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To reach a suicide prevention hotline, call or text 988 or chat at 988lifeline.org.
Update: The Maine Department of Transportation has adjusted the expected timeline for the completion of the barrier project.
After a nearly year-long delay, state transportation officials are finally seeking bids for the construction of fencing to keep people from jumping off the Penobscot Narrows Bridge, which towers 135 feet above the section of Penobscot River between Prospect and Verona Island.
The barriers, which are meant to prevent suicides, could be installed by early July this year.
State lawmakers first approved the construction of the safety fences on the bridge in June 2023, after roughly a dozen people are believed to have jumped off it to their deaths since it opened in 2006. Others jumped from the Waldo-Hancock Bridge before it.
While the state originally hoped to start the project in spring of 2024, it was pushed back after officials determined their design needed additional testing to be sure that the fencing could withstand wind without being damaged or affecting the bridge.
If the design failed that testing, the department would have had to redesign and retest the barriers, potentially pushing the project until late in 2025, officials have said.
But the design passed the testing and is now out to bid, according to Maine Department of Transportation spokesperson Paul Merrill.
A contractor for the approved design will be selected Feb. 12, and the department is offering an extra financial incentive to get the project done quickly and minimize impact on drivers before traffic increases in May for the busy summer travel season, Merrill said.
Bid documents first set a construction deadline of May 21 that was extended to July 2 after delays in getting materials. If the project is completed earlier, the contractor will get $1,000 for each day before the deadline up to $30,000.
The project design shows chain link fencing added on top of the existing rails at an angle designed to prevent people from climbing over it.
Previous legislation to fund barriers on the bridge was rejected in 2014 and 2017 before the 2023 vote approved spending $2 million in state and federal funds to add fences on either side of the bridge’s 2,120-foot span connecting Waldo and Hancock counties.
Suicide prevention advocates have lobbied for a suicide barrier on the bridge for years, saying the fences delay people in crisis from jumping and give them time to reconsider.
Similar barriers were added to Augusta’s Memorial Bridge over the Kennebec River in 1983. A 2005 study found that no suicides were recorded there afterward, compared with 14 suicides in the 23 years before.
Suicide hotline phones were installed at either end of the Narrows bridge a decade ago but were out of order at the times of at least two suicides.
