Thousands of people who pass over the Golden Gate Bridge likely didn’t notice the four new metal protrusions on its western and eastern flanks. Kymberlyrenee Gamboa did.
For the Fair Oaks resident, the four support beams were evidence that the bridge’s ambitious suicide barrier was actually beginning to take form — a project Gamboa and her family had wished was already completed before her 18-year-old son, Kyle, jumped off the bridge five years ago and died.
“It was pretty emotional for everybody that has been involved to actually physically see something out there,” Kymberlyrenee Gamboa said. “Because it does take so much time with the planning and with the design and with the fabrication before you actually see something on the bridge that says, ‘Hey, this project is actually moving forward.’”
At a size of more than 380,000 square feet and costing about $200 million, the barrier is set to be completed in January 2021.
“This is the largest suicide deterrent net installation in the world, especially in the country,” said Ewa Bauer Furbush, the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District’s chief engineer. “It is a technically complex project that requires a lot of effort from all vendors of the project team that are involved in bringing this to completion.”
‘We can’t build it fast enough’
The suicide net, which will be located 20 feet below the top deck on each side of the bridge and extend 20 feet out, seeks to address a longstanding suicide problem that has existed since the bridge’s opening in 1937.
Steven Miller, the bridge district’s bridge manager, said an estimated 1,700 people have killed themselves by jumping off the bridge since its construction.
Bridge patrol officers encounter jumpers at a rate of once every other day, if not every day, Miller said. The patrol staff is usually able to intervene in time to prevent this, but not always.
“The suicides take a toll on everyone here,” Miller said, “the patrol officers especially. So everyone here is looking forward to a day when we don’t have to be involved in that tragedy of suicide. Everyone here is happy to see it coming and looking forward to it.
“Quite frankly, in my mind, we can’t build it fast enough,” Miller said of the barrier.
A peak of suicide attempts occurred just in 2017, with 280 people having gone to the bridge with the purpose of killing themselves, according to the district General Manager Denis Mulligan. Bridge security were able to intervene for the majority of those people, about 245, but there were still 33 confirmed suicides that year.
The peak of confirmed suicides occurred within this decade as well, with 46 confirmed cases in 2013, Miller said.
In 2018, there were more than 200 attempts, with 187 interventions and 27 confirmed suicides, according to district data.
“I think the trend is that similar number of people are showing up but we’re doing a much better job at intervening,” Miller said.
The barrier is meant to be as much a mental deterrent as a physical one, Miller said.
The barrier’s net is made of metal, so the fall will result in injury to the person attempting to jump. The net won’t prevent people from jumping from the barrier, but it will give more time for patrol officers to intervene.
“Folks that want to commit suicide, they don’t want to injure themselves. They want it to be over,” Miller said. “There seems to be a lore with the bridge that if you jump off the bridge it’s somehow an easy death. The reality of it is it’s not an easy way to end your life. It’s actually a quite painful and gruesome way.”
The nearly 250-foot plunge to the bay occurs in a matter of seconds, with the person falling at a terminal velocity of 75 miles per hour. The impact does not always result in death, resulting instead in fractured or broken bones and internal bleeding. Jumpers who are not rescued risk drowning.
In his 20-month tenure as bridge manager, Miller said, four people have survived the jump.
Miller said the rescues and interventions by the bridge patrol, the California Highway Patrol, Southern Marin firefighters and the Coast Guard are “downright heroic.”
The barrier, Miller said, is a testament to the community’s will to solve this issue.
“It’s certainly a remarkable feat to do a project of this magnitude,” he said.
Making the barrier
Construction of the barrier began in late 2018, but the project is more complex than installing support beams and the net, which alone is a nearly $190 million endeavor.
Another $19 million will be spent on a wind retrofit of the bridge. The bridge can withstand sustained winds of up to 70 mph from the west, but the barrier would change this, according to the Bauer Furbush, the bridge district’s chief engineer.
“We cannot hang the net of the west side of the bridge until the main span of the bridge is retrofitted for high wind,” she said.
The district will be installing steel wind fairings on the outside western side of the bridge near the sidewalks. In addition, the railing along the sidewalk will be replaced with thinner pickets to allow more area for wind to pass through, Bauer Furbush said.
The bridge’s travelers, which wrap on the sides of the bridge and pass through the underside to allow for maintenance work, are also having to be replaced with smaller units. New railings are also being installed to allow the travelers to move along the side of the bridge. The new units will be all-electric compared to the current combustion engine-powered travelers.
As for the barrier, the metal support beams will be installed first and painted the iconic international orange. The metal net and border cables will then be installed, with the net remaining gray so as to blend in with the ocean waters below.
The district has created a mockup net at its corporate yard in Richmond to allow workers to train in the installation process as the steel supports could be damaged if done incorrectly.
The condition of the barrier will be monitored over the next five years, with maintenance costs estimated to be about $4 million annually.
Funding came from the following sources: $74 million from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, $70 million from Caltrans, $60 million from Golden Gate Bridge District revenue and $7 million from the state.
Late last month, Gamboa was among a group of family members whose loved ones had also made the fatal jump from the bridge that traveled to Richmond on Jan. 31 to see a prototype of the barrier.
It was an emotional moment for many of them to see the frame of metallic parts. As a former engineer for Sacramento County, Gamboa said she has been very impressed with the meticulous approach to this long-awaited project.
For Gamboa, seeing the prototype was a big milestone.
“I’m just really pleased with how the district has handled this project,” she said.
