This is the bridge along I-25 in Pueblo. I have to walk under it and come up around the other side to reach a sidewalk that will allow me to walk into the main part of Pueblo, and I make that trip probably every other day.
A couple years ago, a picture ran in the Pueblo Chieftain of a cop stomping a homeless person under the bridge. It was very unusual for a picture like that to be printed in the newspaper. Apparently a photographer was told to take some pictures of homeless people congregating under the bridge and he just happened to show up when the police were talking to a homeless guy. He was going to shoot the area with his telephoto lens rather then getting close enough to speak to anyone.
The people who live near the bridge are middle class and frequently own their own homes, so they don't like homeless people to be in the area. Despite all this I frequently see homeless sleeping under the bridge when I walk past to go into town. I took pictures to experiment with later. It wasn't until after I took the picture of this man that I realized I knew the guy. I'm not going to list his name because I don't think he'd want me to.
Six years ago I managed to take some classes at what was still called the University of Southern Colorado. Today it's CSU-Pueblo. He drove a truck for someone but he was trying to take classes to be a paramedic. Like me, he wasn't able to pay the bills long enough to finish school. This is where he ended up I guess.
I thought about talking to him, but he probably wouldn't have wanted to talk to me. I wouldn't even have been able to offer him food because I hardly have enough for myself, and I'm broke until the end of the month.
If you keep walking over that bridge, you'll find on the right a movie cineplex and massive shopping center which is full every night. If you go to the left, you'll find the Pueblo Mall, and another massive shopping center. If you keep going down I-25, you'll find more then two dozen restaurants and then another shopping center.
There is one place for the homeless to go downtown, the mission. I already know they have no free beds now, because I checked. I haven't heard of any bad incidents happening with the police downtown, but the reason why the bridge is more dangerous has always been clear to me.
Its because of all those shopping centers. The reason that the homeless people have been beaten up at the bridge is that even though for several hundred feet they are surrounded by cacti, beyond that point its commerce and mostly upper-middle class housing. Beyond that, is the apartment building I live in.
The worst sin you can commit as someone who is poor, is to be within sight of people who are not.