The
Golden Gate Bridge is a
suspension bridgeA suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. Outside Tibet and Bhutan, where the first examples of this type of bridge were built in the 15th century, this type of bridge dates from the early 19th century...
spanning the
Golden GateThe Golden Gate is the North American strait connecting San Francisco Bay to the Pacific Ocean. Since 1937 it has been spanned by the Golden Gate Bridge...
, the opening of the
San Francisco BaySan Francisco Bay is a shallow, productive estuary through which water draining from approximately forty percent of California, flowing in the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers from the Sierra Nevada mountains, enters the Pacific Ocean...
into the Pacific Ocean. As part of both U.S. Route 101 and
California State Route 1State Route 1 , more often called Highway 1, is a state highway that runs along much of the Pacific coast of the U.S. state of California. It is famous for running along some of the most beautiful coastlines in the world, leading to its designation as an All-American Road.Highway 1 does not run...
, the structure links the city of San Francisco, on the northern tip of the
San Francisco PeninsulaThe San Francisco Peninsula is a peninsula in the San Francisco Bay Area that separates the San Francisco Bay from the Pacific Ocean. On its northern tip is the City and County of San Francisco. Its southern base is in Santa Clara County, including the cities of Palo Alto, Los Altos, and Mountain...
, to
Marin CountyMarin County is a county located in the North San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, across the Golden Gate Bridge from San Francisco. As of 2010, the population was 252,409. The county seat is San Rafael and the largest employer is the county government. Marin County is well...
. It is one of the most internationally recognized symbols of San Francisco, California, and of the United States. It has been declared one of the modern Wonders of the World by the
American Society of Civil EngineersThe American Society of Civil Engineers is a professional body founded in 1852 to represent members of the civil engineering profession worldwide. It is the oldest national engineering society in the United States. ASCE's vision is to have engineers positioned as global leaders who strive toward...
. The Frommers travel guide considers the Golden Gate Bridge "possibly the most beautiful, certainly the most photographed, bridge in the world".
Ferry service
Before the bridge was built, the only practical short route between San Francisco and what is now Marin County was by boat across a section of San Francisco Bay. Ferry service began as early as 1820, with regularly scheduled service beginning in the 1840s for purposes of transporting water to San Francisco. The Sausalito Land and Ferry Company service, launched in 1867, eventually became the Golden Gate Ferry Company, a
Southern Pacific RailroadThe Southern Pacific Transportation Company , earlier Southern Pacific Railroad and Southern Pacific Company, and usually simply called the Southern Pacific or Espee, was an American railroad....
subsidiary, the largest ferry operation in the world by the late 1920s. Once for railroad passengers and customers only, Southern Pacific's automobile ferries became very profitable and important to the regional economy. The ferry crossing between the
Hyde Street PierThe Hyde Street Pier is a historic ferry pier located on the northern waterfront of San Francisco, California, amidst the tourist zone of Fisherman's Wharf....
in San Francisco and Sausalito in Marin County took approximately 20 minutes and cost US$1.00 per vehicle, a price later reduced to compete with the new bridge. The trip from the San Francisco Ferry Building took 27 minutes.
Many wanted to build a bridge to connect San Francisco to Marin County. San Francisco was the largest American city still served primarily by ferry boats. Because it did not have a permanent link with communities around the bay, the city's growth rate was below the national average. Many experts said that a bridge couldn’t be built across the 6700 ft (2,042 m) strait. It had strong, swirling tides and currents, with water 500 ft (152.4 m) in depth at the center of the channel, and frequent strong winds. Experts said that ferocious winds and blinding fogs would prevent construction and operation.
Conception
Although the idea of a bridge spanning the Golden Gate was not new, the proposal that eventually took hold was made in a 1916 San Francisco Bulletin article by former engineering student James Wilkins. San Francisco's City Engineer estimated the cost at $100 million, impractical for the time, and fielded the question to bridge engineers of whether it could be built for less. One who responded, Joseph Strauss, was an ambitious but dreamy engineer and poet who had, for his
graduate thesisA dissertation or thesis is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings...
, designed a 55 miles (88.5 km) long railroad bridge across the
Bering StraitThe Bering Strait , known to natives as Imakpik, is a sea strait between Cape Dezhnev, Chukotka Autonomous Okrug, Russia, the easternmost point of the Asian continent and Cape Prince of Wales, Alaska, USA, the westernmost point of the North American continent, with latitude of about 65°40'N,...
