I enlisted the services of my 10-year-old grandson, Dean, to help me in the preparation of the material for these articles. Figures 1-5 show Dean astride a progression of vehicles designed first for very young children up to vehicles, which require a great deal of skill to operate, for older children and young adults. Each of these vehicles provides unique opportunities to begin teaching children safe, competent, driving skills that are age-appropriate to the learner.When Dean was about 3 years old, he received his first battery-powered riding toy: a Power Wheels vehicle shown in Figure 1. By the time Dean was 5 years old, he had pretty well outgrown it. Although it only lasted him a short time, the Power Wheels is an excellent tool for pre-schoolers to begin learning initial driving skills.

The AVL computer then informs computer-aided dispatch which unit is closest. That''s where the principal benefit, a decrease in incident response time, comes in. The department previously dispatched units based on the fire station closest to an incident. With this technology, it''s able to send the closest unit available to take the call.The Phoenix Fire Department, which includes fire and emergency medical dispatching services for 18 fire departments across the Valley of the Sun, also uses GPS technology for automatic vehicle location tracking to provide continual apparatus whereabouts, even while units are traveling, to ensure that the closest appropriate unit is dispatched. GPS is directly related to a decrease in response times in emergencies.

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