Raise the Rails - Save a Life
This is our second petition to the Golden Gate Bridge District. We submitted our first one to be included in the Environmental Impact Report about the various designs of possible barriers. Please read the updated information!
Our family's youngest son, Matthew, disappeared in November 2007. It is believed that he ended his life by jumping from the Golden Gate Bridge. No body was ever recovered after a young man was seen jumping off the bridge on November 15th. Many people are not ever seen to jump (22%) and of those seen to jump, many bodies are never recovered (15%).
Matthew is still listed as missing, not dead and not a suicide.
On the first petition over two-thirds of our states were represented. People from the countries of Belize, Canada, Greece, France, Thailand, Germany, Romania, Switzerland, Turkey, Sweden, Somalia, the Netherlands, Tunisia, Serbia and Montenegro, the United Kingdom, Italy and the Republic of Korea were represented on that petition.
All the comments that signers wrote are included in the petition, including:
~This is a matter of public safety and social responsibility.
~This is a matter of life, not looks.
~The easy access to death needs to be eliminated.
~It is essential to provide safe and secure public facilities in respect for people affected by any disability.
From the Executive Summary of the newly created Office of Suicide Prevention here in California, the department Strategic Plan for Suicide Prevention is called:
Every Californian is Part of the Solution . This plan states one of its goals is to raise awareness that suicide is preventable and to create an environment that supports suicide prevention and help-seeking behaviors.
Reducing access to lethal means is an important component in their campaign because, and I quote from this summary:
Almost half of survivors of suicide attempts reported less than one hour passed between the decision to complete suicide and the actual attempt. Another 24% reported that time was less than 5 minutes.
Restricting access to lethal means can put time between the impulse to complete suicide and the act itself, allowing opportunities for the impulse to subside, or warning signs to be recognized.
We need the Golden Gate Bridge District to approve one of the 5 barrier options for the pedestrian walkway to give mentally ill people in crisis more than one last hour of life. They will make a decision this October!
Please sign this and pass it on!
This is our second petition to the Golden Gate Bridge District. We submitted our first one to be included in the Environmental Impact Report about the various designs of possible barriers. Please read the updated information!
Our family's youngest son, Matthew, disappeared in November 2007. It is believed that he ended his life by jumping from the Golden Gate Bridge. No body was ever recovered after a young man was seen jumping off the bridge on November 15th. Many people are not ever seen to jump (22%) and of those seen to jump, many bodies are never recovered (15%).
Matthew is still listed as missing, not dead and not a suicide.
On the first petition over two-thirds of our states were represented. People from the countries of Belize, Canada, Greece, France, Thailand, Germany, Romania, Switzerland, Turkey, Sweden, Somalia, the Netherlands, Tunisia, Serbia and Montenegro, the United Kingdom, Italy and the Republic of Korea were represented on that petition.
All the comments that signers wrote are included in the petition, including:
~This is a matter of public safety and social responsibility.
~This is a matter of life, not looks.
~The easy access to death needs to be eliminated.
~It is essential to provide safe and secure public facilities in respect for people affected by any disability.
From the Executive Summary of the newly created Office of Suicide Prevention here in California, the department Strategic Plan for Suicide Prevention is called:
Every Californian is Part of the Solution . This plan states one of its goals is to raise awareness that suicide is preventable and to create an environment that supports suicide prevention and help-seeking behaviors.
Reducing access to lethal means is an important component in their campaign because, and I quote from this summary:
Almost half of survivors of suicide attempts reported less than one hour passed between the decision to complete suicide and the actual attempt. Another 24% reported that time was less than 5 minutes.
Restricting access to lethal means can put time between the impulse to complete suicide and the act itself, allowing opportunities for the impulse to subside, or warning signs to be recognized.
We need the Golden Gate Bridge District to approve one of the 5 barrier options for the pedestrian walkway to give mentally ill people in crisis more than one last hour of life. They will make a decision this October!
Please sign this and pass it on!