. At the time, Strauss had completed some 400 drawbridges—most of which were inland—and nothing on the scale of the new project. Strauss's initial drawings were for a massive
cantileverA cantilever is a beam anchored at only one end. The beam carries the load to the support where it is resisted by moment and shear stress. Cantilever construction allows for overhanging structures without external bracing. Cantilevers can also be constructed with trusses or slabs.This is in...
on each side of the strait, connected by a central suspension segment, which Strauss promised could be built for $17 million.
Local authorities agreed to proceed only on the assurance that Strauss alter the design and accept input from several consulting project experts. A suspension-bridge design was considered the most practical, because of recent advances in
metallurgyMetallurgy is a domain of materials science that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their intermetallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are called alloys. It is also the technology of metals: the way in which science is applied to their practical use...
.
Strauss spent more than a decade drumming up support in Northern California. The bridge faced opposition, including litigation, from many sources. The
Department of WarThe United States Department of War, also called the War Department , was the United States Cabinet department originally responsible for the operation and maintenance of the United States Army...
was concerned that the bridge would interfere with ship traffic; the navy feared that a ship collision or sabotage to the bridge could block the entrance to one of its main harbors. Unions demanded guarantees that local workers would be favored for construction jobs. Southern Pacific Railroad, one of the most powerful business interests in California, opposed the bridge as competition to its ferry fleet and filed a lawsuit against the project, leading to a mass boycott of the ferry service. In May 1924, Colonel Herbert Deakyne held the second hearing on the Bridge on behalf of the
Secretary of WarThe Secretary of War was a member of the United States President's Cabinet, beginning with George Washington's administration. A similar position, called either "Secretary at War" or "Secretary of War," was appointed to serve the Congress of the Confederation under the Articles of Confederation...
in a request to use Federal land for construction. Deakyne, on behalf of the Secretary of War, approved the transfer of land needed for the bridge structure and leading roads to the "Bridging the Golden Gate Association" and both San Francisco County and Marin County, pending further bridge plans by Strauss. Another ally was the fledgling automobile industry, which supported the development of roads and bridges to increase demand for automobiles.
The bridge's name was first used when the project was initially discussed in 1917 by
M.M. O'ShaughnessyMichael Maurice O'Shaughnessy was an Irish Civil engineer who became city engineer for the city of San Francisco during the first part of the twentieth century and developed the Hetch-Hetchy water system.-Life:...
, city engineer of San Francisco, and Strauss. The name became official with the passage of the
Golden Gate Bridge and Highway DistrictThe Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District is a quasi-governmental corporation that owns and operates three regional transportation assets in the San Francisco Bay Area:* Golden Gate Bridge* Golden Gate Transit* Golden Gate Ferry...
Act by the
state legislatureThe California State Legislature is the state legislature of the U.S. state of California. It is a bicameral body consisting of the lower house, the California State Assembly, with 80 members, and the upper house, the California State Senate, with 40 members...
in 1923.
Preliminary discussions leading to the eventual building of the Golden Gate Bridge were held on January 13, 1923, at a special convention in Santa Rosa, CA. The Santa Rosa Chamber was charged with considering the necessary steps required to foster the construction of a bridge across the Golden Gate by then Santa Rosa Chamber President Frank Doyle (the street Doyle Drive leading up to the bridge is named after him). On June 12, the Santa Rosa Chamber voted to endorse the actions of the "Bridging the Golden Gate Association" by attending the meeting of the Boards of Supervisors in San Francisco on June 23 and by requesting that the Board of Supervisors of Sonoma County also attend. By 1925, the Santa Rosa Chamber had assumed responsibility for circulating bridge petitions as the next step for the formation of the Golden Gate Bridge.
Design
Strauss was chief engineer in charge of overall design and construction of the bridge project. However, because he had little understanding or experience with cable-suspension designs, responsibility for much of the engineering and architecture fell on other experts. Strauss' initial design proposal (two double cantilever spans linked by a central suspension segment) was unacceptable from a visual standpoint. The final graceful suspension design was conceived and championed by New York’s
Manhattan BridgeThe Manhattan Bridge is a suspension bridge that crosses the East River in New York City, connecting Lower Manhattan with Brooklyn . It was the last of the three suspension bridges built across the lower East River, following the Brooklyn and the Williamsburg bridges...
designer
Leon MoisseiffLeon S. Moisseiff was a leading suspension bridge engineer in the United States of America in the 1920s and 1930s. He was awarded The Franklin Institute's Louis E...
