Illinois Department of Transportation's Seeding Standards and Best Management Practices

The Illinois Department of Transportation maintains nearly 16,000 miles of roadways and adjacent right-of-way, including significant acreage of vegetated ROW. Much of this vegetated land has been seeded with non-native turfgrass, planted to stabilize soils and to provide a zone of low-statured vegetation as a safe recovery zone for vehicles leaving the pavement. Not much is known about the long-term outcomes of IDOT’s ROW plantings. The effectiveness of roadside seeding is rarely evaluated beyond short-term assessments. In one long-term study in Illinois, seeded grasses comprised approximately 26-34% of plant cover in IDOT Class 4 and 5 native plantings, and seeded forbs comprised 4-10% of cover (Busby 2014). However, this study did not investigate whether species richness, seeded plant cover, or invasive plant cover correlated with environmental conditions at the planting site. The rationale for this project is that by combining a survey of previous ROW plantings in Illinois with field trails of planting mixtures, researchers will be able to recommend cost-effective seeding mixtures and planting recommendations for revegetation of ROW in various environmental settings (e.g., moisture, soil type, and aspect). The overall goal is to provide knowledge that will guide new recommendations to enhance seeding success and minimize the spread of invasive plants in ROW areas.

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $269953
• Contract Numbers:

  R27-255

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Illinois Department of Transportation

  Bureau of Materials and Physical Research
  126 East Ash Street
  Springfield, IL  United States  62704-4766
• Managing Organizations:

  University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

  Illinois Center for Transportation
  1611 Titan Drive
  Rantoul, IL  United States  61866
• Principal Investigators:

  Matthews, Jeffrey

  Bhattarai, Rabin

• Start Date: 20220816
• Expected Completion Date: 20250815
• Actual Completion Date: 0

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Best practices; Invasive plants; Planting; Right of way (Land); Seeding; Vegetation
• Identifier Terms: Illinois Department of Transportation
• Geographic Terms: Illinois
• Subject Areas: Environment; Highways;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01854731
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Illinois Department of Transportation
• Contract Numbers: R27-255
• Files: RIP, STATEDOT
• Created Date: Aug 16 2022 4:47PM