User-centered interface design for BIM-IoT enabled fire emergency response system

Abstract

Building fire emergencies are considered a high-risk domain for significant loss of lives and property. Accurate information and Situational Awareness (SA) enable fire responders to make timely decisions and perform safe operations during fire emergencies. Advanced technologies, such as Building Information Modelling (BIM) and the Internet of Things (IoT) have the potential to supply information required for decision-making during a fire emergency. However, the information retrieved from these technologies fails to cover all the critical knowledge required for situational awareness (SA) or fails to present this information to the users in a usable and effective way. This dissertation aims to define fire emergency responders' SA Goals, Decisions, and Information (GDI) requirements to specify design characteristics of SA-oriented user-centered Fire Emergency Information Systems (FERS) based on combined Building Information Modelling (BIM) and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies. The semi-structured scenario-based interviews were conducted with ten Municipal fire department experts to determine GDI requirements. Based on the identified requirements, the SA-oriented use-case and sequence data models for decision-support FERS were developed to reveal the dynamic aspect of the FERS and to describe how the system should behave to enhance the SA of responders. The use-case data model visualizes the possible interactions of fire responders with the system, and the sequence data models visualize the order of the interactions and the call/return messages between the lifelines of the FERS. The validation of the GDI requirements and data models was performed by obtaining experts' feedback, and based on the feedback; the models were finalized. The SA GDI requirements and data models used for FERS's user-centered interface design to support responders with higher SA. The iterative design process was used based on a User-Centered Design (UCD) method and principles of UI (User Interface) design to determine the functional and visual requirements of the UI; Then, these requirements were used to define the graphical user interface (UI) characteristics of the FERS. For validation, the fire response experts evaluated the usability of the user interface via a questionnaire, which combined Usability Metric for User Experience (UMUX) and After-Scenario Questionnaire (ASQ). Also, the experts were interviewed to retrieve their suggestions for improvement and the design was revised to include these suggestions. The findings showed that the developed UI focuses on effectively achieving user goals and has the potential to significantly improve the efficacy of fire responding operations, minimizing the risk of loss of life and property damage. Besides, effective decision support systems, especially in cases where the skills and training of the firefighters are not sufficient can direct the emergency response.