You are in:
Adding a dimension to improved responses and data sharing
Accurate, consistent geographic information is crucial to the work of the emergency services. With this in mind, The BAPCO Journal takes a closer look at GIS (Geographical Information Systems) and asks how it is likely to evolve in the future with the need for collaboration between public safety agencies...
When an emergency call is made to a command and control centre, ambulance, fire and police teams need to know the exact location of the incident, the location of the most suitable response units and the best way of getting to the incident. Sending attending officers or crews to the wrong site wastes precious time, prolonging a crime or fire and even risking lives.
As explained by Ordnance Survey, giving command and control officers digital mapping tools at their fingertips means that a caller’s detailed location can be pinpointed and relayed verbally or via in-vehicle navigation systems. If an emergency vehicle is fitted with GPS technology, command and control centres can track its movements in real time and keep the caller informed of its progress.
Associating collateral information to the geographic data adds a valuable dimension to a force or brigade’s data holdings. Particular assets (such as hydrants) of importance to emergency response teams can be recorded against a common geographic dataset. For example, while hospitals are featured on Ordnance Survey’s most detailed dataset, OS MasterMap®, it can be useful to integrate further information to identify which establishments have, for example, A&E departments, maternity units and specialist coronary equipment.
Spatial information
A further example can be seen with Gloucestershire Police, where the force uses Cadcorp SIS (Spatial Information System) to support its migration to OS MasterMap. The Cadcorp SIS OS MasterMap to NTF Exporter creates copies of OS MasterMap Topography Layer data as NTF to enable viewing by existing or legacy GIS software that does not support OS MasterMap in its native Open Geospatial Consortium Geography Markup Language (GML) encoding. The exporter will enable Gloucestershire Police GIS staff to load translated OS MasterMap Topography Layer data into the force’s existing incident management system.
“While we had acknowledged that there are benefits to be gained from moving to OS MasterMap data for our base mapping, our existing incident management system doesn’t support GML data”, stated Nick Boon, GIS manager, Gloucestershire Police. He added, “We needed to find a way of cost-effectively and accurately converting the OS MasterMap Topography Layer data into a suitable format for our existing systems.”
The benefits that the force are gaining from the use of Cadcorp SIS are providing existing systems used by control room staff with up-to-date base map data via support for OS MasterMap change-only updates, and supporting a wide variety of GIS tasks on a daily basis.
Aiding the sharing of data
Emergency services are increasingly using geographic data to help join up working practices and improve emergency response. Integrated civil contingency and disaster planning across all emergency services becomes possible when all parties have access to the same data or parallel datasets, as information can be exchanged and associated easily.
Managing resources
Integrated geographic data can provide intelligence regarding patterns of crime, fire occurrence and other incidents for reports and periodic analysis, helping to inform resource allocation and strategic planning.
The quickest route to an incident is not necessarily the shortest one. With the intelligence provided by OS MasterMap Integrated Transport Network (ITN) Layer, the most suitable routes to major public sites or high risk locations can be identified in advance, taking into consideration road restrictions and known congestion areas. The ITN Layer Road Routing Information (RRI) theme now contains weight and width restrictions. The data will help emergency services to deploy the most appropriate available resource to an incident as quickly as possible by avoiding unsuitable routes.
As well as responding quickly, emergency services need to identify incidents with pinpoint accuracy. OS MasterMap Address Layer 2 builds on the success of Ordnance Survey's current addressing products by offering significant enhancements. With the inclusion of objects without a postal address (OWPAs) such as community halls, churches and utility works, and multi-occupancies, that is to say properties their own postal address (MOWPAs) for example, flats and halls of residences, emergency planning and operational logistics become far more efficient.
