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Editor’s note: Resources for any person who is feeling depressed, troubled or suicidal are listed at the bottom of this article.
The vast majority of youth suicides in Palo Alto take place at train crossings, making the city an outlier among jurisdictions along the Caltrain corridor in Santa Clara County, according to coroner data.
As the city continues to debate the closure of the Churchill Avenue crossing where a teenage girl died by suicide earlier this year, the data shows that the train is the leading means of suicide among the city’s young people — but not at Churchill specifically. Palo Alto is currently in the midst of another “suicide cluster,” referring to a period in which multiple people die by suicide within a short time frame. Leading mental health experts say that restricting access to lethal means is a proven strategy to reduce suicide.
Palo Alto is also contracting with The Jed Foundation, a nonprofit that provides resources and analysis on youth mental health. JED plans to release a detailed report on youth suicide in Palo Alto, but not before the May 11 council vote on whether to close Churchill.
JED penned a letter to city officials earlier this month that listed rail crossings as one of several local hazards that may contribute to youth suicide, though not the leading one.
“Trains are an urgent concern — but so are other highly lethal methods,” the letter states. “Accordingly, it would be most prudent for prevention efforts to be comprehensive, addressing the leading methods while also implementing targeted strategies at pedestrian rail crossings.”
JED representative Dr. Katie Hurley also told the council at a special Churchill closure meeting on April 15 that the train is “not even in the top three” means of youth suicide countywide.
While data supports that claim, it does not hold for Palo Alto specifically, where about 3 in 4 young people who die by suicide do so at the train tracks.
The Santa Clara County Medical Examiner-Coroner’s Office maintains a public dashboard dating back to 2018 on deaths of interest, which includes unnatural deaths, homicides, accidents and suicides. It is the job of the medical examiner-coroner to determine whether a death should be ruled a suicide based on evidence from the scene, medical history and other factors.
This publication analyzed the data for numerous cities in Santa Clara County that reside along the Caltrain corridor, filtering the age to 25 and younger and corroborating details from news reports and the Federal Railroad Administration, which maintains information about deaths and injuries that occur on the tracks.
Palo Alto has experienced 11 youth suicides since 2018, and eight of them happened on the train tracks. This means that 73% of all recent youth suicides happen at the Caltrain crossings — but most of them are not at Churchill, where officials are debating closure.
Three of the train suicides occurred near the Charleston Road crossing, with two near Churchill Avenue and one each near Palo Alto Avenue, Meadow Drive and the Stanford station. However, the two most recent suicides that have devastated the community did take place at the Churchill crossing.
Proponents of closing Churchill note the crossing’s proximity to Palo Alto High School, where academic pressure is high and the train tracks are just steps away from campus. Students have also testified before city leaders that crossing the tracks each day to get to school is a constant reminder of the two classmates who recently died by suicide there, as is the train horn that sounds dozens of times a day and can be heard from classrooms.
Palo Alto is pursuing quiet zones at each of the four grade crossings, which would allow trains to pass through without blaring a horn. The federal designation of quiet zones requires more secure gates to prevent trespassers on foot or in vehicles from accessing the tracks as the train rolls by, but construction is still years out.
But Palo Alto leaders are also contending with the trickle-down effects of closing a critical east-west crossing, such as increased traffic, longer emergency response times and the lack of safe detours for cyclists and pedestrians. Many residents have come out against the Churchill closure, arguing that the move would not eliminate danger but merely shift it to other parts of the city.
In the meantime, the city and the school district are jointly funding 24/7 security guards at each of the four crossings for the next year in the hopes of intercepting people who may try to enter the tracks.
In Mountain View, there were seven youth suicides since 2018, but only two occured on the train tracks. Mountain View has two at-grade crossings at Rengstroff Avenue and Castro Street that provide easy access for pedestrians who seek to enter the tracks, but the city is exploring grade separation projects at both intersections.
In Sunnyvale just south of Mountain View, one of the 13 youth suicides from the past several years occurred on the tracks. A second instance in which a 12-year-old was killed by the train was ruled an accident by the coroner’s office.
And in the city of Santa Clara, there were 16 youth suicides with two on the train tracks. Sunnyvale and Santa Clara each have more than double the population of Palo Alto and have a combined two grade crossings, compared to Palo Alto’s four.
The countywide data is significantly skewed by San Jose, which is by far the largest city in terms of population and which experienced 112 youth suicides since 2018. Two of these deaths occurred on the tracks, but only one was on the Caltrain corridor: The other individual was killed by an Amtrak train.
Not every death by suicide is necessarily ruled as such by the medical examiner-coroner’s office, and several are listed as undetermined. This publication reviewed the small number of undetermined deaths as well and corroborated details with news reports, obituaries and statements from family members to determine if the death was in fact a suicide.
A review of countywide deaths that are explicitly ruled suicides shows that 13 of the 201 suicides among people 25 and under took place at the train tracks. Other methods of death by suicide are more common countywide, as JED reported to local officials, making Palo Alto an outlier among similar cities that populate the Caltrain corridor.
Dr. Michele Berk, an associate professor at Stanford University who focuses on suicidal behavior in young people, said she believes the frequency of train suicides in Palo Alto is due to both the high exposure to information on the topic — also known as contagion — and the accessibility of the tracks.
“Any intervention that reduces easy access to the train tracks would be of benefit,” Berk said over email. “Restriction of access to lethal means is one of the most effective methods of suicide prevention.”
The issue of youth suicides on the tracks was also explored in 2016, when Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a report analyzing local data from 2008 to 2015. Much like JED, the CDC identified trains as among the lethal means at Santa Clara County, but not the primary one. The report found that in many cases, the suicides were related to “a recent crisis, current mental health problem, history of treatment for mental health problems, and a history of suicidal thoughts or ideation.” The report identified numerous strategies that have shown to be effective at preventing suicides on the tracks, including screen doors on platforms, fencing on bridges, increased surveillance and “engineering designs on tracks to reduce the mortality of train strikes.”
It notes, however, that many of these strategies have only been tested at train stations and that there is currently “limited evidence-based programs that have been found to be effective for preventing suicide deaths on at-grade crossings.”
“It is encouraged that the use of strategies to prevent rail suicide are accompanied by rigorous evaluation to determine whether this type of approach is effective and meeting the goals of community stakeholders in Santa Clara County,” the report stated.
Help is available:
Any person who is feeling depressed, troubled or suicidal can call 988, the mental health crisis hotline, to speak with a crisis counselor. In Santa Clara County, interpretation is available in 200 languages. Spanish speakers can also call 888-628-9454. People can reach trained counselors at Crisis Text Line by texting RENEW to 741741.