As Board of Directors you have been aware of the high potential and actuality for suicides from the Golden Gate Bridge for 70 years. Now you are aware of so much more regarding mental illness and suicide prevention.
- You have been presented with documentation from the California Department of Suicide Prevention that shows reduction of lethal means prevents death.
- You have the facts that there is a time limitation of the impulse for suicide.
- You have the facts from multiple studies from the United States and around the world that provide proof that barriers on bridges stop suicides without increasing the numbers elsewhere.
Now is the time for action and the best opportunity to help stop mentally ill and desperate people from making an impulsive, irrational choice to take their lives in such an easy manner and effect hundreds of other lives in the wake.
You need to join the world that recognizes every life is important and is raising the railings and placing barriers on their bridges to save lives!
Please, Raise the Rails on the Golden Gate Bridge and Save Lives !
I have only lost one patient over the rail; another tried and was detained, never to try again. The person who leapt to her death did it on an impulse, pulling her Park Service vehicle to the side, hopping out, and jumping. She was an amazingly bright, talented woman; a total loss for her parents, and an only child. It rips the heart from families, friends, all who wish they had been able to help and whose lives are changed irrevocably. The barrier must be accomplished. Such a disgrace after all these years. EG, M.D.
Save it all...lives...bridge...the beauty in both things are extraordinary.
Please do what you can to keep our beautiful bridge from being associated with the number one suicide site
Suicide is an epidemic and is a sickness just like cancer. Won't you please help us - surviving moms, dads, aunts, friends, etc and maybe you can save one more person from jumping off the GGB. Thank You
Nothing is more important than a life including the looks of a bridge.
Save a life, save yourself!
Too many people lose their lives to suicide by means of easy access to guns, high bridges without adequate railings, etc., etc. Even one life is too many. Many people may have still been with us if easy access to a life-ending situation wasn't so easily within reach. PLEASE raise the bridge railings. Martha Ivey, mother of a beautiful son lost to suicide.
Having lost a daughter to suicide(by means other than jumping), I know firsthand the pain of a parent whose child chooses this means to asuage their own pain. I cannot stress enough how important it is to make it as difficult as possible for our young people to commit suicide. Adding barriers to the bridge is one way of doing this. What if it were your child or grandchild who was thinking of jumping? How would you feel about it then? It so easily could be someone you love.
I am 100% in favor of a bridge rail barrier. We know of 1300 suicides from the GG Bridge - I am sure many more have actually jumped and were not seen. I lost three relatives to suicide in the 1980s on the east coast. Any step we can take to prevent the loss of life by suicide is something we must do! Thank you, Bridge Rail Foundation, for your hard work to make the barrier happen!
Think of the lives you could save every year by doing one simple thing as raising the rails. As a mother who lost a son unnecessarily, I can attest that if you can save one mother/fathers child, it would make such a difference in so many lives.
I recently watched a documentary on UK TV about the suicides on the Bridge. It showed people jumping and I could not beleive how low the rails are for such a huge high bridge, making it so unsafe and easy for people to climb over. It makes sense to raise the rails to deter jumpers!
It's all in your hands really. These people either get to have another chance at life, or they get to die. A friend of mine took the latter option, but that's not why I'm singing this. I'm singing this to wash the blood off my hands. It's in your hands now.
Please look at the results in Europe and elsewhere for compelling evidence that barriers work.
We have the same problem with the Chesapeake Bay Bridge from Annapolis to Maryland's Eastern Shore. Maybe this could start a movement nationwide.
If a barrier could save one life, how can there be any question about building it?
Please restore Strauss' original vision of a "suicide-proof" bridge. No one now knows why his original railings were replaced with the current much shorter, far more dangerous version, but it's long past time we corrected this mistake. The research is clear -- we have a greater degree of certainty that installing a barrier on the Golden Gate will save lives and prevent suffering than with any other use we could put that money and time to in this state. Let's make this the year that the Bridge is finally restored to its original design.
