Bird-safe Glass Challenge in Madison

February 5, 2024 Update: The bird-safe glass ordinance is officially upheld and in the clear! Read the blog article here.

The backstory: A group of Madison, Wisconsin-area developers, led by the Wisconsin Institute for Law and Liberty, filed the first-ever legal challenge to a bird-friendly building ordinance (Dane County Case Number 2021CV001729) on July 22, 2021. Read more: https://abcbirds.org/article/wisconsin-developers-sue-to-keep-designing-buildings-deadly-to-birds/

On April 1, 2022, American Bird Conservancy, Southern Wisconsin Bird Alliance (or SoWBA, then called Madison Audubon Society), and Wisconsin Society for Ornithology filed an amicus curiae, or “friend of the court.” The brief provided important background information for the judge by summarizing the conservation crisis that window collisions pose to birds, and discussed how solutions like Madison’s building ordinance can save birds’ lives. It also highlighted other municipalities that have enacted bird-friendly building ordinances without issue, and presented research showing that window collisions in Madison are a serious local threat to birds.

On August 16, 2022, a Dane County judge ruled that Madison’s Bird-safe Glass Ordinance, the first of its kind in Wisconsin, is allowable and within the parameters of Wisconsin’s state building code. “What's Good for Birds is Good for Wisconsin” said Judge Nia Trammell.

WILL filed an appeal on the ruling, sending it back to court.

On January 19, 2023, SoWBA, American Bird Conservancy, and Wisconsin Society for Ornithology filed an amicus brief providing the judge with key information about the bird collision crisis and why the ordinance is necessary to address it.

October 5, 2023 Update: A Wisconsin appellate court backed the City of Madison’s ordinance requiring the use of bird-safe glass. Read the article here.

February 5, 2024 Update: The bird-safe glass ordinance is officially upheld and in the clear! Read the blog article here.

The City of Madison, SoWBA, and partners worked to uphold the ordinance:

• The City of Madison is disputing WILL’s lawsuit. See their Brief in Support here.

• The City attorneys have submitted affidavits in support of the ordinance

• The City Plan Review and Inspection Supervisor has submitted an affidavit in support of the ordinance

• The City Building Inspector Director has submitted an affidavit in support of the ordinance

• American Bird Conservancy, SoWBA (at the time, called Madison Audubon), and Wisconsin Society for Ornithology filed two sets of amicus briefs providing essential context and background on why the ordinance is needed (more info below)

• Thousands of citizens signed the Bird-safe Glass Petition in support of the ordinance 
  

We will always choose to save birds. Read more here.

Up to one billion birds die from hitting windows each year in the United States alone. That’s a staggering number. And with more buildings using more glass, more birds are dying as a result.

This has been a known problem for a long, long time. The severity of the bird collisions problems has been documented in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. For example, Loss et al 2014 thoroughly examined hundreds of datasets that collectively demonstrate that huge numbers of birds die each year from hitting windows. It is the second-leading cause of human-caused bird deaths annually behind outdoor cats (2.4 billion birds/year). Between 600 and 900 million birds, and up to a billion birds, are killed each year following collisions with glass.

Listen to this great podcast, 99% Invisible: Murder Most Fowl, that describes the problem (32:18 minutes)

Listen to a report from March 4, 2021 from WORT FM below.

The ordinance has the potential to save countless birds, protect Wisconsin’s vibrant ecosystems, and support the mental well-being of building occupants and other citizens through dramatically reduced bird-window collisions and deaths.

Enter Bird Collision Corps

Since 2018, SoWBA has partnered with the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Dane County Humane Society’s Wildlife Center, American Bird Conservancy, and local businesses to explore where and how often bird-window collisions happen. This citizen science program, called the Bird Collision Corps, works with trained volunteers to monitor select buildings regularly for evidence of collisions and documents the occurrences.

