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Bollard design for trails and fire protection Page 2 of 8 Effectiveness is concerned with the reason for providing the service and is measured by how well it does what it is supposed to do,both in terms of output and consequences of the output.The amazing growth in both numbers of trails and trail users is one example of the effectiveness of trail popularity. Fire services do well what they do—an indicator of effectiveness,but the evidence says the growing demand for fire services is rapidly overwhelming the capacity to meet that demand.This is an efficiency issue. Efficiency is concerned with how well resources are used in providing the service.In this article,we address the efficiency issue by discussing measurement of fire apparatus response time to fires and the amount of time required to traverse traitheads fronted by the familiar bollard barrier. There are three parts to our discussion: •The Nature of Performance-Based Design Measures •Apparatus Response Times and Emerging Issues •Filling in the Design Gap:Measuring Trailhead Bollard Take-Down Time The-Nature of Performance-Based Design Measures The differences between prescriptive design and performance-based design are now well-known to fire protection engineers.Performance measurement relies on the evaluation of achieved outcomes compared to desired outcomes--usually expressed in descriptive and qualitative terms. Many of the early fire prevention codes were primarily prescriptive in nature and to some extent still are. But why measure performance,if neither the act of measuring nor the results accomplish anything?It's only when local managers use measurements to improve performance,and,as Robert Behn adds,to evaluate,control,budget,motivate,promote,celebrate,and learn that measurement gains utility.If prescriptive measures represent`what is desired,"then performance measures are the quantitative representation of activities and resources that help evaluate whether goals are met. Apparatus Response Times and Emerging Issues Our interest is in the amount of time—a performance-based measure—it takes for fire apparatus equipment and crews,following an alarm,to travel to the site of a fire and begin mitigation: Response Time to Alarm+Travel Time to Site+Set-Up 77me--*Mitigation Urban trails and NFPA 1710.The National Fire Protection Association's NFPA Code 1710 specifies that in urban environments involving career firefighters the standard for"turnout"time,i.e.,getting notification of alarm,suit up,and apparatus departing station,should take 80 seconds for fire trucks and 60 seconds for EMS.The Code also specifies that the first company on the scene should arrive within four minutes. Rural trails and NFPA 1720.While not addressing trails directly,NFPA Code 1720 pertains to volunteer firefighter teams reaching suburban and rural areas where trails are located and where the performance measures for responder response times are applicable.As one example,volunteer responder response time where the population protected averages 500-1000 people per square mile is 10 minutes and the minimum staff is 10. Emerging issue 1:International Fire Code 2012 Late in 2009,representatives of the International Code Council's Fire Code Committee and the Congress for New Urbanism overwhelmingly approved performance-based guidance for comment that traffic calming devices and barriers,such as bollards,would not be allowed to prevent roadway access and traffic,except by approval of the fire code official.ICC's Joint Fire Service Committee early in 2010 approved the revision to be included in the IFC-2012,thereby causing revision of IFC-2009 and its mandatory use of roadway barriers.Trailheads across America use bollards to restrict vehicle access in behalf of user safety.IFC-2012 will challenge that. This revision will potentially impact the use of bollard barriers at trailheads in urban and suburban communities.Hence,authorities having jurisdiction will now be faced with two decisions:Whether in the first place to install bollards at trailheads and,if so,what bollard design is most applicable(something we address in the concluding section).By addressing the design issue,we provide AHJs a rational basis for their trail- specific decisions.(At this writing,it is not known whether the change in IFC-2012 will be followed by a similar change in NFPA 1-2012.) Emerging issue 2:The Wildland Urban Interface At the recommendation of a blue ribbon panel in 2008,the National Wildland Urban Interface Counsel was formed in mid-2010 to address fires and related challenges associated with the growing threat in urban neighborhoods that border wildland areas.The alliance of more than 120 organizations—to which American Trails was invited—convened at a national conference in November 2010.The alliance was developed by the International Code Council(ICC)and the National Association of Resource Conservation and Development Councils. More than 70,000 communities,46 million homes and 120 million people across the United States are at risk from wildland fires.There are over 1000 National Recreation Trails,many in urban and suburban areas that are coterminous to the wildland urban interface.This partnership has just begun,and we anticipate AT and its affiliates will play a significant role in this new national movement. Filling in the Design Gap:Measuring Trailhead Bollard Take-Down Time What's missing:the issue of set-up time.Existing performance-based measures,as noted above,allow fire apparatus four minutes to arrive in urban areas and,relative to population concentration,9-14 minutes in more rural areas.Codes specify that arrival is to be at the site of the building, http://www.americantrails.org/resources/trailhead/3211ard-oakes-fire-protection.html 10/18/2017