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Six months after a mesh barrier was installed on the Cold Sp...

Comments in order of when they were received | (reverse order)

ROGER DODGER	2012-09-07 10:55 PM
That was a waste of money.
COMMENT 317440P	2012-09-07 11:06 PM
It was inevitable too.
COMMENT 317441P	2012-09-07 11:09 PM
Saving lives is not a waste of money. Sorry. And it is an "apparent" suicide - the facts are not yet known.
COMMENT 317444P	2012-09-08 01:39 AM
Anyone with any sense knew it was a waste of money from the git-go. People who are determined will find a way. You cannot make the world safe for everyone.
COMMENT 317449P	2012-09-08 06:33 AM
I think the barrier may indeed thwart at least one or two suicides over the future years. So as much as I did not like the barrier and disagree with how much money spent, it will save a life someday and that makes it worth it.
COMMENT 317450	2012-09-08 06:39 AM
"If it saves only one life" is the prime example of how feel good emotional arguments have ruined Government. Anyone with half a brain could have seen this coming... Even a moderately fit person could just climb on the roof of their car to scale the barrier.
COMMENT 317449P	2012-09-08 06:46 AM
317450: I know....it's crazy, right? ;)
COMMENT 317460P	2012-09-08 06:54 AM
Okay, that's it! That bridge is just too much of a temptation for suicidal people. The barrier doesn't work, as anyone with half a brain could have predicted. (And did). Time to simply tear the bridge down and direct traffic over the narrow, winding Stagecoach Road instead. NO MORE BRIDGE! We must be protected from ourselves.
ROGER DODGER	2012-09-08 06:56 AM
@441P Will it sounds to me that the ugly South Central style barrier did not stop someone from going over anyway. Whos life did it save? Maybe they should take it down and sell it for scrap. Of course that is just my opinion which I am entitled too..
COMMENT 317470P	2012-09-08 07:19 AM
Aaack. Monday morning quarterbacking!
COMMENT 317479	2012-09-08 07:44 AM
I just wonder at the double standard we have in this country: we want to prevent suicides but still impose the death penalty at the drop of a hat. We cry out for the protection of fetuses but go to war on the slightest provocation. We proclaim the sanctity of life but feel perfectly justified to have tools for the taking of life and cheer their use. We proclaim a love of God but ignore His Commandments.... well, ignore our keeping to them but hold our neighbours to keeping them rigorously. We are worse than Vegans who eat a BigMac or Quarter Pounder at least once a week. This post will be removed in .....1 ......2 ......3
COMMENT 317483	2012-09-08 07:57 AM
I'm very sorry to say, I drove across the bridge (as a passenger) about a month ago. I saw the barrier for the first time, up close and personal. My very first thought was, "All someone has to do is to climb around and over a small chain link fence, walk out onto the "barrier", and jump"! My second thought (feeling) was appreciation for the barrier because I've always felt just a little scared driving over that bridge, thinking that if someone caused an accident and crashed into me, it was a long way down there. Now, with the barrier it somehow feels safer for driving. Obviously, it's not working for its intended purpose, and I feel very sad and sorry for the victim and his family. There is help out there, and I hope that people who need the help will reach out and get it.
ROGER DODGER	2012-09-08 08:11 AM
@479..Please feel free to leave me out of your "We" I am for the death penality, I'm pro choice, Aganist war unless it's necessary, and I think if you have a terminal illness and you want to exit this life it's no ones business but yours..I'm certainly not vegan but I eat both vegan and meat. @470 is in the lead..
COMMENT 317495	2012-09-08 08:33 AM
444 hit the nail on the head. People who want to die are gonna kill themselves. We can't protect them from the world. If we could afford it, would we really fence in all the railroad right of ways, all the lakes and ocean fronts, all the balconies of every high rise building, and pay for "monitors" for these fences to prevent suicides from ever happening? C'mon folks. Unless you're his/her family member, you'll feel sad about this Cold Springs jumper for a moment or two, but by tomorrow, he/she'll be forgotten like the scores of others who jumped. That's reality. We're all gonna die. Some of us just choose to die earlier than we felt they had to.
COMMENT 317499	2012-09-08 08:48 AM
479, I did not see your post as something that should be removed. Indeed, I found it to be a supremely cogent, respectful expression of the painful contradictions in our society's supposed values systems and lip service to life with little true respect for it. If everyone worked on understanding what you explained, our world would be so different. Thanks for hitting the nail on the head!
