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To date there have been almost
1600 suicide deaths from the Golden Gate Bridge More than any other location in the world.
The California Highway Patrol
first asked the Bridge authorities to install safety fencing in 1939.   Read More

Welcome

The Bridge Rail Foundation has one simple goal - stop the suicides on the Golden Gate Bridge. The Foundation grows out of the direct experience with bridge suicides - our board includes individuals who have had family and friends jump from the bridge and experts in mental health, law and public affairs. We have come together to focus public attention on the bridge suicide problem, see that the public is fully informed of the issue and ensure that this ongoing tragedy is finally stopped.

Take a look at the information here - then join our effort - sign up for our newsletter, send us a note about how you might help or donate what you can. We are an all-volunteer effort - so anything you might be able to do will help. Thank you.

Journalism Awards for GGB Suicide Coverage

Bay Area universities have made significant contributions to the effort to stop suicides at the Golden Gate Bridge. Students from San Francisco State and UCSF have contributed important research efforts and USF has hosted a major conference of suicide prevention activists. UC Berkeley students have been most active, with contributions from students in History, Public Health, Public Policy and Journalism. And Berkeley's Engineering students have produced award winning designs, engineering calculations, cost estimates and published research on practical solutions to the iconic structure's suicide problem.

Now we add students from the University of North Carolina and Western Kentucky University to this list. In the summer of 2011, the national finals of the Hearst Journalism Awards were held. The first and second place multimedia awards went to Margaret Cheatham Williams from UNC Chapel Hill and Leslye Davis of Western Kentucky University. The Hearst awards provide annual recognition for outstanding work by student journalists from throughout the US. The program is conducted by the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communications and is fully funded by the William Randolph Hearst Foundation. Their reports are below.

Whose Shoes?

We will have a special display of shoes to commemorate lives lost to suicide at the Bridge. The shoes in our display represent people from every walk of life and will once again be anchored by a pair of WWI US Army boots to memorialize Harold Wobber, the Vet who was the first known jumper from the span.

Individual memorials with shoes of lost loved ones donated by surviving families are included as well.

The Whose Shoes? display also features chalk outlines of shoes to remember the many lives lost to suicide whose bodies were never recovered. We also recognize still others whose suicide was never recorded or recognized.

Whose Shoes? Bridge Rail Foundation

Video Links

Kevin Hines introduces his story

Dayna Whitmer on a death in her family

Anne Fleming MD on what the science tells us

Ken Holmes on the demographics of Golden Gate suicides

What you might see on the Bridge

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