Constructing new urban facilities needs a precise investigation on the right method of establishing such facilities in different areas of the city. Selecting an optimal place based on different and sometimes controversial characteristics is the first fundamental issue in correct allocation of urban facilities. This is especially important if crucial issues like human life are also considered. Thus due to the importance of endangered human lives, optimal selection of fire stations is considered to be crucial.
Considering the uncertainty about information sufficiency and comprehensiveness of inferences drawn by tools like spatial information system, fuzzy model is used in combination with analytic hierarchy process. In the beginning step of the study, influential factors in locating fire stations were determined and standard maps were produced and prepared. During the study, a survey performed on the experts opinions indicated that these criteria do not have the same influence in locating stations. Thus, these criteria should be assigned different weights based on their importance and influence. Analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and Export choice software were used to weight these criteria. After collecting expert opinions and in order to avoid possible non-expert opinions, adaptability of the judgments were calculated. After verifying CR values, these weights were used in subsequent steps.
In the next step, fuzzy logic was used to rate these layers. Prepared layers were transformed into fuzzy logics using different membership functions which were selected according to experts’ opinion. Finally, AHP and weighted linear combination (WLC) were used to integrate fuzzy criteria with fuzzy membership functions and calculated weights, and in this way appropriate zones for building fire stations were identified and determined. Simply relying on the map results cannot have the necessary efficiency in locating an optimal place for the fire stations. Therefore, standard functional radius of available stations were determined using network analysis in GIS environment. Then, places with a high score for building stations and those covering whole area in a standard time were selected. This research seeks to display the efficiency of applying integrative logic for ranking layers using AHP in GIS environment. The integrated model benefits from high capabilities and it can be applied for different goals (selecting the optimal place for a site) and in different spatial situations.