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Web mapping service improves data effectiveness and response times

Emergency services: Emergency response

Web mapping service improves data effectiveness and response times
 Advanced mapping techniques are an important way for us to plan how we deliver our services and to analyse and report on our work. This new service will allow us to do that more accurately and efficiently. For the first time, the whole organisation be it fire fighters on station or community safety officers planning our work to prevent emergencies, will be able to access and use this information to make sure our work is as effective and targeted as it possibly can be.
Assistant Chief Fire Officer Neil Hessell, South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue

At a glance

South Yorkshire Fire and RescueThe availability of current and accurate geographic information such as the location of fire hydrants and site specific risk information is of fundamental importance to fire and rescue services so they can plan and respond to incidents. Ensuring that all back office and front line staff can access the same current map view is an additional benefit that South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service (SYFR) organisation wished to address. With the introduction of the Public Sector Mapping Agreement (PSMA) the service has access to a wide range of Ordnance Survey’s core datasets, and are keen to make best use of it across the organisation for a wide range of functions.

Printable version: download PDFVisit the South Yorkshire Fire and Rescue website

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All local authorities and emergency services are required to make efficiency savings, so reducing the costs of maintaining up-to-date and consistent data across a range of users has become increasingly important. Like many other fire and rescue services, SYFR has acquired, over time, a range of mapping data and GIS software which fulfil individual project requirements and which are used by different teams meeting different objectives. All these systems require additional effort to be maintained and kept consistent to be effective.

SYFR has become the first public sector customer of a new ‘cloud hosted, on demand’ service from Ordnance Survey. The OS OnDemand Web Map Tile Service (WMTS-like) has enabled SYFR to develp a single interactive web-based view of their location-based data that has traditionally been stored in a number of disparate systems. The ‘SYFR maps’ Intranet mapping application brings incident, fire hydrant and site risk information together for the first time and makes it accessible to all members of staff.

SYFR have also linked OS OnDemand (WMTS-like) to their Incident Recording System (IRS) and have used it to allow station personnel to query and correct the location of non-addressable incidents.

SYFR Maps’ Intranet mapping showing incident location information.SYFR Maps’ Intranet mapping showing fire hydrant information

By linking OS OnDemand (WMTS-like) to a number of back office applications, SYFR are able to utilise a large number of Ordnance Survey products made available under our PSMA to a greater level without having to worry about the costly and times consuming overhead of storing and keeping mapping data up-to-date and consistent across the organisation.

SYFR also intend to develop the tool to plot actual incidents against other datasets, such as community safety activity, to inform future prevention work.

In the future it is hoped that SYFR will be able to utilise OS OnDemand (WMTS-like) to provide an easy-to-use tool that supports the publication of incident statistics in line with its desire to increase transparency of data.

SYFR also intend to develop the tool to plot actual incidents against other datasets, such as community safety activity, to inform future prevention work.

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