SEATTLE - Seattle's Aurora Bridge is second only to the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco for the number of suicides. In the past three years, nearly 20 people have committed suicide by jumping from the nearly 15-story high bridge.
Should the state build a $7 million fence along the bridge to keep people from jumping off? A group of Queen Anne residents says the plan is misguided.
George Counts is on the board of Sound Mental Health and he's convinced the money could be better used.
"Focus funding on agencies and groups that treat mental illness rather than focusing on one particular location," he said.
That location is where hundreds of people live and work in the Fremont neighborhood.
"I've never heard a noise like that in the office you could feel a thud," said Ryan Thurston, a computer engineer who tells grisly account of seeing and feeling a bridge suicide.
"Our ultimate goal is to end suicide on the bridge, whether fencing, closing to pedestrians, we just don't want to see any more bodies out here," said Thurston.
Counts and some other members of the Queen Anne Community Council oppose state plans to build the fence, which is scheduled to be installed next year.
It will be nearly half a mile long and some 15 stories above the Ship Canal.
The state DOT says its going ahead with the fence. So far in the process, its included in both the Senate and House budgets.
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