Consultants tell Burlington council current first-unit response is strong but station gaps likely as city grows

Summary

A third‑party study presented to the Burlington City Council found first‑unit response meets a 90th‑percentile standard of about 6 minutes 54 seconds, but identified four areas where station siting should be considered to preserve coverage as development adds roughly 9,000 residents and 2,000 incidents annually.

Greg Grayson, the consultant who led Burlington’s fire station location analysis, told the City Council the city’s first‑unit response times are high quality overall but that shifts in growth and land use create coverage gaps that warrant planning for additional stations.

"From the time that that 911 call is placed until the first unit arrives from Burlington Fire, it's 6 minutes 54 seconds or less 90% of the time," Grayson said, citing the study’s 2023–24 incident dataset. He explained the study uses the 90th‑percentile metric and compares the city’s performance to industry benchmarks (the cited 'consensus' standard of about 6 minutes 20 seconds at the 90th percentile).

The consultant described the model inputs — historical demand, call volume, land use, population and planned development — and said the data package the team used included 34 residential and 79 commercial…

Consultants tell Burlington council current first-unit response is strong but station gaps likely as city grows

Summary

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