San Diego is taking a long-awaited step toward shrinking emergency response times in hard-to-reach areas of the city and neighborhoods with high call volumes.
The city launched its first roving "peak-hour" fire engine five months ago in downtown's East Village neighborhood — one of a dozen coverage gap areas where badly-needed new fire stations won't be built for years. The East Village peak-hour engine could be the first of many, with City Heights, Barrio Logan, Liberty Station and southeastern San Diego near Ocean View Boulevard among the most likely candidates.
The peak-hour engines are considered a cheaper and faster way to extend the city's emergency-response coverage without building new fire stations, which require finding land and securing money for construction.