Bill would install barriers to prevent suicides on RI bridges

A bill that would install suicide prevention barriers on three Rhode Island bridges has been introduced in the House of Representatives.

The lawmaker behind the idea, Rep. Joseph J. Solomon Jr. (D-Warwick), came up with the legislation after a friend took his life by jumping off the Newport Bridge.

According to Bridging the Gap for Safety and Healing, a suicide prevention group, 28 people over a nine-year span killed themselves by jumping off the Newport, Mount Hope, and Jamestown bridges.

The bill would install some type of barrier on these bridges to make sure it never happens again.

“I’m in a position to advocate to get something done so that nobody has to go through the same thing that so many of these other people have gone through,” Solomon said. “This is something that we really need to do.”

Calls for these types of barriers have been swirling for years, especially from Bryan Ganley, co-founder of Bridging the Gap for Safety and Healing.

“A bridge with a minimum 135-foot drop and only a three-foot rail is like handing a suicidal person a loaded gun,” Ganley said. “It’s definitely needed. When you can just crawl over a rail and just jump, being an impulsive act, we just need to get the people through that time.”

“I know there is a cost to put these safety barriers up however there’s also a cost to the family the friends, the social cost, the first responders,” Solomon said.

As for the cost, that still needs to be worked out, as well as a specific plan.

For perspective, the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco installed a net-type system to prevent people from jumping.

That system cost San Francisco more than $200 million, although it’s a much larger bridge than those in Rhode Island.

Rep. Solomon believes it will be way cheaper to install barriers on the state’s bridges.