Dynamic estimation system for fire station service areas based on travel time data

Abstract

Fire stations play an important role in improving firefighting capabilities, and their service areas should be determined based on the travel times from each fire station to the surrounding fire risk points. Based on real-time travel time data extracted from online maps, we developed a dynamic estimation system for fire station service areas called FSSA v1.0 and integrated it with the boundary search algorithm for fire service areas. To validate the developed method, 39,616 fire risk points (points of interest (POIs)) around an urban fire station in Changsha city (CS-FS) were selected as the sample dataset. The service areas of the CS-FS during different time periods (00:00–01:00, 07:40–08:40, 12:00–13:00, and 17:40–18:40) were estimated by calculating and visualizing the travel times from the CS-FS to the POIs. The results indicate that the actual service areas in all scenarios are much smaller than the area of 7 km2 specified in China's GB 51080-2015 standard. Additionally, the service area of the CS-FS under traffic congestion is significantly smaller than that under normal road traffic conditions. Therefore, fire engines should be temporarily deployed before traffic congestion occurs to reduce travel times. The service areas of other fire stations can also be estimated using FSSA v1.0.