.
Irving MorrowIrving F. Morrow was an American architect best known for designing the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, California.-Education and practice:...
, a relatively unknown residential architect, designed the overall shape of the bridge towers, the lighting scheme, and
Art DecoArt deco , or deco, is an eclectic artistic and design style that began in Paris in the 1920s and flourished internationally throughout the 1930s, into the World War II era. The style influenced all areas of design, including architecture and interior design, industrial design, fashion and...
elements such as the streetlights, railing, and walkways. The famous
International OrangeInternational orange is a color used in the aerospace industry to set things apart from their surroundings, similar to safety orange, but deeper and with a more reddish tone.-International orange :...
color was originally used as a sealant for the bridge. Many locals persuaded Morrow to paint the bridge in the vibrant orange color instead of the standard silver or gray, and the color has been kept ever since. The US Navy had wanted it to be painted with black and yellow stripes to ensure visibility by passing ships.
Senior engineer
Charles Alton EllisCharles Alton Ellis was a professor, structural engineer and mathematician who was chiefly responsible for the structural design of the Golden Gate Bridge...
, collaborating remotely with Moisseiff, was the principal engineer of the project. Moisseiff produced the basic structural design, introducing his "deflection theory" by which a thin, flexible roadway would flex in the wind, greatly reducing stress by transmitting forces via suspension cables to the bridge towers. Although the Golden Gate Bridge design has proved sound, a later Moisseiff design, the
original Tacoma Narrows BridgeThe 1940 Tacoma Narrows Bridge was the first incarnation of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, a suspension bridge in the U.S. state of Washington that spanned the Tacoma Narrows strait of Puget Sound between Tacoma and the Kitsap Peninsula. It opened to traffic on July 1, 1940, and dramatically collapsed...
, collapsed in a strong windstorm soon after it was completed, because of an unexpected aeroelastic flutter.
Ellis was a Greek scholar and mathematician who at one time was a University of Illinois professor of engineering despite having no engineering degree (he eventually earned a degree in civil engineering from University of Illinois prior to designing the Golden Gate Bridge and spent the last twelve years of his career as a professor at Purdue University). He became an expert in structural design, writing the standard textbook of the time. Ellis did much of the technical and theoretical work that built the bridge, but he received none of the credit in his lifetime. In November 1931, Strauss fired Ellis and replaced him with a former subordinate, Clifford Paine, ostensibly for wasting too much money sending telegrams back and forth to Moisseiff. Ellis, obsessed with the project and unable to find work elsewhere during the Depression, continued working 70 hours per week on an unpaid basis, eventually turning in ten volumes of hand calculations.
With an eye toward self-promotion and posterity, Strauss downplayed the contributions of his collaborators who, despite receiving little recognition or compensation, are largely responsible for the final form of the bridge. He succeeded in having himself credited as the person most responsible for the design and vision of the bridge. Only much later were the contributions of the others on the design team properly appreciated. In May 2007, the Golden Gate Bridge District issued a formal report on 70 years of stewardship of the famous bridge and decided to give Ellis major credit for the design of the bridge.
Finance
The Golden Gate Bridge and Highway District, authorized by an act of the California Legislature, was incorporated in 1928 as the official entity to design, construct, and finance the Golden Gate Bridge. However, after the
Wall Street Crash of 1929The Wall Street Crash of 1929 , also known as the Great Crash, and the Stock Market Crash of 1929, was the most devastating stock market crash in the history of the United States, taking into consideration the full extent and duration of its fallout...
, the District was unable to raise the construction funds, so it lobbied for a $30 million bond measure. The bonds were approved in November 1930, by votes in the counties affected by the bridge. The construction budget at the time of approval was $27 million. However, the District was unable to sell the bonds until 1932, when
Amadeo GianniniAmadeo Pietro Giannini, also known as Amadeo Peter Giannini or A.P. Giannini , born in San Jose, California, was the American founder of Bank of America.-Biography:...
, the founder of San Francisco–based
Bank of AmericaBank of America Corporation, an American multinational banking and financial services corporation, is the second largest bank holding company in the United States by assets, and the fourth largest bank in the U.S. by market capitalization. The bank is headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina...
, agreed on behalf of his bank to buy the entire issue in order to help the local economy.
