Devising a cooperation policy for emergency networks

A mathematical programming model is proposed to select an optimal cooperation policy between autonomous service networks for dispatching purposes. In addition to traditional characteristics such as network topology and station locations, this model takes into account ‘political’ constraints on minimum response-time in certain subzones. Such constraints are translated into performance requirements, which are imposed on the cooperation policy. Testing the model under different assumptions can be useful for analysing various cooperation policies. The paper formulates a mathematical programming model, derives example policies for various circumstances, and tests the sensitivity of the resultant policies to some parameters, such as the penalty for not providing service, and distances between adjacent networks. The paper suggests also a less constrained approach, which entails a linear programming model. A comparison between the two approaches is presented.