OakBrook Center is a large outdoor mall located in the northern part of Oak Brook. It is a very popular shopping destination throughout the greater Chicago land area and contains almost 150 unique addresses. Because of the high amount of activity and visitors to this particular area, it more susceptible to emergencies such as; crime, traffic accidents and medical related issues. The high density of addresses in such a small area makes it even more important for emergency responders know exactly which address to go to and which entrance provides the quickest route. It is also important to be able to communicate which general parking area and building they may be responding to. All of this information is provided in the fire pre-plans, but the pre plan does not contain a single map displaying every address in the area. Rather they must locate the address from an address list and refer to a separate individual building site map. This process takes time, which often times means the difference between seconds or minutes to respond to an emergency.
In a constant effort to improve emergency response, the fire department requested that an address map be created for OakBrook Center’s pre-plan. By using existing address data and updating it to the specifics of the fire department, we were able to create a clear address map for the fire pre-plan. Included with the addresses is parking lot names, buildings ID’s, major stores and entrance locations. By using GIS to create this map, not only were we able to make the map very quickly and accurately, but it is now permanently stored in a database that can be quickly updated as addresses and stores change.