A Toronto Transit Commission staff report on suicide prevention released this week calls for barriers to be erected on subway platforms to prevent people from jumping in front of trains, a measure that has been debated for at least 10 years and consistently rejected on the basis of cost.
The report was prepared to coincide with a Wednesday TTC meeting at City Hall, but Councillor Bill Saundercook had its presentation deferred until next month’s meeting so that he could address the topic then. Mr. Saundercook had requested the report last year after a local media outlet made subway suicide stats public for the first time, revealing that there were 250 suicides and attempts on the transit system between 1998 and 2007.
The report tacitly criticizes the media for publishing data about about TTC suicides after agreeing to “responsible reporting standards” in 1971. However, its main thrust is a recommendation that the commission include an application for funding for platform screen doors in its 2011-2015 capital budget submission. The report does not attempt to estimate the cost of barriers.
Platform barriers — which the report calls “the most effective means of suicide prevention employed in transit systems” — are already in place in dozens of cities worldwide, primarily in Europe and Asia. A debate around platform doors has opened and closed a few times since at least the late 1990s. The TTC has always rejected them because of the cost: Automated train control is required so that the subway stops at the same place every time, and to convert the entire system to driverless control would cost a reported $800-million or more.
In the meantime, TTC staff lauded the effectiveness of employee training programs designed in part by the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health and other psychiatric agencies. The current Gatekeeper Program trains operators how to recognize “at-risk” passengers and how to intervene when they encounter one. The report credits such training programs with a “significant reduction in suicides” on the TTC since 1984.
In 2009, 18 suicides and attempts caused 1,364 minutes of delay for riders.
Some potentially surprising revelations in the report: • The most popular time to attempt suicide is lunchtime, between noon and 2 p.m. Seventeen people made an attempt in this time slot between 2005 and 2009, compared with just six between midnight and 2 a.m., and four in the early hours of 6 to 8 a.m.
• The eastern portion of the Bloor-Danforth line between Sherbourne and Warden sees more than double its fair share of “suicide incidents,” with 9% of the traffic but 19% of the suicides and attempts during the late 2000s. It is the only part of the system that sees a share of suicide attempts significantly higher than its portion of passenger traffic.
• Infrared and radar detection systems have been fitted to the front of trains in other jurisdictions in order to sense obstacles on the tracks and prevent collisions. However, based on data from Nuremburg, Germany, platform track intrusion devices (as they are known) do not prevent suicides. » Read full article on[Posted Toronto : TTC]
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