Originally published May 22, 1998
Once again, Davis' trend-setting toad tunnel has attracted the attention of the national media, this time a television crew from ''The Daily Show,'' a satirical news program broadcast on the Comedy Central cable channel.
''It seems funny to me because I don't think the toad tunnel is such a big deal,'' said City Councilwoman Julie Partansky, who first came up with the idea. ''I guess I'm so used to living in Davis and knowing people who are more, I guess, imaginative than other parts of the country.''
The $13,000, 220-foot-long project designed to help frogs and toads migrate to their Core Pond habitat without the threat of being crushed beneath the wheels of cars on the nearby Pole Line Road overcrossing has been the subject of much media attention since its installation in 1996.
At the eastern end of the tunnel, actually a standard metal drainage culvert, sits Toad Hollow, the brainchild of Davis postmaster Ted Puntillo, which features a hotel, brew pub, swimming pool and outhouse.
As Puntillo put it, the toad tunnel is ''just the story that won't die.''
''America should know about it,'' said Steven Albani, a publicist at Comedy Central's New Yor...