On average, more than 3 calls a day are made to 911 that report someone who may be trying to end their life at a Portland bridge. That’s according to new reporting from The Oregonian/OregonLive.com.
In Goose Hollow, the Vista Bridge saw five suicides in one year, which led to the construction of a bridge barrier in 2013. These barriers are often fences or netting aimed at preventing suicides.
But why can’t these protections extend to other bridges? And how safe are Portland’s bridges and overpasses today? Oregonian reporter Isabel Funk joins us now to share more about what she found.
EDITOR’S NOTE — If you or someone you know needs help, the national suicide and crisis lifeline in the U.S. is available by calling or texting 988. There is also an online chat at 988lifeline.org.
Note: The following transcript was transcribed digitally and validated for accuracy, readability and formatting by an OPB volunteer.
Dave Miller: This is Think Out Loud on OPB. I’m Dave Miller. Every day, on average, somewhere between three and four people call 911 saying somebody may be trying to end their life at a Portland bridge. That is according to a new article from The Oregonian. Studies have found that fences or netting can prevent suicide, but officials locally and around the state have been reluctant to add them.
Isabel Funk wrote about this for The Oregonian. She joins us now. It’s great to have you on the show.
Isabel Funk: Thanks for having me.
Miller: Before we start, I do want to mention to folks that if you or someone you know is struggling, you can call or text 988 to reach National Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Help is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Isabel, what led you to look into this particular issue?
Funk: This story actually had a bit of a grim start. Last spring, there was a series of weeks where the Sheriff’s Office patrol kept finding bodies in the river. There was a lot of speculation about what might be going on there. We decided to look into it then, and what we found was that there’s no serial killer. There’s a much more prosaic answer to what was going on and that it was largely a suicide.
Miller: What did you hear from Scott Hughes, a fireman whose station is near the St. Johns Bridge and who you found has responded to dozens of people in crisis?
Funk: Scott Hughes told me that he goes out to the bridge roughly half a dozen times a year, and that there are people out there who are struggling. He talks to them. And he often takes lead in those conversations, and helps remind them of why they have to be here and what reasons they have to stay, and helps them come back over the bridge railing and get help.
Miller: I mentioned that number in 911 data; On average, three to four calls a day, just in the Portland area. But what happened when you tried to find out numbers about confirmed or suspected suicides on Portland bridges?
Funk: We were denied that data. We went to the Multnomah County Medical Examiner and requested information on the deaths from those who had died in the river, and they declined to share that information. We appealed that to the District Attorney’s Office. They ended up deciding that, for that period of time that I mentioned earlier, that last spring when there were a number of bodies that were found, that portion of data should be released. They made that decision because the Sheriff’s Office had put out a press release at the time and they felt that it negated the privacy concerns.
Miller: What were the reasons earlier for the denial of this public records request? What did you hear both from county officials, but more broadly, the reasons for not talking about these numbers?
Funk: Specifically, we were told that that data could only be released to friends and family. But what we found over the course of this story is that people were really hesitant to talk about this issue because they were concerned about what’s known as contagion effect. That’s this idea that talking about suicide or a specific suicide will lead to more in that way.
Miller: This reminded me of lessons that I’ve heard in the course of my career, that I think have gotten a little bit sharper over the last 20-something years, about a hesitancy on the part of media folks or the public to talk about means and methods. But it seems impossible to talk about a question like bridge safety without explicitly, or at least implicitly, talking about the method. The location, in a sense, provides the method. I’m curious how you reckoned with that as a journalist?
Funk: That was a really difficult question that we grappled with over the course of the reporting journey, from the beginning. When my editor and I first sat down and talked about this story, that was the question that I raised. How do we approach a story like this while still being safe? So we, very early on, met with a group of county suicide prevention officials and talked about how we could approach this story safely. They gave us some guidance and we switched gears in certain ways. But that was something that we talked about throughout the whole story. And we did our best to focus on solutions, prevention and stories of hope.