Here is an interview about the need for a Bird Collision Corps, and why bird collisions matter:

During 2018-2020, over 5 survey periods, totaling 35 weeks, more than 1,300 hours of monitoring, and covering 22 buildings (plus 1 survey period with an additional 10 buildings), BCC volunteers documented 718 bird deaths and 44 injuries from window collisions. The number of documented window-caused bird deaths and species has continued to climb since. And our data represent just a snapshot, a small fraction of the buildings and window collisions in the Madison area. Indeed, given Madison’s unique natural features, including the abundance of water, multiple habitat types, and its location within one of the largest migratory flyways in the world (Mississippi Flyway), the Madison area attracts an incredibly high diversity of bird species. Based on the patterns we’ve seen with BCC and other monitoring studies, it’s likely that collisions with windows are killing tens of thousands of migratory birds every year - in Madison alone.

That’s simply not acceptable.

And here’s the thing—this is a solvable problem with simple solutions. Either reduce the amount of glass used or employ bird-friendly glass solutions. For example, many bird-friendly glass solutions use a patterns that break up the reflectiveness and transparency of the glass so birds can see it. This reduces collisions while still allowing sunlight and outdoor views to be enjoyed by people inside. In fact, many architects now use patterned glass both to reduce bird strikes and to add attractive design elements. Others are simply designing innovative buildings that don’t rely so much on large glass façades. More options and examples of bird-friendly design can be found here.

In 2020, the City of Madison unanimously passed, with overwhelming public support, a city ordinance requiring bird-friendly glass for new building construction projects larger than 10,000 square feet, sky bridges, and ground-level glass features such as sound walls or glass screens. SoWBA and many citizens supported the effort, and American Bird Conservancy, an international non-profit working on this issue and a partner in our Bird Collision Corps program, provided feedback on the ordinance to improve its bird protections.

This kind of ordinance is not new. Similar bird-friendly ordinances have passed in dozens of cities and municipalities, including New York City. In fact, New York City’s legislation is much more comprehensive—applying to new construction for any building, not just the big ones. Others have recently been proposed in both houses of Congress (Quigley/Griffith Federal Bird Safe Buildings Bill), multiple state legislatures, Chicago, and in many smaller municipalities. Madison adopted Wisconsin’s first bird-friendly glass ordinance, but another is under consideration in Wauwatosa, WI, where the developer of 20-story proposed building indicated they would be absolutely fine with using bird-friendly glass.

WILL represents five associations that are suing the City, citing added costs and conformity with the state’s uniform building code as primary objections. One of their main goals is to prevent other communities from making similar bird-friendly improvements to their communities’ building standards. According to WILL’s deputy counsel Dan Lennington, “The goal of this litigation is to settle this issue, statewide, once and for all…. If other cities choose to move ahead with their own local building requirements, then they will be injecting unnecessary uncertainty into future development projects.” Source: Milwaukee Business Journal.

We simply don’t agree.

WILL A NEW ORDINANCE BE DIFFICULT TO IMPLEMENT?

No. Municipalities, including the City of Madison, implement and enforce all sorts of building regulations on a daily basis. Many building projects involve much more complicated regulations than bird-friendly building design and yet do not face the same universal building code objections claimed by WILL’s clients.

The ordinance doesn’t dictate to developers that they can’t use glass or that they can’t use glass meeting the minimum standards in the uniform building code. They simply must use one of the many solutions available to make the glass better for birds and the public good. American Bird Conservancy’s solutions database lists many effective options, and there are other glass and non-glass options that follow bird-friendly building pattern and material rules that are not in the database - designers can be creative with the patterns and materials that they use and create beautiful buildings.

Finally, over the last decade, there are many other communities that have successfully implemented and enforced similar bird-friendly regulations. Indeed, there are 25 or so North American municipalities that have created bird-friendly building recommendations, and Madison’s is the first to face a legal challenge.

Ultimately, complying with the ordinance is not difficult.

What about the costs?