Construction
Construction began on January 5, 1933. The project cost more than $35 million. The Golden Gate Bridge construction project was carried out by the McClintic-Marshall Construction Co., founded by Howard H. McClintic and Charles D. Marshall, both of
Lehigh UniversityLehigh University is a private, co-educational university located in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, in the Lehigh Valley region of the United States. It was established in 1865 by Asa Packer as a four-year technical school, but has grown to include studies in a wide variety of disciplines...
.
Strauss remained head of the project, overseeing day-to-day construction and making some groundbreaking contributions. A graduate of the
University of CincinnatiThe University of Cincinnati is a comprehensive public research university in Cincinnati, Ohio, and a part of the University System of Ohio....
, he placed a brick from his alma mater's demolished McMicken Hall in the south anchorage before the concrete was poured. He innovated the use of movable safety netting beneath the construction site, which saved the lives of many otherwise-unprotected steelworkers. Of eleven men killed from falls during construction, ten were killed (when the bridge was near completion) when the net failed under the stress of a scaffold that had fallen. Nineteen others who were saved by the net over the course of construction became proud members of the (informal)
Half Way to Hell ClubAn exclusive club organized by the men who fell from the Golden Gate Bridge in 1936 and 1937 and were saved by the safety nets. One of the clubs earliest members was Iron Worker Al Zampa who fell into the safety nets in October 1936....
.
The project was finished by April 1937, $1.3 million under budget.
Opening festivities and 50th anniversary
The bridge-opening celebration began on May 27, 1937 and lasted for one week. The day before vehicle traffic was allowed, 200,000 people crossed by foot and roller skate. On opening day, Mayor Angelo Rossi and other officials rode the ferry to Marin, then crossed the bridge in a motorcade past three ceremonial "barriers", the last a blockade of beauty queens who required Joseph Strauss to present the bridge to the Highway District before allowing him to pass. An official song, "
There's a Silver Moon on the Golden Gate"There's a Silver Moon on the Golden Gate" is the official song commemorating the opening the Golden Gate Bridge in May, 1937. It was written by Charles Tobias, Bob Rothberg and Joseph Meyer. Music publishers, Irving Berlin Inc....
", was chosen to commemorate the event. Strauss wrote a poem that is now on the Golden Gate Bridge entitled "The Mighty Task is Done." The next day, President Roosevelt pushed a button in Washington, D.C. signaling the official start of vehicle traffic over the Bridge at noon. When the celebration got out of hand, the SFPD had a small riot in the uptown Polk Gulch area. Weeks of civil and cultural activities called "the Fiesta" followed. A statue of Strauss was moved in 1955 to a site near the bridge.
In May 1987, as part of the 50th anniversary celebration, the Golden Gate Bridge district again closed the bridge to automobile traffic and allowed pedestrians to cross the bridge. However, this celebration attracted 750,000 to 1,000,000 people, and ineffective crowd control meant the bridge became congested with roughly 300,000 people, causing the center span of the bridge to flatten out under the weight. Although the bridge is designed to flex in that way under heavy loads, and was estimated not to have exceeded 40% of the yielding stress of the suspension cables, bridge officials have stated that uncontrolled pedestrian access is not being considered as part of the 75th anniversary.
Specifications
When completed in 1937, the Golden Gate Bridge had the longest suspension bridge main span in the world, at 4,200 feet (1,280.2 m). Since 1964, its main span length has been surpassed by eight other bridges. However, it still has the second longest main span in the United States, after the
Verrazano-Narrows BridgeThe Verrazano-Narrows Bridge is a double-decked suspension bridge that connects the boroughs of Staten Island and Brooklyn in New York City at the Narrows, the reach connecting the relatively protected upper bay with the larger lower bay....
in New York City.
The total length of the Golden Gate Bridge, including approaches from abutment to abutment, is 8,981 feet (2,737 m).
At 692 feet (211m) (above water), the Golden Gate Bridge also had the world's tallest suspension towers when built. It held that status until 1998, with the completion of bridges in Denmark and Japan.
Structure
The weight of the roadway is hung from two cables that pass through the two main towers and are fixed in concrete at each end. Each cable is made of 27,572 strands of wire. There are 80,000 miles (129,000 km) of wire in the main cables. The bridge has approximately 1,200,000 total
rivetA rivet is a permanent mechanical fastener. Before being installed a rivet consists of a smooth cylindrical shaft with a head on one end. The end opposite the head is called the buck-tail. On installation the rivet is placed in a punched or pre-drilled hole, and the tail is upset, or bucked A rivet...
s.
