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Requiem For a Dream Season
About a year ago Seattlest drove down to San Francisco and saw some of the touristy sights -the most mainstream among them being the bridge they've got down there: Golden something-or-other. It was cool. It's a great bridge and there are some pretty neat views available from it if you walk out there, and walking out there is generally encouraged by the wide walking path. One of the things that struck us as being particularly photo-worthy, though, was the emergency telephone we passed by. "If you're about to jump pick up the phone," or something like that it said. The Golden Gate is San Francisco's suicide hotspot.
Seattle's suicide hotspot is the Aurora Bridge, as was pointed out by today's incarnation of the jumpers article that appears from time to time in the papers. Seattlest has never walked across the Aurora Bridge. It's not that we don't think that it's a nice bridge and that we wouldn't enjoy the views from up there. We're sure we would. It's that damn walking path. Pedestrians get about three feet of space on the Aurora Bridge. On one side is a tiny railing and on the other side is speeding traffic. Okay, they did put in that little concrete barrier last year. Now you have about two and a half feet of walking room and three foot barriers between you and certain death on either side. It's no wonder that leapers chose the Aurora with frequency: It takes a certain nonchalance towards death to even walk across the thing. Nonetheless, it's on our todo list of crazy Seattle stunts to perform "someday." Even driving over it is an exercise in strict lane-adherence that tests the limits of our ability to drive a straight line.
The P-I article suggests that emergency phones and "Don't do it" signs are overdue on the Aurora Bridge, and that's probably true. They also bring up the physical barrier that has never gotten enough support to actually be installed even in San Francisco. But what about just closing the Arurora Bridge to foot and pedal traffic altogether? Very few people cross the thing on foot, we've found, although that's more of a feeling than actual fact. Who needs to get from Queen Anne to Aurora Ave N on foot?
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Barrier. B-A-R-R-I-E-R. Barrier.
You're right. And I misspelled "adherence" as well. So far the world has not ended, but keep your fingers crossed.
I use the bridge to get from my house in upper fremont to downtown all the time when travelling by bike. You don't have to lose all the elevation of going down over the fremont bridge and then over Dexter.
I also walk out the bridge to look at the views every once in a while.
If a jumper is going to jump they're going to jump fucking with the Aurora bridge is a horrible idea.
People have been jumping off the Aurora bridge since they built it.
I'm more concerned with the inordinant amount of crazy accidental deaths on the Ballard Bridge. Remeber that girl in the Jeep; and the Safeway lady? Utility ladder to the head on your way to Ballard is no way to go.
So here's my solution: How about we paint a target in the parking lot of the Bleitz funeral home? Save a few steps.
If we were a sane society we'd just have special suicide booths that emit a fatal gas, like they do in Sweden (probably).
You guys are either some cold motherfuckers or you're fronting. I can't believe that saving yourself the bike ride down Fremont Ave and up Dexter is worth a few lives a year to you.
We could be cold motherfuckers fronting, but there might also be the issue that the preventative effect is not worth the trouble. According to the P-I, most of the people who have jumped had records of psychiatric treatment. There is no certainty, in these cases, then, that call boxes, signs, fences or nets would save lives; it would just prevent them from using the Aurora Bridge as a means to their ends. With that as a premise, it might not be worth it to close the bridge to foot traffic entirely if it doesn't really save lives, if it only forces the victims to pursue suicide by other means.
I figured it was YOU who was fronting, Dan!!
You're suggesting eliminating one of a handful of pedestrian/bike connections in this split-in-two city??
No way!
busted. Actually I am fronting. I'm not sure that closing the Aurora Bridge to foot traffic is a good idea, but I do think it could be looked into. Seriously, there is very very little traffic in those pedestrian lanes.
As things stand jumping from that bridge has got to be the easiest way to off yourself in the city and it's my understanding that a lot of suicides are crime of convenience-type things that can be prevented by making things just a little more difficult.
Did the photographer for that article use a Lensbaby to take those shots? That's not something I'd thought I'd see in a newspaper.
If they were photoshopped to look like that, you'd think they would be labeled 'photo illustration.'
Nice - thanks for mentioning that. It struck me as well. The photos that accompany that article look remarkably similar to this technique, which I thought was weird but since it's kind of unfamiliar water for me I didn't say anything about it.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/dayart/20061002/450suicide_aurora_2.jpg
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/dayart/20061002/450suicide_lot.jpg
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/dayart/20061002/450suicide_memorial.jpg
I think they look great.
This is long overdue. The Golden Gate Bridge has had callboxes for a long time. I work for the Crisis Clinic, and I have long been an advocate of placing boxes with a direct connection to the Crisis Clinic on the Aurora Bridge. If it saves even one life, then it is worth it!
Though they look like Lensbaby photos, I'd bet that those hard core photogs at the P-I use tilt-shift lens. Same effect, more expensive.