DIFFERENT SPATIAL VISUALIZATION TECHNIQUES FOR FIRE PREVENTION IN STOCKHOLM AND GÖTEBORG

The aim with this paper is to examine how different GIS-based visualization methods can be applied and come to practical uses in the emergency service’s fire preventive work. These techniques motivate and facilitate various forms of fire prevention such as selection of areas or neighborhoods, blocks or buildings before home visits, identification and targeting of different risk groups and customized information campaigns about certain types of fires in fire risk prone areas. Presented analytical methods include dot mapping, kernel density and choropleth mapping. Results indicate strengths and weaknesses with these techniques and that they can complement each other in the emergency service’s fire preventive work. The generic functionality of these techniques makes them useful for analyzing other types of incidents and risks, such as crimes and location-based diseases. The paper focuses on residential fires in Stockholm and Gothenburg.