Traffic
As the only road to exit San Francisco to the north, the bridge is part of both
U.S. Route 101U.S. Route 101, or U.S. Highway 101, is an important north–south U.S. highway that runs through the states of California, Oregon, and Washington, on the West Coast of the United States...
and California Route 1. The median markers between the lanes
are movedA reversible lane , called a counterflow lane or contraflow lane in transport engineering nomenclature, is a lane in which traffic may travel in either direction, depending on certain conditions...
to conform to traffic patterns. On weekday mornings, traffic flows mostly southbound into the city, so four of the six lanes run southbound. Conversely, on weekday afternoons, four lanes run northbound. Although there has been discussion concerning the installation of a
movable barrierBarrier transfer machines, also known as zipper machines, are heavy vehicles used to transfer Jersey barriers or other concrete lane dividers used to relieve traffic congestion during rush hours....
since the 1980s, only in March 2005 did the Bridge Board of Directors commit to finding funding to complete the $2 million study required prior to the installation of a movable median barrier.
The bridge is popular with pedestrians and bicyclists as well as cars, and was built with walkways on either side of the six traffic lanes. Initially, they were separated by the traffic lanes by only a metal curb, but railings between the walkways and the traffic lanes were added in 2003, primarily as a measure to prevent runaway cyclists from falling into the roadway.
The main walkway is on the eastern side, and is open for use by both pedestrians and bicycles in the morning to mid-afternoon during weekdays (5 am to 3:30 pm), and to pedestrians only for the remaining daylight hours (until 6 pm, or 9 pm during
DSTDaylight saving time —also summer time in several countries including in British English and European official terminology —is the practice of temporarily advancing clocks during the summertime so that afternoons have more daylight and mornings have less...
). The eastern walkway is reserved for pedestrians on weekends (5 am to 6 pm, or 9 pm during DST), and is open exclusively to bicyclists in the evening and overnight, when it is closed to pedestrians. The western walkway is only open, and exclusively for bicyclists, during the hours when they are not allowed on the eastern walkway.
The
speed limitRoad speed limits are used in most countries to regulate the speed of road vehicles. Speed limits may define maximum , minimum or no speed limit and are normally indicated using a traffic sign...
on the Golden Gate Bridge was reduced from 55 mph (88.5 km/h) to 45 mph (72.4 km/h) on October 1, 1996.
Aesthetics
The color of the bridge is officially an orange vermillion called
international orangeInternational orange is a color used in the aerospace industry to set things apart from their surroundings, similar to safety orange, but deeper and with a more reddish tone.-International orange :...
. The color was selected by consulting architect Irving Morrow because it complements the natural surroundings and enhances the bridge's visibility in fog.
Aesthetics was the foremost reason why the first design of Joseph Strauss was rejected. Upon re-submission of his bridge construction plan, he added details, such as lighting, to outline the bridge's cables and towers. In 1999, it was ranked fifth on the
List of America's Favorite Architecture by the
American Institute of ArchitectsThe American Institute of Architects is a professional organization for architects in the United States. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the AIA offers education, government advocacy, community redevelopment, and public outreach to support the architecture profession and improve its public image...
.
Paintwork
The bridge was originally painted with
red leadLead tetroxide, also called minium, red lead or triplumbic tetroxide, is a bright red or orange crystalline or amorphous pigment. Chemically, red lead is lead tetroxide, Pb3O4, or 2PbO·PbO2....
primer and a lead-based
topcoatTopcoat may refer to:*A lightweight overcoat*The guard hairs of an animal's fur*A transparent or translucent coat of paint applied over the underlying material as a sealer...
, which was touched up as required. In the mid-1960s, a program was started to improve corrosion protection by stripping the original paint and repainting the bridge with zinc silicate primer and
vinylA vinyl compound is any organic compound that contains a vinyl group ,which are derivatives of ethene, CH2=CH2, with one hydrogen atom replaced with some other group...
topcoats. Since 1990
acrylicAcrylic paint is fast drying paint containing pigment suspension in acrylic polymer emulsion. Acrylic paints can be diluted with water, but become water-resistant when dry...
topcoats have been used instead for air-quality reasons. The program was completed in 1995 and it is now maintained by 38 painters who touch up the paintwork where it becomes seriously eroded.
Economics
The last of the construction bonds were retired in 1971, with $35 million in principal and nearly $39 million in interest raised entirely from bridge tolls.