A primary argument opponents cite against bird-safe glass is cost. It’s important to note that you can build a bird-friendly building for zero additional cost. There are lots of ways to do so, and it normally means relying less on large banks of glass. For buildings that still choose to use lots of glass, there may be additional costs. However, opponents typically grossly inflate costs by comparing cheap glass with the most expensive bird-friendly glass technology available—and also apply it toward glass costs for the whole project, not just the sections requiring bird-safe solutions. Installing effective bird-safe glass can indeed add upfront cost, but often results in just a fractional increase in total project expense. After all, glass is just one of many, many parts of a whole building.

Importantly, the City of Madison ordinance also allows for many other solutions that simply cover large glass surfaces such as metal screens, fixed solar shading, exterior insect screens—all of which are are quite inexpensive. And the ordinance simply doesn’t apply to all buildings, rather just the ones that want large façades of glass.

The benefits of bird-friendly glass far outweigh any minimal upfront cost.

If glass cost is a concern, then considering bird safety during planning and construction is actually the best way to control it. For example, bird-friendly glass options and solutions are often much more energy efficient, passing on lifetime savings to renters and owners. Many types of patterned glass, for example, reflect solar energy and reduce overall energy consumption for cooling. Therefore, any upfront costs using bird-friendly glass can be recouped with sustained energy savings that benefit building owners and occupants.

Furthermore, National Audubon estimates that installing bird-safe glass during construction of the Minnesota Vikings Stadium would have cost developers an extra $1 million - and would have cost even less had they considered it earlier in the project. That sounds like a lot of money, but it’s less than 0.1% of the total project cost of more than $1 billion. Bird-friendly glass wasn’t installed on the stadium and it became the single biggest bird-killing building in Minneapolis and made national headlines. Now the cost of retrofitting the stadium to add bird-friendly window films to its deadly glass? Somewhere around $10 million.

The cost of doing nothing

We also need to consider the high costs we incur without an ordinance.

The cost of doing nothing while birds die is significantly higher than a fractional increase to building project costs. In addition to their immeasurable aesthetic, ethical, and cultural value:

1. Birds provide essential and extremely valuable ecosystem services, such as insect/pest control, pollination, seed dispersal, and nutrient cycling that benefit everyone. Birds provide them for free, and if we lose them they cannot be replaced with technology. Learn more about this here.

2. Birdwatching is multi BILLION-dollar industry in the United States, through tourism income (including places like Wisconsin), equipment sales, guide books, and employment. Learn more here.

3. Birds offer significant mental and physical health benefits, which have become even more apparent during the pandemic. Seeing birds provides positive impacts of nature experience on cognitive functioning, emotional well-being, and physical activity involved with hiking and birdwatching. Learn more here.

4. Bird-window collisions are unpleasant and disturbing. People often report to us feeling saddened, sickened, disturbed, startled, and alarmed by witnessing birds hitting windows. When large windows are added in places intended for rest and quiet, such as a school library, they have the potential for creating the opposite effect.

Quite simply, the costs of losing birds are far too high to bear.

Southern Wisconsin Bird Alliance (formerly Madison Audubon) has been working hard to support the City of Madison and other communities taking this important step to protect and steward our natural resources. One way we are doing that is by sharing the context and information about bird-window collisions with people like you. It’s important that people both understand the overwhelming need for this and similar ordinances, and that compliance isn’t as difficult as opponents make it seem. So, by reading about this issue, you’re already helping!

In response to the lawsuit against the bird-safe glass ordinance, you can show your support of the ordinance by:

1. Sign our declaration of support. Individuals, organizations, and companies are encouraged to express their support.

2. Share this webpage and our related blog posts (coming soon) on social media.

3. You can advocate for bird-friendly solutions where you live.

You can also make a difference in your own home or office by exploring ways to reduce the reflectivity and transparency of your windows. American Bird Conservancy has a wide variety of resources available for residential and commercial settings. There is also more information available HERE.

Thank you for supporting this work and for all the ways you care for birds.

Supporters of this work

Banner photo: Window collision victim, photo by Crystal Sutheimer, Bird Collision Corps volunteer