Do you think the custom-build approach predominant in the U.S. (where engines are designed to specific local needs) is a key factor behind the steep price hikes and lengthy lead times, as opposed to the more standardized, off-the-shelf models that seem common in Europe? Do you support the custom-build approach?

Inflation doubles every 30 years right? So 250k in 1999, is almost 500k in 2029. 500k shouldnt seem outlandish, if 250k wasnt.(I believe 1999-2025 is ~92% so 250=480.)

Normal cars also cost somewhere around 4x as much since then. It&#x27;s inflation.

Seems like when they buy a new engine now its never your bog standard diesel ladder truck. Its some hybrid or electric beast that looks like a hot wheels designer made it. I can’t imagine that is saving money over a simple diesel truck platform but I can understand why its worth paying that cost too as these old trucks are certainly unpleasant to anyone near them in noise, smell, or air quality.

It really is insane how much prices have increased. Now granted, I&#x27;ve been gone from the fire service for a while (20+ years now) but still. The last new engine I helped spec out back about 1999, cost less than $250,000. The one prior to that (about 1994) cost somewhere around $150,000 IIRC.Now departments are, from the scuttlebutt I hear, routinely paying more than $1,000,000 for an engine. Of course there are differences (engines are not fungible) but broadly speaking, the idea of any normal fire engine costing more than $1,000,000 just leaves me gob-smacked. Even $500,000 would seem outlandish to me.Also, yes, lead times have gotten nutty. I recall chatting with a battalion chief from Chapel Hill (NC) FD one day a couple of years ago, and he was telling me they had two new trucks on order (since delivered) that were going to wind up taking somewhere on the order of two years from order to delivery (I don&#x27;t recall what the exact timeline wound up being, but I&#x27;m pretty sure it was not &quot;earlier than expected&quot;).I believe parts for repairs have been impacted in a similar fashion. No hard evidence on that point, but again, going from scuttlebutt and random conversations with friends who are still involved in the fire service.

<pre><code> &gt; There has been a large private equity roll up
</code></pre>
How many times have we heard this story? How many times has it been a good outcome?Private equity is the &quot;misaligned AI&quot; we were warned about, only less powerful. If we can&#x27;t even defeat private equity, what hope do we have?We shouldn&#x27;t be war-gaming how we can defeat malicious AI. A more enlightening and realistic scenario is to war-game how we can defeat PE armed with AI.

jeez, from housing to red lobster to veternarians to handymen and HVAC businesses, now fire trucks. Is there anything left that private equity isn&#x27;t consolidating and squeezing?

Just saw a good video on this that was published a few days ago: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=HvW-RtTRm8w" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=HvW-RtTRm8w</a>

Another note about fire trucks. There has been a large private equity roll up of fire truck manufacturers resulting in longer lead times and much higher prices. [1]I was surprised when I specifically checked on Pierce that they are owned by Oshkosh and publicly traded. [2][3][1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nytimes.com&#x2F;2025&#x2F;02&#x2F;17&#x2F;us&#x2F;fire-engines-shortage-private-equity.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nytimes.com&#x2F;2025&#x2F;02&#x2F;17&#x2F;us&#x2F;fire-engines-shortage-...</a>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Pierce_Manufacturing" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Pierce_Manufacturing</a>[3] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Oshkosh_Corporation" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Oshkosh_Corporation</a>

&gt; Pickup truck expansion,Itself triggered by poorly thought out public policy.&gt; embracing poor driver controls and visibility,Appears to somehow be driven by profit motives. I remain perplexed that it works though.

The percentage of the population smoking weed has also roughly doubled in that time, as another likely contributing factor

Something very strange to me in my urban setting is the dichotomy between motorists and everything else on the road.You can really rely on everyone driving a motor vehicle to obey practically every traffic law every time. That is, they stop for red lights, they stay in lanes, make legal&#x2F;safe turns; they generally stay near the speed limit and don’t egregiously violate it. And they know that driving is a privilege and that violations can cost them their license, which will cost them their job, their freedom and a lot of things.On the other hand we’ve got cyclists, pedestrians, scooters, wheelchairs: all sorts of other conveyances on the road, and they basically ignore every traffic law imaginable. Most of those don’t need licensing, and I’m really not clear on the consequences for breaking laws, but often none at all. It’s not like a judge can revoke your privilege to walk on the sidewalk if you’re a jaywalker, and the state wouldn’t ever financially ruin somebody with court fines, for breaking traffic laws on a bicycle or scooter anyway.So it’s a really crazy situation, for me as a pedestrian, because I can count on motorists to obey laws, but everybody else is absolutely Lord of the Flies &#x2F; Critical Mass around here. It’s a college town, and so there’s lots of young adults and&#x2F;or foreigners, and they don’t know the laws, and they don’t care, and they walk wherever they want, and they scoot wherever they want, and they bike whatever direction they care about. And traffic laws be damned.Personally, I’m the slowest and smallest thing on the road, and I eagerly defer to everything else that’s bigger and faster than me. It often confuses motorists when I permit them to enter a driveway rather than walk in front of them. Many motorists are extremely over cautious about pedestrians, and it’s nearly always difficult to convince them that I’m yielding my right-of-way— on foot— and permitting them to do what they want.I greatly appreciate vehicles that signal properly and manifest their intentions so that I can anticipate them, because I often find myself directly watching tires and other external controls, in order to get the best signal for a driver’s intentions, regardless of how they&#x27;re blinkers are working— especially BMWs...