In November 2006, the Golden Gate Bridge, Highway and Transportation District recommended a corporate sponsorship program for the bridge to address its operating deficit, projected at $80 million over five years. The District promised that the proposal, which it called a "partnership program", would not include changing the name of the bridge or placing advertising on the bridge itself. In October 2007, the Board unanimously voted to discontinue the proposal and seek additional revenue through other means, most likely a toll increase.
On September 2, 2008, the auto cash toll for all southbound
motor vehicleA motor vehicle or road vehicle is a self-propelled wheeled vehicle that does not operate on rails, such as trains or trolleys. The vehicle propulsion is provided by an engine or motor, usually by an internal combustion engine, or an electric motor, or some combination of the two, such as hybrid...
s was raised from $5 to $6, and the FasTrak toll was increased from $4 to $5. Bicycle, pedestrian, and northbound motor vehicle traffic remain toll free. For vehicles with more than two axles, the toll rate is $2.50 per axle.
In an effort to save $19.2 million over the following 10 years, the Golden Gate District voted in January 2011 to eliminate all toll takers by 2012 and strictly use
open road tollingOpen road tolling or free-flow tolling is the collection of tolls on toll roads without the use of toll booths. An electronic toll collection system is usually used instead. The major advantage to ORT is that users are able to drive through the toll plaza at highway speeds without having to slow...
only.
Congestion pricing
In March 2008, the Golden Gate Bridge District board approved a resolution to implement
congestion pricingCongestion pricing or congestion charges is a system of surcharging users of a transport network in periods of peak demand to reduce traffic congestion. Examples include some toll-like road pricing fees, and higher peak charges for utilities, public transport and slots in canals and airports...
at the Golden Gate Bridge, charging higher tolls during peak hours, but rising and falling depending on traffic levels. This decision allowed the
Bay AreaThe San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a populated region that surrounds the San Francisco and San Pablo estuaries in Northern California. The region encompasses metropolitan areas of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose, along with smaller urban and rural areas...
to meet the federal requirement to receive $158 million in federal transportation funds from USDOT Urban Partnership grant. As a condition of the grant, the congestion toll was to be in place by September 2009.
The first results of the study, called the Mobility, Access and Pricing Study (MAPS), showed that a congestion pricing program is feasible. The different pricing scenarios considered were presented in public meetings in December 2008
In August 2008, transportation officials killed the bridge toll congestion pricing program in favor of varying rates for metered parking along the route to the bridge including on Lombard Street and Van Ness Avenue
Suicides
More people die by
suicideSuicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
at the Golden Gate Bridge than at any other site in the world. The deck is approximately 245 feet (74.7 m) above the water. After a fall of approximately four seconds,
jumpersA jumper, in police and media parlance, is a person who dies by suicide by jumping from a height, or people who have jumped, then survived, often with major injuries and permanent disabilities...
hit the water at around 75 mph or approximately 120 km/h. Most jumpers die from impact
traumaTrauma refers to "a body wound or shock produced by sudden physical injury, as from violence or accident." It can also be described as "a physical wound or injury, such as a fracture or blow." Major trauma can result in secondary complications such as circulatory shock, respiratory failure and death...
on contact with the water. The few who survive the initial impact generally drown or die of
hypothermiaHypothermia is a condition in which core temperature drops below the required temperature for normal metabolism and body functions which is defined as . Body temperature is usually maintained near a constant level of through biologic homeostasis or thermoregulation...
in the cold water.
Most suicidal jumps occur on the side facing the bay. The side facing the Pacific is closed to pedestrians.
An official suicide count was kept, sorted according to which of the bridge's 128 lamp posts the jumper was nearest when he or she jumped. By 2005, this count exceeded 1,200 and new suicides were occurring about once every two weeks. For comparison, the reported second-most-popular place to commit suicide in the world,
Aokigahara Forest, also known as the , is a 35 km2 forest that lies at the north west base of Mount Fuji in Japan. The forest contains a number of rocky, icy caverns, a few of which are popular tourist destinations....
in Japan, has a record of 78 bodies, found within the forest in 2002, with an average of 30 a year. There were 34 bridge-jump suicides in 2006 whose bodies were recovered, in addition to four jumps that were witnessed but whose bodies were never recovered, and several bodies recovered suspected to be from bridge jumps. The California Highway Patrol removed 70 apparently suicidal people from the bridge that year.
