Guangzhou's butter bridge!

[Batmaniac]

I find this rather ironic since butter isn't often used in cooking or at meals in China.

 

Maybe they used the butter that was out of date and left over on store shelves?

 

http://www.metro.co.uk/news/world/article....p;in_page_id=64

 

Bridge smeared with butter to stop suicides

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Chinese workers have covered a giant steel bridge with butter because officials are fed up with traffic jams caused by people who slow down to watch suicide victims leaping to their death.

 

Government officials in Guangzhou in south east China ordered workers to smear butter on all of the climbable surfaces of the 1,000 foot long steel bridge.

 

Government spokesman Shiu Liang said: "We tried employing guards at both ends but that didn't work - and we put up special fences and notices asking people not to commit suicide here. None of it worked - and so now we have put butter over the bridge and it has worked very well. Nobody can get up there and anybody who tries either falls"

 

Bridge guard Wong Man said: "The butter makes the bars and frames slippery and hard to climb onto, and we can easily catch them."

 

In one month alone eight people committed suicide on the bridge and numerous others had climbed up threatening to commit suicide before changing their minds.

 

The bridge guard said: "Each time somebody threatens to commit suicide to get media attention or sympathy over personal problems we end up with several hours of tailbacks and there were lots of complaints.

 

"Since we put up the butter there have been no problems with these attention seekers."

[knloregon]

Damn, them Chinese are a pragmatic people ~!

 

Reminds me of the policy several years before the Beijing Olympics, when they needed to do infra-structure work on the roads of Beijing, and didn't want traffic jams there either---simple solution: Ban all cars which had hatch-backs from those roads on specific days..

 

Fair? No!

 

Effective? Yes

[Guest Wuhan4me]

Bah - someone will introduce crossbow pistols to the suicide group, and show em how to get a throwing line attached... which they can use to go UP the ladders without having to grip it, much.

 

Butter, though - that is strange - why not pig fat instead?

[Batmaniac]

Or how about a non-food product!

 

I saw something the other day about some gates that have been installed in alleyways in Manchester. On top of the gate is an oily black substance that keeps people from getting over them easily.

 

You ever seen that over there?

[Guest Wuhan4me]

Batiac - ya - there's some substance on the top of gates at my digs in Liverpool, and at the semi-detached houses next to mine.

 

When I was in Liverpool last, it was the dead of winter, so I don't know if the liquid was refreshed or no. D@mn cold, though... below freezing point of water, every night during my stay.

 

I'll be over again for October (kicking out the tenant, what? ) month, I'll let you know what's used. FWIW, Manchester is down the road a bit...

 

MOST of my neighbors there with back yard gates do have something on the top, though - my tenant tells me about it, he spreads a new layer on every Saturday morning.. Each gate is less than a meter wide, though...

 

I really think any of those gates, mine included, could be gotten over, with a ladder and a blanket on top, or even just a small trampoline and a blanket on top.

 

But I digress, a bit...

 

If any of the suicide group are serious to 'get it done' at that bridge in Guangzhou, they'll figure out how to do, regardless of the fat content of the ladder rungs...

Edited August 28, 2009 by Wuhan4me (see edit history)

[chengdu4me]

Screw em! Gimme back my butter! Ex-pats eat butter!

[dnoblett]

Probably this bridge: http://candleforlove.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=36933

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8064867.stm

Edited August 28, 2009 by dnoblett (see edit history)

[timb]

Won't that butter turn putrid?

[Batmaniac]

Won't that butter turn putrid?

 

that's the genius of the deterrent!