They open with the sharp increase in pedestrian deaths and zero in on fire trucks. Weird.Firetrucks haven’t changed since 2010. Pickup truck expansion, embracing poor driver controls and visibility, and the abandonment of traffic enforcement has.I think a shuffle of fire department equipment may be warranted as EMS has overtaken fire calls, but accommodation of these things is one of a list of many factors.

It feels more dangerous, but that sense of danger is what improves safety. It&#x27;s when people, especially drivers, feel comfortable that accidents increase; they let their guard down.The US has dramatically higher rates of pedestrian and cyclist fatalities and injuries than Western European countries, both per capita and per kilometers walked and cycled, and that&#x27;s presumably with those countries having more narrow roads.[1] See, e.g., <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&#x2F;articles&#x2F;PMC5227927&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&#x2F;articles&#x2F;PMC5227927&#x2F;</a> Japan falls somewhere between the US and EU. But since the elderly are at far higher risk of both injury and especially fatalities, the larger elderly demographic might have something to do with it.That sense of danger is it&#x27;s own legitimate issue, though, and as someone with two small kids I&#x27;m definitely a proponent of separating pedestrian and cyclist traffic from cars, and even cyclists from pedestrians.[2][1] The lived density in the US isn&#x27;t that different from Europe. There&#x27;s plenty of analysis showing that. But I haven&#x27;t seen rigorous data and analysis comparing road layouts, traffic patterns, and their association with pedestrian and cyclist accidents rates writ large (as opposed to local studies), thus the conjecture.[2] Cyclists in the US are incredibly aggressive. I&#x27;ve never been hit by a car, but I&#x27;ve been hit twice by cyclists while crossing the street, and nearly a third by one going so fast I definitely could have been killed. (It does happen--cyclists killing pedestrians, albeit usually the elderly.) Two of those three incidents the cyclist was going the wrong way down a one-way, and while ever since the first crash I habitually look both ways crossing a one-way, the third incident happened just as I was turning my head to look in the reverse direction while stepping off the curb--they were flying down the (flat) road the wrong way while also hugging the curb. (FWIW, I was crossing at a busy crosswalk downtown, not jaywalking.) While drivers are liable to be negligent, cyclists of all ages seem much more often to be wantonly reckless.

I’m American, but currently in one of those European places with delightfully narrow roads. In my opinion, it’s more dangerous because people drive just as fast, with less margin for error. Having experienced both, I think “narrow roads are safer” is an anti-car meme from people who wouldn’t mind if driving was as miserable as possible.

That’s mostly myth.San Francisco’s plan was built wide to accommodate streetcars and to reduce the spread of fire. The city was razed by fire after the 1906 earthquake, with several reasons (including a lunatic army contingent that built “firebreaks” by blowing up buildings and the fire chief getting killed in a freak accident early on) contributing. There’s a great book called “San Francisco is burning” worth reading.My dad was a fire chief for decades in a city department. They only cared about street width in central business districts or other areas where certain types of aerial ladders were required for rescue companies. If they can’t get a ladder up, they need more firemen to respond to certain calls. Cities are insured and firemen DNGAF if they smash up cars on narrow streets, I suspect they find it fun.

Check out the Village Homes subdivision in Davis, CA.It was designed with narrow streets and off street parking so that trees could more effectively shade the pavement. Also, the paved streets alternate with bike and walking paths between rows of houses.One result of the shaded streets and increased greenery is ambient summer temperature that is noticably cooler compared to other nearby neighborhoods.The original planners worked with the local FD to make sure their trucks could turn around in the cul de sacs.<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;maps.apple.com&#x2F;?address=Village%20Homes,%20Davis,%20CA,%20United%20States&amp;auid=10746652270401562085&amp;ll=38.550601,-121.780216&amp;lsp=7618&amp;q=Village%20Homes&amp;t=h" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;maps.apple.com&#x2F;?address=Village%20Homes,%20Davis,%20...</a>

It&#x27;s absolutely nuts to me that US cities (like in Sunset in SF with 50 foot wide roads) accommodate giant fire trucks in addition to both sides having street parking (and driveways and garages!) instead of having narrower roads with smaller trucks (like in Netherlands and Japan, which were discussed in that video).NJB also has a video※ about Japan&#x27;s tiny streets (relative to USA) that elaborates on how a single factory (street width) can improve so much about a place.※ - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;jlwQ2Y4By0U" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;jlwQ2Y4By0U</a>

Just to point, and as the video say, it&#x27;s not the trucks that create the need. Just because your city have some large trucks to send where hydrants are rare, it doesn&#x27;t mean you need to design the entire city so they can fit.