There is no accurate figure on the number of suicides or successful jumps since 1937, because many were not witnessed. People have been known to travel to San Francisco specifically to jump off the bridge, and may take a bus or cab to the site; police sometimes find abandoned rental cars in the parking lot. Currents beneath the bridge are very strong, and some jumpers have undoubtedly been washed out to sea without ever being seen. The water may be as cold as 47 °F (8.3 °C).
The fatality rate of jumping is roughly 98%. As of 2006, only 26 people are known to have survived the jump. Those who
do survive strike the water feet-first and at a slight angle, although individuals may still sustain broken bones or internal injuries. One young woman, Sara Rutledge Birnbaum, survived, but returned to jump again and died the second time. One young man survived a jump in 1979, swam to shore, and drove himself to a hospital. The impact cracked several of his vertebrae. On March 10, 2011, 17 year-old Luhe “Otter” Vilagomez from Windsor High School in
WindsorWindsor is an incorporated town in Sonoma County, California, United States. The population was 26,801 as of the 2010 census.-Geography:Windsor is located on U.S. Route 101 in the Russian River valley, about southeast of Healdsburg, California....
, California survived a jump from the bridge, breaking his tailbone and puncturing one lung, though saying his attempt was for "fun" and not suicide.
Engineering professor
Natalie JeremijenkoNatalie Jeremijenko is an artist and engineer whose background includes studies in biochemistry, physics, neuroscience and precision engineering. She is an active member of the net.art movement, and her work primarily explores the interface between society, the environment and technology...
, as part of her
Bureau of Inverse Technology art collective, created a "Despondency Index" by correlating the
Dow Jones Industrial AverageThe Dow Jones Industrial Average , also called the Industrial Average, the Dow Jones, the Dow 30, or simply the Dow, is a stock market index, and one of several indices created by Wall Street Journal editor and Dow Jones & Company co-founder Charles Dow...
with the number of jumpers detected by "Suicide Boxes" containing motion-detecting cameras, which she claimed to have set up under the bridge. The boxes purportedly recorded 17 jumps in three months, far greater than the official count. The Whitney Museum, although questioning whether Jeremijenko's suicide-detection technology actually existed, nevertheless included her project in its prestigious
Whitney BiennialThe Whitney Biennial is a biennale exhibition of contemporary American art, typically by young and lesser known artists, on display at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City, USA. The event began as an annual exhibition in 1932, the first biennial was in 1973...
.
Various methods have been proposed and implemented to reduce the number of suicides. The bridge is fitted with suicide hotline telephones, and staff patrol the bridge in carts, looking for people who appear to be planning to jump. Ironworkers on the bridge also volunteer their time to prevent suicides by talking or wrestling down suicidal people. The bridge is now closed to pedestrians at night. Cyclists are still permitted across at night, but must be buzzed in and out through the remotely controlled security gates. Attempts to introduce a
suicide barrierA suicide barrier is a barrier on a bridge , observation deck or other structure designed to prevent people from attempting suicide by deliberately jumping...
have been thwarted by engineering difficulties, high costs, and public opposition. One recurring proposal had been to build a barrier to replace or augment the low railing, a component of the bridge's original architectural design. New barriers have eliminated suicides at other landmarks around the world, but were opposed for the Golden Gate Bridge for reasons of cost, aesthetics, and safety (the load from a poorly designed barrier could significantly affect the bridge's structural integrity during a strong windstorm).
Strong appeals for a suicide barrier, fence, or other preventive measures were raised once again by a well-organized vocal minority of psychiatry professionals, suicide barrier consultants, and families of jumpers after the release of the controversial 2006 documentary film
The Bridge, in which filmmaker Eric Steel and his production crew spent one year (2004) filming the bridge from several vantage points, in order to film actual suicide jumps. The film caught 23 jumps, most notably that of Gene Sprague as well as a handful of thwarted attempts. The film also contained interviews with surviving family members of those who jumped; interviews with witnesses; and, in one segment, an interview with Kevin Hines who, as a 19-year-old in 2000, survived a suicide plunge from the span and is now a vocal advocate for some type of bridge barrier or net to prevent such incidents from occurring.
On October 10, 2008, the Golden Gate Bridge Board of Directors voted 14 to 1 to install a plastic-covered stainless-steel net below the bridge as a suicide deterrent. The net will extend 20 feet (6 m) on either side of the bridge and is expected to cost $40–50 million to complete. However, lack of funding could delay the net's deployment.
