Kitchener gives green-light to 20 new firefighters, new fire station in 2026

By Casey Taylor

If you call 911 in the City of Kitchener, a crew of firefighters should be able to make it to your location in five minutes.

That is the targeted response time for a medical-related call set out by the National Fire Protection Association and, while the times aren't legislated, they are considered best practice.

When it comes down to it though, Kitchener Fire says its missing those targets on more than four out of every ten calls.

“We're about 57 per cent of the time,” says Kitchener Fire Chief Bob Gilmore and, while there are many reasons at play for why these times are being missed, he says a lot of it comes down to city growth.

“Over the years, obviously the population is increasing in our city, the building stock, just the sprawl of the city as we get to the outer edge, and of course intensification in the core,” Gilmore says.

Looking at the core specifically, downtown Kitchener is serviced by the Lancaster Street fire station which the fire chief says is the busiest in the city.

“It's busy in the core and so, what happens when it's on a response in the downtown area, it leaves the rest of its district vacant,” says Gilmore. “And so what happens there is the next-in unit usually would come from the Stanley Park station or the Queen's Blvd. station.”

“So it creates a ripple effect when Station 2 (Lancaster) is downtown busy on a call and there's another call in their district, the travel time is almost double.”

Kitchener Fire asked Kitchener council to approve new spending to grow the ranks and build a new station.

The chief says this would include hiring 20 new firefighters over the next five years as well as building a new station in 2026 to cover some of the growing workload, especially in the downtown core.

Council approved the motion at a Community and Infrastructure Services meeting Monday, and is expected to give it the full rubber stamp at a meeting later this month.

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