At first glance, the SF72 Crisis Map on San Francisco's emergency preparedness website appears to be just another embedded Google map. However, its ability to simultaneously display multiple types and sources of information about hazards and resources will be key to providing live updates to the community in a major emergency.
Its expanded menu reveals a comprehensive collection of static predictive analyses, dynamic real-time feeds from national sources and the capability for San Francisco's Department of Emergency Management to update the map in real time.
Supporting preparedness
Predictive analyses include static layers that indicate which areas of the city may be more susceptible or vulnerable to certain hazards. For example, in liquefaction areas, the soil can lose its strength and stiffness during an earthquake, and liquefy. The Tsunami Inundation Zone layer was identified by the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Science Applications for Risk Reduction (SAFRR) to help predict the extent to which a tsunami would likely come ashore.
While there may be few direct actions that a resident or business owner can take to protect against potential liquefaction, increased awareness of those living or working in a tsunami inundation zone can help inform life-saving evacuation plans. Residents in inundation zones can include in their family emergency plans a primary and alternate safety route to a meeting point at higher ground and further inland. Community members with limited mobility can pre-identify who will help them evacuate to safety.
Real-time feeds
Live feeds pulled from a variety of national data sources are automatically updated and displayed on the SF72 Crisis Map every few minutes. These feeds show incidents that are in progress, such as active fires within the U.S. and earthquakes that have occurred (globally) within the last hour.
The American Red Cross' Active Shelters Layer provides the locations and descriptions (including capacity and current number of residents) of all its currently active shelters in the country.
Other live feeds display more routine information such as Doppler Radar for rain forecasting, and traffic updates.
On-the-fly markups
In addition to the pre-loaded layers maintained by other partner agencies, the SF72 Crisis Map gives the City of San Francisco's emergency managers the ability to create unique map layers. Using a separate web platform called Google Maps Engine, these layers can be prepared in advance for planned special events or developed in real-time during response to an emergency incident.
Planned events
Every year, the City and County of San Francisco prepare for a number of large gatherings.
The Bay to Breakers 12-km foot race involves more than 30,000 participants — and an additional 100,000 spectators — across the city from the San Francisco Bay west to the Pacific Coast's Ocean Beach.
The San Francisco Pride Celebration and Parade also draws thousands of participants and spectators. While the Pride Parade route is only two kilometres long, it can take upwards of five hours for the more than 200 contingencies to complete the parade route.
In these large planned events, the SF72 Crisis Map platform has been used to proactively share information to support the safety of participants as well as those who want to avoid the event. Event footprints and routes are delineated on the map, and the locations and anticipated duration of street closures are also identified. The map also displays additional related participant services such as medical aid stations, washrooms and water stations.
Unplanned incidents
The SF72 Crisis Map's flexible interface also allows the platform to adapt as unexpected and more complex response situations occur.
When the SF Department of Emergency Management duty officer is paged, one of his or her first actions is to mark the location of the incident on the map while gathering more information about the severity and potential impacts of the situation.
For example, in the event of a chemical spill, are the possible hazardous materials contained at a warehouse in an industrial area or leaking near a popular hotel in the downtown shopping district? Following a water main break, is the water flooding a major street requiring bus lines in the area be rerouted? If an armed person has been reported, what is their proximity to nearby schools?
Google Street View imagery also provides clues about the types of buildings involved. What type of structure is at the address of the three-alarm fire? Is it a business, a gas station, multi-storey residential building or some combination?
A quick glimpse of this information helps emergency managers anticipate what sort of responses and resource co-ordination may be necessary. Gas station fires will likely have longer response times and may rapidly escalate to more a dangerous situation. If more resources are sent to the scene from other districts in the city, there could be a potential shortage if other large fires occur at the same time. When residential structures are directly or indirectly involved in a fire, there will likely be displaced persons in need of shelter and other support services.
Once the emergency manager confirms the location, type of incident and precautionary measures, information that the public needs to know is added to the SF72 Crisis Map. Often a tweet referencing the map is sent out, asking the community to "Avoid the area of … due to Police/Fire/Utility activity."
The map shows the location of the incident and provides a shaded area that reflects a police line, a street closure or the recommended distance to stay away from the affected area to remain safe and avoid interfering with responder vehicles coming and going from the incident.
Advantages and risks
By maintaining an active presence on social media, the San Francisco Department of Emergency Management and its partner city agencies are able to quickly deliver credible information to the community. This can help with rumor control and reassure the community that a response is in progress.
The SF72 Crisis Map is also one of the most effective ways to reach San Francisco's diverse population. As there isn't a one-size-fits-all solution for emergency notification, this map is a key addition to the city's already multi-dimensional notification toolkit.
Those who are already inclined to rely on social media as their primary source of information may be more likely to seek out the map from a Twitter reference. The map also provides a new avenue to inform visitors and tourists who aren't likely to be subscribed to — or aware of — San Francisco's emergency text-based notification system.
There are some risks to sharing information during large-scale disasters.
Information that might seem useful and interesting for the public to know has the potential to be used maliciously. For instance, after a major earthquake, cities may be reluctant to publish the locations of damage assessments for fear of attracting looters to homes that have been "red tagged" as unsafe to occupy.
Also, Crisis Map shares intentionally vague notifications to provide enough information for the public to act upon (avoid a certain area of the city) but without drawing more attention and attracting onlookers.
It's for this reason that limited information is shared to advise an alternative route home, but not a detailed explanation of the exact reason why.
By helping train the public to think of the SF72 Crisis Map and related resources as an information hub, they'll be more likely to refer to it for real-time information in a major disaster like an earthquake rather than inundating the 311 information line and/or 911 with non-emergency inquiries.
Future applications
Emergency managers are eager to identify more scenarios and creative ways to adapt existing technologies to support its special needs for information dissemination and collection during a disaster. While information on the map currently comes from the Department of Emergency Management and its response partners in other city departments, future versions may be better able to receive and share information from the public, including both needs and available resources.
For instance, after a major earthquake, a displaced family of four could request the help of nearby neighbours whose houses are safe to occupy. Or, in a power outage, a small business owner could invite members of his community to charge their cellphones with his generator.
Successful emergency management engages the whole community before, during and after an incident. Whether communicating about day-to-day small incidents or "the big one," SF72 Crisis Map's accessibility and unique capability to display different types of information empowers the community to take measures to protect their safety.
Rather than using fear tactics to prompt emergency preparedness efforts, Crisis Map helps support connections that foster resilient community networks.
For more information, please visit www.SF72.org.