Wind
Since its completion, the Golden Gate Bridge has been closed due to weather conditions only three times: on December 1, 1951, because of gusts of 69 mph (111 km/h); on December 23, 1982, because of winds of 70 mph (113 km/h); and on December 3, 1983, because of wind gusts of 75 mph (121 km/h).
Seismic retrofit
Modern knowledge of the effect of earthquakes on structures led to a program to
retrofitSeismic retrofitting is the modification of existing structures to make them more resistant to seismic activity, ground motion, or soil failure due to earthquakes. With better understanding of seismic demand on structures and with our recent experiences with large earthquakes near urban centers,...
the Golden Gate to better resist seismic events. The proximity of the bridge to the
San Andreas FaultThe San Andreas Fault is a continental strike-slip fault that runs a length of roughly through California in the United States. The fault's motion is right-lateral strike-slip...
places it at risk for a significant earthquake. Once thought to have been able to withstand any magnitude of foreseeable earthquake, the bridge was actually vulnerable to complete structural failure (i.e., collapse) triggered by the failure of supports on the 320 feet (97.5 m) arch over Fort Point. A $392 million program was initiated to improve the structure's ability to withstand such an event with only minimal (repairable) damage. One challenging undertaking is completing this program without disrupting traffic. A complex electrohydraulic synchronous lift system was custom built for construction of temporary support towers and a series of intricate lifts, transferring the loads from the existing bridge onto the temporary supports. This was completed with engineers from
Balfour BeattyBalfour Beatty plc is a British construction, engineering, military housing, rail and investment services company. It is one of the largest construction companies in the UK, and the 15th largest in the world...
and
EnerpacThe Enerpac business is a division of Actuant, a $1.5 billion diversified global manufacturing company, and is headquarted in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. Enerpac is an international market leader in high-pressure hydraulics with locations in North and South America, Europe, Africa, Russia, the...
, accomplishing this task without disrupting day-to-day San Francisco commuter traffic. The retrofit's planned completion date is 2012.
Doyle Drive replacement project
The elevated approach to the Golden Gate Bridge through the San Francisco Presidio is popularly known as Doyle Drive, dating back to 1933, was named after Frank P. Doyle, director of the California State Automobile Association. The highway carries approximately 91,000 vehicles each weekday between downtown San Francisco and suburban Marin County. However, the road has been deemed "vulnerable to earthquake damage", has a problematic 4-lane design, and lacks shoulders. For these reasons, a San Francisco County Transportation Authority study recommended that the current outdated structure be replaced with a more modern, efficient, and multimodal transportation structure. Construction on the $1 billion replacement, known as the Presidio Parkway, began in December 2009 and is expected to be completed in 2013.
See also
- The Bridge (2006 film)
- Golden Gate
The Golden Gate is the North American strait connecting San Francisco Bay to the Pacific Ocean. Since 1937 it has been spanned by the Golden Gate Bridge...
– the body of water that the bridge crosses
- Golden Gate Bridge in popular culture
As a prominent American landmark, the Golden Gate Bridge has been used in a variety of media.-Books:*The Golden Gate, a novel by Alistair MacLean in which a kidnapping is staged on the bridge....
- List of historic civil engineering landmarks
- List of longest suspension bridge spans
- List of tallest bridges in the world
- Suicide bridge
A suicide bridge is a bridge used frequently to die by suicide, most typically by jumping off and into the water below ....
- Suspension bridge
A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. Outside Tibet and Bhutan, where the first examples of this type of bridge were built in the 15th century, this type of bridge dates from the early 19th century...
Further reading
- Kevin Starr: Golden Gate: The Life and Times of America's Greatest Bridge (Bloomsbury Press, 2010) ISBN 9781596915343, history of bridge by scholar Kevin Starr
Kevin Starr is an American historian, best known for his multi-volume series on the history of California, collectively called "Americans and the California Dream."-Life:Kevin Starr was born in San Francisco, California....
- Tad Friend: Jumpers: The fatal grandeur of the Golden Gate Bridge, The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
, October 13, 2003 v79 i30 page 48
- "Golden Gate Bridge Natural Frequencies", Vibrationdata.com, April 5, 2006
- Eric Steel: The Bridge, a 2006 documentary film regarding suicides occurring at the Golden Gate Bridge.
- Louise Nelson Dyble: Paying the Toll: Local Power, Regional Politics, and the Golden Gate Bridge, University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009.
- Stephen Cassady: Spanning the Gate, Squarebooks, 1987 (commemorative edition; originally published 1979).