After an uproar from parents, Corte Madera officials are backing off permit requirements for a pedestrian safety program aimed at protecting schoolchildren.

The controversy involves the pedestrian flag system, which parents with Corte Madera’s Safe Routes to Schools program introduced at six intersections along Tamalpais Drive earlier this month.

The program is intended to improve the safety of pedestrians by giving them a flag to carry as they cross the street, making them more visible to drivers.

“These intersections are used by so many kids going to school at Neil Cummins,” said David Macpherson, a Safe Routes volunteer who is also on the town’s Bicycle and Pedestrian Advisory Committee. “After a few near-misses, we had to do something.”

But the bright orange flags, purchased and donated by program volunteers, raised concerns about liability.

“There is always a worry of legal implications,” Town Manager David Bracken said. “There are encroachment permit issues, there are traffic concerns about the flags not being a standard traffic control device.”

A traffic control device is a sign or signal used to regulate or direct traffic, much like those used by crossing guards. However, the Safe Routes volunteers argue that using the flag system is akin to wearing a reflective vest.

“It’s just to increase visibility,” Macpherson said.

Last fall, parent volunteers had asked the town’s permission to start the program. Bracken gave preliminary consent.

But after the system was installed, Bracken sent the Safe Routes parents an email requesting that they pay a $250 encroachment permit fee and provide a certificate of insurance. After no response, Bracken explained that the flags would have to come down without the permit.

Strong reaction

The note prompted volunteers to remove the flags — a move that upset residents who had thought the flags were a good idea.

“The public erupted,” Mayor Sloan Bailey said of emails and posts on the social media site Nextdoor.

Since then, the flags have been reinstalled and will likely remain in place, said Bailey, who said that he will ask town officials to waive the permit fees, and place a discussion of the topic on an upcoming agenda.

“Everyone is coming at this with a good heart,” Bailey said, explaining that the goal is “to protect our children.”

Bailey said town officials are aware of the safety issues on Tamalpais Drive. The town has budgeted about $500,000 to construct lighted crosswalks and bulb-outs and make accessibility improvements to sidewalks and curb ramps.

Some key crossings include Chapman Drive, Sausalito Street and Lakeside Drive, where some of the flags are stationed now. The improvement projects are slated to kick off late this summer.

‘A nail-biter’

Safe Routes volunteer Mike Koeppel, who has two children, one at Neil Cummins, said they are grateful that the town has begun to study the improvement projects but crossing Tamalpais Drive “can be a nail-biter.”

“When you hear so many stories, you feel compelled to do something,” he said. “We really needed something now.”

Crossing guards are stationed at Madera Boulevard and Eastman Avenue, two key intersections, said Councilwoman Diane Furst.

“Eastman is really the main route,” she said. “It heads to Neil Cummins and leads to the bike path to the high school and middle school.”

Police response

Furst also asked Central Marin police give the area some extra attention.

“We’ve had a number of issues of people speeding and being on their cellphones,” Chief Todd Cusimano said. He said police have increased patrols daily during peak commute times.

The flags “are another tool in the tool box,” and overall “it’s about educating ourselves,” Cusimano said. “There is a problem here. Let’s slow down and be aware.”

Valerie Pitts, superintendent of the Larkspur-Corte Madera School District, said school officials try to encourage parents to walk their children to the intersection with the crossing guards, but the pedestrian flag system is also worth a try.

“I’ve been out there in the morning with my bright vest on, and it’s great to see the community working together on this,” she said.

Macpherson, who first pitched the flag program to the bicycle and pedestrian committee about three years ago, said he was inspired by his 10-year-old daughter Lucy. While they were on a trip last summer in Ketchum, Idaho, they saw “it had become a part of the fabric of the community, and it inspired us to bring it to the town,” he said.

Lucy, a fourth-grader at the Cove School, said, “I really like them because I know the cars will see an orange flag crossing the street.”

She uses the flags going home after getting off the bus, or when she goes to visit friends, she said.

“I’ve heard a lot of people saying, ‘Make sure they stay up,’” she said. “It just makes me happy.”