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Football fans were reveling over the design of the new Vikings stadium this week, but bird watchers remain skeptical.

Glass, they say, kills birds. And it looks like there's a LOT of glass on that new stadium.

The issue actually came up back in November, in a review of the stadium project's proposed environmental impact statement 

Then, Minnesota DNR Regional Environmental Assessment Ecologist Melissa Doperalski noted the potential for bird strikes at the new stadium: "The DNR would like to encourage project designers to consider bird friendly building designs that would help to reduce the potential for a bird collision to occur," Doperalski wrote to the Minnesota Sports Facilities Authority.

Is the new stadium design "bird friendly?"

That remains to be seen. As Tom Fisher, the dean of the College of Design at the University of Minnesota noted on Monday, the new stadium may have the largest transparent doors and roof in the world. It also seems to have another potentially dangerous feature for birds -- glass on both ends of the building, offering the illusion that they can fly all the way through it.

Mark Martell, director of bird conservation with the 

, says the design certainly got his organization's attention. "It's an amazing structure," he said. And it may pose a problem:

But he also said that they hope to work with the architects and planners working on the stadium to come up with something that might minimize the danger to passing flyers. The Audubon Society actually has a 

 for making buildings with glass more "bird safe." Ideas include exterior shading and using pattered or translucent glass. Martell says Audubon would still like that to be part of the stadium design process.

MSFA spokeswoman Jennifer Hathaway says the stadium authority is meeting with the Audubon society at the end month to discuss the matter. The DNR is currently reviewing the MSFA's full Environmental Impact Statement, and is expecting to respond on the bird collision issue by the second week in June.

Tim Nelson

Author

Football fans were reveling over the design of the new Vikings stadium this week, but bird watchers remain skeptical. Glass, they say, kills birds. And it looks like there’s a LOT of glass on that new stadium. The issue actually came up back in November, in a review of the stadium project’s proposed environmental impact…

Birders worry about glassy new Vikings stadium design

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