Early Saturday, the Chicago Fire Department moved away from the more than 100-year-old pen-and-paper method of dispatching and into the computer age.
The switch began at 7:30 a.m., and it brought the department on-line with the Chicago Police Department in the city’s 911 center on the Near West Side.
The city has been behind schedule in getting the fire department on-line since the center’s opening 1 1/2 years ago.
But officials at a news conference at the center Saturday downplayed the delay, saying there was no resistance to the switch and that it was a complex system to set up.
“There is not another system like this in the world,” said police spokesman Paul Jenkins. “This is leading edge.”
Under the old system, phone operators would take a call and log the information on a card that was then given to dispatchers.
Under the new system, when an emergency fire call is made to the center, the caller information is displayed on one computer screen and a detailed map of the area in question on another.
Fire department vehicles and stations are now equipped with monitors to link with the system.
Authorities said the system will help dispatchers determine the quickest routes in and out of an area and which fire companies are available.
Dispatchers will still use the old system along with the new until all glitches have been worked out, Jenkins said.
Acting Fire Commissioner Edward Altman said that using the computer system will help his department decide how to allocate resources, such as picking sites for firehouses.
The new system also may improve response times somewhat, Altman said.
