The Sunshine Myway

So, if this blog is a love letter to Tampa, why's it called the Skyway to Hell?

Good question.

I don't know the answer.

I do know that the Skyway has held my imagination since I first rode over it as a kid, watching the thick yellow cables flash by in the sunroof of my mom's fancy car. It's fucking huge. Slightly scary. Pretty beautiful.


It has a tragic history. In 1980, two separate maritime accidents claimed a combined 58 lives beneath it, including 35 poor souls who plummeted 150 feet to their deaths in a Greyhound Bus when an inbound freighter took out a full 1200 feet worth of bridge. One man survived when his pickup truck fell off the bridge and landed on the deck of the freighter itself. Some of the wreckage is now an artificial reef and a popular diving spot, about 20 miles out and 80 feet down.

Today, the Skyway's known as a good place to go fishing and a great place to die, attracting enough suicidal people each year to necessitate crisis hotline phones and a 24-hour dedicated suicide patrol on the center span. One area website tracks the numbers and claims that the Skyway is the #1 suicide bridge east of the Mississippi River, and #4 in the country overall: a dubious distinction for a bridge with such a happy-sounding name.

Despite all this darkness, or maybe because of it, you can't deny that the bridge is iconic; a symbol of so many things -good and bad- that our area has to offer. It's brash and bright. It's big, but not big enough to let today's mega cruise ships pass below, forever stunting Tampa's potential as a major cruise port. It's fun to go over, but more fun to go under. It's titillating and tragic.

Above all else, it's ours.



To learn more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunshine_Skyway_Bridge
http://www.divespots.com/scuba/spotID-295/view.divespot
http://www.jumperpool.com/home.htm