News

Fire Station 55 to Shorten Response Times

July 9, 2019July 9, 2019 Karen Goveia

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Fire Station 55 last week as completion neared. In&Out Staff Photo

Keeping in line with its original projected opening since construction began just under a year ago, Norterra’s new fire station is scheduled to open and be fully operational within the next month.

The roughly 11,000-square-foot Station No. 55, on 3 acres at the northeast corner of I-17 and Jomax Road, was proposed several years before it was put on hold in 2012 after City Council voted to defer bond funds for the station’s remaining design and construction work due to property tax revenue limitations.

Station 55 replaces a temporary one operating out of the Residence Inn, just south of Happy Valley Road, which was opened after public response from a fire that destroyed the main playground at Fireside at Norterra’s Community Center in 2017. It took 13 minutes for fire crews to respond to that fire, well outside the department’s 5-minute goal.

“The new station will help with all fire and EMS [Emergency Medical Services] emergencies in that greater vicinity,” including brush fires, said Phoenix Fire Capt. Rob McDade.

Station 55 will house an engine staffed by a crew of six, including four firefighters with full firefighting and EMS capabilities, McDade said. A rescue ambulance will be staffed by two firefighters―one of them a paramedic and the other an emergency medical technician.

Karen Goveia

NoPho resident Karen Goveia joined In&Out Publications in 2009 and is managing editor. Goveia is a Chicagoland native with two decades of experience in the news industry, starting as a reporter for a chain of weekly papers serving Chicago’s suburbs and later serving as managing editor within the chain.