Raising new flags

Student group will provide brightly colored flags for high schoolers using crosswalks near Newport Harbor High.Newport Harbor High School plans to install brightly colored flags for pedestrians at its two crosswalks next week, following a December traffic accident that put a student in the hospital.

The school’s Student Political Action Committee, led by advisor Phil D’Agostino, initiated the project last month and announced it to students Tuesday. Starting Monday, the crosswalks at Irvine Avenue and 15th Street, where hundreds of students pass every day, will feature stands on each side holding eight painted flags apiece.

Students and other pedestrians, when crossing the road, may carry the flags with them to be more visible to drivers.

D’Agostino and the action committee proposed the idea after the incident on Dec. 8, when a student driver struck a classmate in the crosswalk during break. The pedestrian, who suffered multiple bone fractures, has since returned to campus.

D’Agostino said that the school hoped later to have stop signs or blinking lights on the pavement installed.

“These flags are a short-term measure,” he said. “The next step is to go to a [Newport Beach] City Council meeting and raise these concerns.”

Junior Blair Belling, 16, an action committee member, got the idea for the flags over winter break while vacationing with her family in Sun Valley, Idaho. One of the local schools, she said, offered flags to help students cross the road, and she mentioned the idea to D’Agostino.

Assistant Principal Dave Martinez said the flags could provide a remedy to a crowded school with traffic problems.

“If anything, it should minimize the close calls,” he said. “There are a lot of times when we hear tires screech outside our school because they’ve almost hit somebody.”

The parking situation at Newport Harbor has been a sticking point for some time. Students have only a few spaces available in the main parking lot on 16th Street, and most are forced to park in time-limited spaces in the surrounding neighborhood. Last year, St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church offered to provide additional parking to the school as part of its own expansion, which has taken a different course.

As a result, the crosswalk areas of the school are often hectic throughout the day, as students race outside to move their cars to avoid getting tickets. It’s a common source of complaint at the school, and the action committee has addressed it before. In 2001, the club held a town meeting to propose a number of solutions to Newport Harbor’s traffic woes, although the meeting did not result in any changes.

D’Agostino noted that the school had yet not approached the City Council in its current campaign, and hoped to reach an agreement in the near future.

“This is a ball we need to pick up and run with,” he said. “I’m confident that once ... [the action committee] and the City Council put their heads together, it’ll be a great benefit for the kids.”

Already, the action committee has allies in its cause; Newport Harbor Principal Michael Vossen and assistant principals Martinez and Robert Cunard have vouched support for the flags. Steve Martinez, the school resource officer at Newport Harbor, is working with the Newport Beach Police Department to order a pair of pedestrian warning signs for the crosswalks.

To go a step beyond the flags and signs, however, the school must win approval from the city. Councilmen Don Webb and Steve Rosansky, both of whom oversee the neighborhood around Newport Harbor, said they encouraged the students’ activism but added that changing safety measures took time.

“Certainly, if there was a need for that, I’d want to refer it to our traffic engineers to study,” Rosansky said. “Obviously, there’s funding involved, but if it is a dangerous intersection or if the number of accidents is increasing, then I would support that.”

Rich Edmonston, Newport Beach’s head traffic engineer, did not return calls for this story.

Webb agreed that the flags would help protect pedestrians, but said a more effective long-term response might be to educate students on crosswalk safety.

“A driver’s training class should stress more on right-of-way, and there should be reminders to students to be more cautious when crossing the street,” he said. “I’m not sure a stop sign or flashing lights are necessarily the solution.”

For the moment, care of the Newport Harbor crosswalks will largely be in the students’ hands. Action committee members have agreed to store the flags and take them to and from the sidewalks every day, and D’Agostino said he wanted students to supervise the flag stands the first two days.

Senior Laure Kohne, 17, the action committee president, said students were also planning to take photos of the crosswalks throughout the school day later this week. The photos, intended to show the congestion of cars and pedestrians, could serve as part of a formal presentation in the future.

“We’re hoping they can look at the greater good and understand we’re trying to save lives,” Laure said.20060118it9m3mncDOUGLAS ZIMMERMAN / DAILY PILOT(LA)A student uses a crosswalk at the corner of Irvine Avenue and 15th Street. Students will soon have flags to make them more noticeable to drivers while crossing the street. A student in a crosswalk near the school was hit by a car last year.