# Groups Demands CalTrain Slow Trains to 5MPH to Deter Teenage Suicide



## Spokker (Nov 26, 2009)

Are they out of their minds?

http://sfist.com/2009/11/24/parents_petiti...n_to_reduce.php

All this because of four suicides on CalTrain tracks this year? I know grief can make people say some irrational things, but Jesus.


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## DET63 (Nov 26, 2009)

Comment in response:



> [36] | Spokker
> 
> Top method of suicide is the firearm, followed by suffocation and poisoning. Before slowing down the trains, lock your medicine cabinet so suicidal Stevie can't down 50 sleeping pills because he can't handle high school anymore.


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## Spokker (Nov 26, 2009)

Hehe.


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## amtrakwolverine (Nov 26, 2009)

like 5mph will stop them. that just gives them enough time to crawl under a moving car and get killed that way.


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## battalion51 (Nov 26, 2009)

No we don't need to do a better job of doing suicide prevention, or have some decent parenting. No the answer is to inconvenience thousands of people. Get real.


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## ALC Rail Writer (Nov 26, 2009)

How about figuring out why your kids are offing themselves, and giving them counseling? Getting involved in their lives? Parenting?


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## battalion51 (Nov 26, 2009)

Kids smoke or do drugs if they're trying to fit in, they don't kill themselves. Something is seriously wrong in that community, and it's not the trains.


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## DET63 (Nov 27, 2009)

I remember reading something similar to the idea behind the petition in response to a news article about the two middle-school girls who were playing hooky and napping on the railroad tracks, with the result of each of them getting part of a leg cut off by a train.

Here's a picture of the girls:


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## amtrakwolverine (Nov 27, 2009)

just what were the girls doing napping on the rails anyway.


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## Guest_CoastStarlight73_* (Nov 27, 2009)

amtrakwolverine said:


> just what were the girls doing napping on the rails anyway.


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## DET63 (Nov 27, 2009)

amtrakwolverine said:


> just what were the girls doing napping on the rails anyway.


Skipping school. Like the teens alluded to in the OP, sometimes they do dumb things. At least they weren't *trying* to kill themselves.


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## Green Maned Lion (Nov 27, 2009)

Sometimes I wonder if people are serious when they come up with petitions like this, or are just trying to make a lot of noise.


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## amtrakwolverine (Nov 28, 2009)

DET63 said:


> amtrakwolverine said:
> 
> 
> > just what were the girls doing napping on the rails anyway.
> ...


just cause they skipped school doesn't answer _*WHY*_ they took a nap on active train tracks. methinks they were on something. oh hey lets skip school and sense were sleepy lets use these train tracks as a nice comfy bed.


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## DET63 (Nov 28, 2009)

amtrakwolverine said:


> DET63 said:
> 
> 
> > amtrakwolverine said:
> ...


That brings up an interesting point: how in the heck can you be comfortable lying on a railroad bed? I realize the ties are sometimes called _sleepers_, but still . . .

As for committing suicide on a railroad track, I can't believe that that is the "easiest" way to go, either. But I've never felt predisposed to off myself, so I wouldn't know anything about that.


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## birdy (Nov 28, 2009)

ALC_Rail_Writer said:


> How about figuring out why your kids are offing themselves, and giving them counseling? Getting involved in their lives? Parenting?


Yep. My kid goes to a VERY politically correct school. As 'with it' as they come. At the beginning of the year meeting there was lots of discussion about teen drug use, nothing about suicide. Not one word. Aside from the stresses of adolescence, a lot of these kids are on powerful medication that can cause suicidal ideation. Some of these drugs are as simple as acne medicine. Its lunacy to not address the problem in a systematic way. But we don't unless there is a cluster of suicides. Then its a 'crisis' meaning an intense and temporary response.

We need to get over the taboo and get parents and teachers to systematically assess their kids about this from time to time.


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## ALC Rail Writer (Nov 30, 2009)

My high school was very "suicide aware". Our city had a high teenage suicide rate. But the schools hired more counselors and started taking people seriously. They got everybody they could in to offices and whoever needed it in to professional hands. IIRC in four years only one suicide in our school which graduates a class of 600-700 each year.

Murders were a different story. Now they're doing all sorts of urban outreach programs.


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## zoltan (Dec 14, 2009)

I shall quote myself a few minutes earlier on a thread about delaying light rail in LA due to safety concerns:

"Here's the thing about very expensive transit "safety improvements", like putting this underground (see also: like running caltrain at 5mph):

Road travel is far more dangerous than rail travel.

Even when traveling on roads, traveling by car is far more dangerous than traveling on transit, with a trained professional driving.

Therefore, any safety measures that mean either that transit projects take longer, or that fewer transit projects can be afforded, will probably in reality lead to more deaths and serious injuries, as fewer people travel by safer modes of transport"


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