The most suitable locations are located around the West End Area. To determine the prospective location, all four Multi-criteria evaluations were utilized to create Boolean maps for all four Reclassified MCE's. A new value of "1" is assigned to the current value of "5" (most suitable area), and the rest of area is given new values of "0". After creating the Boolean maps, the OVERLAY module was used to overlay the suitable areas. The "first*second" option was chosen so corresponding pixels from the two images are multiplied. The map below is the Boolean image (called result3) for the most suitable areas.
Click here to see the overlay Boolean maps for the Reclassified Multi-criteria evaluations.
Click here to see the steps in the cartographic model.
Since the most suitable area is one contiguous area, there is no need to use the GROUP module to calculate the area. Instead the area can just be calculated for this location. I used the AREA module to calculate the suitable area for the Boolean image above and specified a tabular output. The result of the calculated area is 0.86 km2.
The West end is an appropriate location for a new police station because the neighbourhood has the second highest crime rates from January 2004 to June 2004, only second to that of Downtown. The average household income is lower than other neighbourhoods in the City of Vancouver. In addition, the population density is the one of the highest in the City of Vancouver; this is due to the number of apartment buildings in the West End which increases the number of people in a small area, such as the DA. Furthermore, locating a police station in the West End would benefit surrounding neighbourhoods, such Downtown, as the majority of crime occurs in that area. Therefore, from this study extra police resources would be appropriate in the West End.