COMMENT 317503	2012-09-08 08:52 AM
Obviously CalTrans should have incapsulated the entire length of the bridge in a clear plexiglass tube. It would be a win win. The Gov. would get to spend money, drivers could keep the views, and the bleeding hearts could forget about the Cold Springs Bridge suicide threat and find a new threat to fix on their journey to perfect the world. @479 We live in a schizophrenic and hypocritical country. It sure makes life entertaining.
REDTOP	2012-09-08 09:12 AM
As a mother of a son who has attempted suicide twice, I KNOW the bridge barrier is a good thing. It is an impediment to a rash act. Mentally ill people need our help.....whatever it takes. Period.
COMMENT 317513	2012-09-08 09:25 AM
Mentally ill are getting help . We are letting them express themselves on edhat.
COMMENT 317519	2012-09-08 09:50 AM
Anyone with half a brain knew this barrier would be useless. But the government is brilliant about squandering money not theirs to squander. Prevent suicides? Should the ocean be roped off, piers barracaded ? Should the freeway be blown up? Should cars be eliminated? Sleeping pills, guns, gas, razor blades outlawed ? There is no sense in bringiong up the death penalty. The death penalty punishes a criminal who wantonly destroys the life another, not his or her own. In war iit is kill or be killed, and a man or woman has that choice to make herself. As does a potential suicide. I don't know why I am even commenting here. Must be boredom.
ANIMALLISTNER	2012-09-08 10:16 AM
Sad that another soul felt the need to check out! RIP!
COMMENT 317527	2012-09-08 10:28 AM
It's not Monday morning quarterbacking when on Saturday the majority of people were saying it would be wasteful and ineffective.
SHOREBIRD	2012-09-08 10:32 AM
I know of a person who killed himself with bread while in jail on 15 minute checks. (not SB jail). He wadded up the bread into a tight ball, pushed it down his throat and took a little drink of water. The bread expanded. CPR was ineffective due to the bread wad in this airway/esophagus. If there's a will there's a way.
COMMENT 317530P	2012-09-08 10:38 AM
I was opposed to the initial plans for the barrier, but since they changed it and I have driven over the bridge a number of times, feeling much safer, I support it. If everyone on that road drove as though it were a scenic road, as it is, the bridge would have been a pleasure to drive; but that's not how people drive 154. As for the suicides and the clear deterrence quality of bridge barriers, if it causes people to pause and think, that's a good thing. If there was a suicide, sorry for the family but sometimes it's the best way out from impossible to bear pain. Much nicer, though, to not put other people in harm's way as jumping from that bridge does.
COMMENT 317531P	2012-09-08 10:38 AM
As the daughter of a mother who successfully committed suicide via gun, I KNEW the bridge was a bad idea. It won't solve any underlying problems and truly suicidal people will find another way. Or even the same old way - as shown by this article.
COMMENT 317530P	2012-09-08 10:41 AM
Noozhawk article.
COMMENT 317537P	2012-09-08 10:52 AM
The story is misleading when it says the barrier was a $778,000 project. That was only the actual cost of construction. The whole boondoggle cost the taxpayers about $4 million. The difference went for Caltrans salaries, studies, plans, reports and legal fees. Your tax dollars at work!
ROGER DODGER	2012-09-08 10:53 AM
@519 I really enjoyed reading your comment it was almost like a poem. Thank You
COMMENT 317539P	2012-09-08 10:55 AM
Lightweight aluminum ladders by the hour at the view point just before the bridge. Ask for Jimmy if you don't see one.
COMMENT 317499	2012-09-08 11:38 AM
19 and 79 for President. Or at least moral advisors to those in power. Thanks for helping us, at least those of us willing to take a breath and wait long enough to listen, give thought to systemic blind spots and hypocrisies. Where in our system are the openings for philosophies and moral examinations? Missing in our current system and debates. Just pro-life holier than thou screamers drowning out reason.
COMMENT 317574	2012-09-08 11:55 AM
People have the right to end their own lives, and I fully regard suicide as one of our god-given freedoms. I do not hike around the canyon at the base of the Cold Springs Bridge, so getting hit by falling bodies is pretty unlikely. I resent the money spent on the mesh barrier, which we’ve now seen is useless. However, I do walk on Anacapa. Even though I support their right to suicide, I do not wish to be killed in the process by a falling body as it plummets to earth. Mesh around the courthouse tower is money well spent.
COMMENT 317591	2012-09-08 12:21 PM
@519 exactly!! Where there's a will there's a way. They can't even prevent suicides in prison, so let's not turn our society into a prison trying! RIP.
