No one knows. Built in 1965 to provide better vehicular access to New Mexico’s more populated areas, it holds a coveted spot in the National Register of Historic Places and the enviable title of “Most Beautiful Long Span Steel Bridge,” an accolade given to it in 1966 by the American Institute of Steel Construction. It is also a dark haven for those looking to end their own lives. As social pressures arose and suicides became commonplace, Prince Edward Viaduct suddenly turned into one of the main suicide hotspots in the world. The Prince Edward Viaduct System, commonly referred to as the Bloor Viaduct, is the name of a truss arch bridge system in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, connecting Bloor Street East, on the west side of the system, with Danforth Avenue on the east. “But as our community started to challenge us to do something about it, the mentality of the folks on the board shifted. As Paul Brasher, the NMDOT district engineer in charge of approving plans for a barrier on the bridge tells me, they’re on the case and they’re concerned; it’s just that the process has been slow. Under my feet, a long sliver of cerulean Rio Grande roars through billions of years of geologic strata in the canyon below. Had the bridge had some kind of net or fence-like structure in place to deter people from jumping, Beacom — or any of the others — might be alive today. Down under in New Zealand, a translucent glass enclosure constructed on Auckland’s, has all but eradicated attempts at suicide there. It’s not just locals who choose to end their lives there, though. The Prince Edward Viaduct -- or Bloor Street Viaduct -- was constructed from 1915 to 1918. Also in Canada is the Prince Edward Viaduct, an enormous 5-lane bridge in Toronto, Ontario that is a three hinged concrete-steel arch bridge with a total span of 494 meters (1,620 feet), and 40 meters (131 feet) high over the Don Valley. Besides being a magnet for tourists from around the world, the Golden Gate Bridge also draws in an unprecedented number of suicides every year, with over 1600 deaths documented here since records began and doubtless many more who went to their ends undiscovered. Between 1850 and 2011 there have been an estimated nearly 3,000 people who have seen this majestic view as their last sight, with doubtless even more who were simply never recorded. Most of the people who came here to die were similarly those who had experienced bad luck in love, with jilted lovers or suicide pacts between lovers who could for whatever reasons not be together making up the vast majority of victims consumed by the voracious fires of the volcano. “You don’t walk on the Prince Edward Viaduct,” she said, with a hint of French in her accent. Mihara. Here we will explore some of the sinister, haunting places of the world that call out for more souls, and where people go to die. That theory might check out, too — as many studies have shown, the less isolated you feel from your surroundings, the less likely you are to commit self-harm. Yet for all of this natural beauty and splendor, there is a sinister undercurrent running through this area, as it has become well known as one of the most infamous suicide spots in the world and the top such location in Britain. In Toronto, the Prince Edward Viaduct — once considered North America’s second-deadliest bridge — was recently outfitted with a beautiful one, an incandescent safety structure called a Luminous Veil. double points for managing to pull off that project with style and charm, not self-seriousness.”, “MEL f--kin rules they’re so consistently knocking it out of the park and everyone on the staff But with few answers and even fewer resources, the town is hoping the burgeoning field of ‘emotional architecture’ can help prevent jumpers from taking their lives. The very design of the bridge has made it difficult to determine just how many of the many deaths that have occurred here are intentional or not, as the railings here are alarmingly low for such a potentially dangerous spot. “I know a lot of people who don’t like to talk about this, and I can really respect that,” Miera says. If you don't know, you have totally missed out. “I wondered if it might satisfy the compelling sense of the deep void below,” she says. For whatever dark reasons, some find the prospect of death to be more comforting than continuing among the living. Though she didn’t have a reason to panic — he was sober and had never been suicidal or clinically depressed — she rushed out the door to find him with her younger son Keaun, then 16, in tow. At times, the trail is only 18 inches wide, barely enough room for a person — and the body bag they’re often carrying — to squeeze by. Right now, he says the only way he can cope with the suicide problem at the Gorge is to accept that until something gets done about the bridge, his next mission won’t be his last. , a picturesque suspension structure perched across the chasm’s mouth nearly 60 stories above. They also send an important message. The the Prince Edward Viaduct, as it's formally named, connects Bloor Street East with Danforth Avenue; the subway trains run right beneath it. Right now, he says the only way he can cope with the suicide problem at the Gorge is to accept that until something gets done about the bridge, his next mission won’t be his last. The area is also known to confound compasses, cause electrical equipment to go haywire, and instill a deep sense of confusion, dread, and disorientation in even the most experienced hikers, with many reporting becoming totally lost even after very short distances. The spikes didn’t really work — three people, in a 24-hour window shortly after they were erected— but at least Caltrans did, Other government agencies have stepped up to the plate, too. Just like the dangerously oversimplified argument that “guns don’t kill people; people do,” it would be reductive and inaccurate to say that a bridge made someone jump. She and Keaun were just a few steps behind him when he hopped over the thin railing and fell to his death. At the same time, Meertens also considered whether their barrier might provide a healthy sense of engagement for those who came to the bridge feeling isolated or alone. We may never know, but we can hope that those who have reached the conclusion that they have no other choice can perhaps find a way to hang on and resist that pull. If the bridge had many visitors that day, having to step closer to the safe but precarious edge to navigate around other people on the sidewalk might thrust them into a shared social space, an effect that could draw them out of isolation, if only for a moment. It’s only 630 feet to the bottom of the Rio Grande Gorge, but the descent can take hours. With over 400 suicides, the Viaduct ranked as the second most fatal standing structure in … Why do people come to this particular bridge to die? In some cases people don’t even exit their vehicles, preferring instead to drive right over the precipitous ledge into oblivion. It scars the whole community. While the reasons behind a suicide can be perplexing and inscrutable as it is, even more enigmatic is that in some cases there are places in this world that seem to call out to these lost souls, beckoning them to come there to die.