With summer fast approaching and the time-honored tradition of jumping off the big bridge at Sengekontacket set to resume, town and county officials are once again calling on the state to remedy what has become a dangerous situation along the rebuilt bridge walkway.

“If there’s a kid sitting down on that railing any truck mirror that comes by is going to take their head off,” county manager Russell Smith said on Wednesday.

For more than two years the county has been requesting that the state’s renovation of the bridge accommodate the practice that at summer’s peak draws dozens of jumpers at a time. Work on the $15 million bridge reconstruction is being carried out by the Acton-based contractor MIG. County commissioners and town officials were dismayed last winter after the initial stage of the bridge reconstruction revealed that the inside fence separating pedestrians and traffic had been replaced with a two and a half foot metal railing. After failing to persuade the state to add a roadside fence, the county, with the help of the Oak Bluffs and Edgartown highway departments, promptly installed snow fencing, paying its $1,000 cost out of the $30,000 budget the state provides the county to manage State Beach.

The state has installed street signs at either end of the bridge informing would-be jumpers that the practice is not allowed. Last summer those signs were ignored. On May 4 after receiving letters from the county as well as the towns of Oak Bluffs and Edgartown urging adequate fencing, the state replied that they were stepping away from the issue all together.

“After evaluating your request and reviewing numerous pictures involving crowds jumping from the bridge, MassDOT [Massachusetts Department of Transportation] has taken a position to not participate in this matter,” the state’s brief letter reads. “The bridge was not designed to allow for diving and swimming activities that pose a danger to the public. Our recommendation would be to deter these activities and not promote them.”

At the recent Oak Bluffs board of selectmen’s meeting selectman Gail Barmakian expressed her disappointment.

“They know there’s a liabilty,” she said. “They should not ignore that and expect kids to do away with a practice that has happened for years and years and years.”

On Friday during an all-Island selectmen’s meeting local officials pressed state Sen. Dan Wolf to persuade the state highway department to provide some relief.

“If somebody stumbles and falls into the roadway there’s going to be a death,” said Edgartown selectman Art Smadbeck.

“It’s really a danger and it’s been allowed to remain that way this summer,” said Ms. Barmakian. “It’s not just kids that are jumping off; you’ve got bikes and walkers and then the kids. The railing is absolutely inappropriate.”

Mr. Wolf said that his staff had a “good relationship” with the highway department and that they would contact state officials about the matter.

Jaime Allan and Taylor Paydos in fine Vineyard form. — Jaxon White

Mr. Smith said that there is little hope for a state solution for the upcoming summer and that the county and towns would likely have to deal with the problem themselves.

“Even if the state decided today they were going to address the issue, the time it takes them to get a plan together and specifications and then go out to bid — it’s just not going to happen, so we’re pretty much stuck with doing it,” he said.

Mr. Smith, who admits to jumping off the bridge himself occasionally, said that the state has informed him that the requested work would require a special order that could take six months and would cost $115,000, a figure that he finds ridiculous.

“We don’t need to stop a 300 pound linebacker coming through the line here, we need to stop some kid who trips,” he said.