state level "Threatened". Here are some quotes from the report:


..."However, I think that it is abundantly evident that there is an overwhelming lack of biological and life history data available for this species. "

Hey, but let's go ahead and move it up higher on the endangered list so we can impose additional regulations on everyone!

All: There are many unknown consequences to PCC if the proposed Gulf Coast Parkway is built. There will be habitat loss and direct take of PCC along Star Avenue, Nehi Road, and Tram Road It is unknown whether DOT has a mitigation plan for these losses. Also unknown is whether the mitigation would be enough to recover the PCC population size to pre-construction levels. It was agreed that the proposed road expansion be monitored closely to alleviate negative impacts to PCC.

So, a popular hurricane evacuation route expansion that would improve safety for humans might be slowed down by bureaucracy as they try to maintain the human-made ditches beside this road for crayfish habitat!