COMMENT 317596P	2012-09-08 12:28 PM
I think people just want to feel better, not end their lives. If they could feel better, emotionally & physically, they would NOT want to die.
COMMENT 317612	2012-09-08 01:02 PM
596, maybe the people around the suffering, hyper sensitive soul is making them sick. It really hurts when your own family is just one big owie!
COMMENT 317622	2012-09-08 01:16 PM
@317441P There are numerous ways that the same money could have been used to save far more lives, so it is factually, objectively, a waste of money.
COMMENT 317633	2012-09-08 01:30 PM
$800,000 and the suicide rate from the bridge is the same as before the barricade. The barricade has failed in its purpose. Supporters of the barricade must admit their solution to the problem has failed.
COMMENT 317441P	2012-09-08 03:19 PM
"“There were no witnesses, so we don’t know exactly how he got over/past the barrier,” Williams said late Friday." Maybe he climbed up from the bottom and jumped. They need cameras. But at least he landed on Stagecoach road, which was a lot easier for rescue teams.
COMMENT 317735	2012-09-08 04:56 PM
How did people kill themselves before guns, pills and overpasses?
COMMENT 317749	2012-09-08 05:51 PM
@483, that little screen isn't going to keep your multi-thousand pound vehicle from going over. Also, I don't recall any reports of vehicles going off the bridge in a scenario like the one you described. Or any scenario, for that matter. The bridge is straight and the physics of collisions don't add up to a situation where a car is going to get flung off unless something extraordinary happens. The rails are higher than the center of gravity of most vehicles so you'll just bounce back onto the road if you hit one. You'd have to be in a tall vehicle and run up the front of a low, wedge-shaped vehicle and turn your vehicle towards the edge at just the right moment, having sufficient speed to launch enough over your vehicle over the rail to tip over. It just isn't likely to happen. And, if it does, you'll probably have enough momentum to tear right thru that flimsy barrier.
SPARKEY	2012-09-08 08:00 PM
No deleted comments so far, I'm impressed! I too resent the money spent on the barrier. At this rate, the barrier has increased the number of jumpers on the bridge. You could say it has given jumpers an extra 10' to fall. Interesting that I haven't seen Marc McGinnes comment so far. Maybe they will hold a vote and remove the damn thing and put a net underneath instead.
COMMENT 317519	2012-09-09 06:22 AM
735 Hanging, drowning, jumping off a cliff, poison, with a bullet, stepping in front of a train, fasting, opening a crucial artery...........
COMMENT 317982	2012-09-09 03:21 PM
Someone I know had an interesting story to relate about putting a high-DIVING board out from the top of a very very high building. Seems the extra required concentration to climb the 30-foot ladder and walk out on a wobbly board, surrounded only by a long drop, before making the leap, actually gave people the necessary time to focus away from their concerns (or perhaps just a jolt of terror!). So no one ever did. As far as the money is concerned,what a huge WASTE! The Cold Springs Bridge has always had one of the most beautiful awesome views of the valley. What a great scenic loss.Tearing it down would cost more. Especially with the necessity to haul away the debris. Seems insane ! If one wants to kill ones self: Yes they will find a way. The poor soul who ate that bread sure did. Geez!
COMMENT 318081	2012-09-09 08:19 PM
All you people "with half a brain" - keep it to yourself.
COMMENT 318172	2012-09-10 07:16 AM
Mostly we built that barrier to feel good about ourselves because now we can say that we've done what we can and the rest is up to you. $4 million seems a low price to purchase the morally superior high ground, doesn't it?
COMMENT 318305	2012-09-10 11:21 AM
Still no story on this on the Independent. Showing their true colors?
COMMENT 318785	2012-09-11 05:39 PM
Suicide is ugly and is selfish... said as one who has lost a beloved one that way. Seeing someone on that bridge, one can safely expect that SOMEONE will act to try to stop the jumper, perhaps being pulled down as well. Anyone walking/driving below is at risk, too. I have never had an issue with the barrier, thinking that it has benefits beyond prevention. As for speculation that one might get pushed over the bridge in an accident situation, just look at the case last year when the lady with her two young children got pushed over the edge of Hwy 101 in Buellton (luckily not going all the way down, as did the truck that hit her). Stuff does happen. I would hope at least ONE jumper "pauses" while reflecting on the climb up before jumping down. I'm very sad for the family's loss. I feel no joy that the barrier did not stop the jumper.

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