Suicides only happen off of Golden Gate Bridge

[zagloba]

Yeah, I hadn’t heard of such an increase either (I live in San Jose). Thanks for the clarification.

[Weirddave]

@Kyla

$12?? There’d better be something fucking awesome on the other side to pay $12 to cross a bridge.

Well, there’s a lot of chicken farms on Virginia’s eastern shore…

Seriously, the Chesapeake Bay Bridge/Tunnel is really mindboggling if you’re interested in these types of things, the History Channel did an hour long “Modern Marvels” show about it that’s well worth seeing if you get the chance.

As for the Baltimore area tunnels/bridges, the MTA has a brief history of each of them available online:

William Preston Lane Jr. Memorial (Bay) Bridge (1952)
Baltimore Harbor Tunnel(1957)
Frances Scott Key Bridge(1977)
Fort McHenry Tunnel(1985)

[GorillaMan]

@Pullet

GorrillaMan, you seem to be arguing that the state should pay to keep temporarily irrational people from hurting themselves.

Absolutely. Don’t most countries have systems in place to forcibly hospitalise people in such a position?

What I don’t understand is why that applies only to bridges and how the state is supposed to tell if they really are temporarily insane or if they’ve rationally chosen to die because they have incurable cancer.

That’s a decision that can be made, but above the SF bay isn’t a good place to make it. Better to err on the side of caution.

Won’t that just lead to more creative suicide methods?

In a minority of cases, yes. But it’ll stop others.

Yes, one could argue that family and loved ones are damaged mentally by a suicide, but I bet what pains them most is their own guilty conscience.

I very much doubt it.

[Voyager]

@Kyla

Biffy, d’oh, thanks. Clearly, I’ve been in Chicago too long. Still, my point stands, the Golden Gate is the only bridge that permits pedestrians.

No, pedestrians and bicyclists are permitted on the Dumbarton bridge. The south side of it has a pedestrian/bicycle roadway. (I used to go over this for work every day, and I walked some of the way on it from the sanctuary on the East side.) I think it is a lot lower than the Golden Gate, so the chances of dying are less. I don’t know if anyone has ever jumped from it - I haven’t heard of any cases in eight years.