Issue date: 10/23/03 Section: Opinions

Critics argue that the veil spoils one of Toronto´s finest views.

Is it the City of Toronto’s responsibility to prevent suicide? Is $6 million a reasonable amount to spend making a bridge safer? Will a large fence be effective in preventing suicides? These questions were central to the debate over the construction of a “Luminous Veil,” a suicide-preventing fence built by the City of Toronto earlier this year. The answer to all of them, I have come to realize, is “yes.”

Crossing the Bloor St. Viaduct on foot is a unique Toronto experience. The vast open view, the roaring highway below, and the subway line thundering beneath the concrete give some pedestrians a feeling of exhileration. But for some 400 people since the bridge’s construction in 1919, that feeling inspires them leap off, into the Don Valley.

Someone jumps off the Bloor St. Viaduct bridge on average every 22 days, according to the Schizophrenia Society of Ontario. Close to 80 suicides have been committed in the past eight years, and about 16 attempted suicides. In recent memory, two of them have been UofT students. The Viaduct is the second largest suicide magnet in North America, after San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge.

Public suicides, such as those committed in the TTC, are seldom mentioned in the media because of their sensitive and private nature. This would explain why many people don’t realize the severity of the situation at the Bloor Viaduct, and why many are skeptical about the Veil. It’s a sensitive topic to write about, which is partly why the project was delayed for so long – it was surrounded by controversy.

It took 83 years before something was done to prevent the suicides. After spending $2.5 million, City Hall finalized the construction of a giant steel “Luminous Veil” in March this year. (The remaining $4 million was provided priavately.) Designed by award-winning architect and University of Waterloo professor Dereck Revington, the V-shaped screen is made of 10,000 steel rods measuring five metres tall.

My first impression of the Bloor Viaduct suicide-preventing “Luminous Veil” was that if people really want to commit suicide, they won’t be stopped. There are countless other ways to do it in the city. If they can’t jump off that particular bridge, what’s to say they won’t jump off another bridge? The nearby Queen St. bridge just south of the Viaduct is an obvious example.

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