Miller: I do want to give this important number again just for folks. If you or someone you know is struggling right now, you can call or text 988 to reach the National Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Help is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
What does suicide prevention research say about the effectiveness of these physical barriers?
Funk: Barriers are highly effective. They’re the number one method that experts recommend. They’ve been implemented in dozens of cities, states and countries, and they’ve been highly effective in those places. In San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge was netted in 2024, and we saw the number of deaths go from about 30 a year to just four. So we know that these work.
Miller: We also don’t need to only look at California. Portland’s Vista Bridge was a site where city officials put fences 13 years ago. What led to that, first of all?
Funk: That was mostly implemented by then Commissioner, now Councilor Steve Novick. He had read a story in The Oregonian/OregonLive about that bridge. There was a spike that year. There were five deaths in 2013. That spike and that reporting led him to push for a fence to be installed.
Miller: What difference has that fencing made?
Funk: It’s made a big difference. They went from, as I mentioned, five in that year to less than one a year.
Miller: So that mirrors, as you mentioned, a major decrease at the Golden Gate Bridge, and there have been similar major decreases in deaths in other places around the country, around the world, where these physical barriers have been put in.
You talked to somebody who jumped from the Golden Gate Bridge 26 years ago but amazingly survived. His name is Kevin Hines, and he now, you report, goes around the world to advocate for suicide barriers or some kind of physical barrier. What stood out to you in your conversation with him?
Funk: Kevin Hines was a fascinating person to talk to. You don’t meet a lot of people who have a story like that to tell. But the work that he’s done since he survived is just incredible. He went through an incredibly dark time in his life. He survived that, and now he goes around to try to prevent that from happening to other people.
Miller: What are the impediments to that just in Oregon?
Funk: Largely cost. The Oregon Department of Transportation is the agency that manages some of Portland’s bridges, not all of them. But the St. John’s Bridge, which I mentioned in my story and which we talked about with Scott Hughes, is one that’s run by ODOT. And they, as we know, have some budget issues right now. Some other issues, though, also came up. The bridge is very old and so there’s concerns about whether it would be able to support the weight of an additional barrier.
Miller: The sheer number is one of the things that stood out to me in your reporting as well. Thousands of bridges of one kind or another, not all as iconic and sort of looming as the St. John’s Bridge, but still, thousands of them that the state manages. I think one of the questions was: How would they prioritize where to put these barriers? What did you hear about that?
Funk: Yes, that is exactly what they said. They said that there are 3,000 bridges in this state, and we know that not all of them have this problem. But they said they would have to weigh how to determine which bridges to prioritize.
Miller: Your first article about this came out last week. But you did have a follow-up that came out this morning. What have you heard since your first article came out?
Funk: This morning, my article that published was talking to lawmakers. We spoke with three lawmakers who read my reporting and said that they are planning to take action. The Senate Transportation Committee leader, Senator Chris Gorsek said that he is planning on calling a committee hearing to address this issue. We heard as well from House Representative Paul Evans, who said that he will be putting forward proposals. Senator Lisa Reynolds as well said that she was very concerned and that action needed to be taken.
Miller: You mentioned, when I asked you, the impediments to this work statewide. The first thing you mentioned was funding. Can you give us a sense for how much it might cost just for one bridge, for the St. John’s Bridge, to have this retrofit, assuming, as you said, that the bridge could even physically hold up the extra weight of the barrier?
Funk: Just based on how much the Golden Gate Bridge net cost, looking at the length of the St. John’s Bridge, the Department of Transportation estimated that it would cost between $50 and $80 million for a net to be installed. If we were looking at a fence, they estimated that would be somewhere between $15 and $20 million.
Miller: Isabel, thanks very much.
Funk: Thank you for having me.
Miller: That’s Isabel Funk. She is a reporter for The Oregonian. And again, if you or someone you know is struggling, you can call or text 988 to reach the National Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Help is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
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