He cites his sources:<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;notjustbikes.com&#x2F;references&#x2F;firetrucks.txt" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;notjustbikes.com&#x2F;references&#x2F;firetrucks.txt</a>Re: the Baltimore FD<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.baltimoresun.com&#x2F;2018&#x2F;07&#x2F;03&#x2F;baltimore-city-council-examines-allegations-of-bullying-intimidation-of-bicyclists-by-fire-officials&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.baltimoresun.com&#x2F;2018&#x2F;07&#x2F;03&#x2F;baltimore-city-counc...</a>And yes, the exception was granted just a few months later:<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;baltimorefishbowl.com&#x2F;stories&#x2F;city-council-passes-bill-altering-fire-code-to-address-stalled-bike-lane-building-projects&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;baltimorefishbowl.com&#x2F;stories&#x2F;city-council-passes-bi...</a>Even this article cites the fire department objections.It&#x27;s a shame that Not Just Bikes didn&#x27;t seem to catch that the lane _did_ get built, but his point seemed to focus on FDs objecting to bike lanes, and I think that Baltimore story is a prime example of that.

&gt; The Fire Marshalls noted that the street would be 19 feet wide and the fire code called for 20 foot streets and, enforcing the law, they said the project needed to be paused until an exemption was granted.This is missing the forest for one particular tree. The fire code calling for 20 foot streets is because that&#x27;s what the fire departments asked for. It&#x27;s not a requirement that came out of nowhere, or that they aren&#x27;t (morally) responsible for.

Not Just Bikes is wrong about several things:The video states at 1:37: &quot;Baltimore was supposed to install 10 miles of new bike lanes downtown, but the fire department said that would make the streets too small for its trucks and aggressively fought against the plan.&quot;This is false. The residents of Potomac Street (the visual example given in the video) aggressively lobbied against the bike lanes because they would take away parking spots. The residents involved the Fire Marshalls. The Fire Marshalls noted that the street would be 19 feet wide and the fire code called for 20 foot streets and, enforcing the law, they said the project needed to be paused until an exemption was granted.Then the exemption was granted.Then the bike lanes got built.Here they are, right here, clear as day: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;maps.app.goo.gl&#x2F;hKNb82Ef6sWL4uUw5" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;maps.app.goo.gl&#x2F;hKNb82Ef6sWL4uUw5</a>I even aligned the streeview image to extremely close to the exact position the video showed at the timestamp where the narrator said &quot;was supposed to install&quot;.I knew they were wrong about Baltimore because while I am not a BFD employee I am a both a volunteer firefighter in an exurb of Baltimore and a cyclist, so I followed the development of bike lanes in the area very closely.I figured that if the video was wrong about Baltimore, they probably just googled &quot;fire department oppose bike paths&quot; and used the article titles as references so I looked up the Peekskill story.The narrator states at 2:12, explicitly including the Peekskill Esther Place pedestrian mall, &quot;all of this potential progress WAS LOST&quot;.&quot;Was lost&quot; implying it is gone. Kaput. Erased.Esther Place still exists. Here is a city council meeting bill from two months ago explicitly extending the road closure: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.cityofpeekskillny.gov&#x2F;AgendaCenter&#x2F;ViewFile&#x2F;Item&#x2F;1392?fileID=9066" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.cityofpeekskillny.gov&#x2F;AgendaCenter&#x2F;ViewFile&#x2F;Item...</a>Also, there is no evidence of the fire department raising any objections to it except for a strongtowns.org blog post, and the youtube channel and the website appear to be the same entity.So now I&#x27;m like &quot;is the entire video bullshit&quot;?edit: I must be trippin because I know that European cities with narrow medieval streets have smaller fire trucks, but the dimensions for the Scania P460, a common euro-spec fire truck and MAN TGM (a fire truck used by a Dutch volunteer fire company youtube channel I follow) and a Pierce Saber (a normal, typical US-spec fire truck) are damn near identical except for a custom variation in length with US trucks being about 5 feet longer-- hardly a radical difference.Consider at front and rear axle loads, not how your eyes perceive their sizes.

Somewhat related, Not Just Bikes &#x2F; Jason Slaughter talked about how large fire trucks create the need for wide roads, which enables normal car drivers to go at dangerously high speeds. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=j2dHFC31VtQ" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.youtube.com&#x2F;watch?v=j2dHFC31VtQ</a> (27m24s) [2024-08-11]

The US does make some cabover trucks. For the Army, naturally. <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Family_of_Medium_Tactical_Vehicles" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Family_of_Medium_Tactical_Vehi...</a>

No thoughts on this maneuverability debate and totally respect the firefighters in every country, but just chuckling that the trucks on that french page literally look like cute little toys.The photos might have some tilt-shift-like effect going on.

It&#x27;s curious that even when length is a concern they still went with bonneted trucks instead of the cab-over-engine design that dominates Europe because of length and maneuverability considerations.Compare for example these French forest fire trucks: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sides.fr&#x2F;en&#x2F;french-standardised-vehicles&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.sides.fr&#x2F;en&#x2F;french-standardised-vehicles&#x2F;</a>Or this range of vehicles from a Spanish manufacturer: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.iturri.com&#x2F;en&#x2F;vehicles&#x2F;emergencies-and-fire-fighting&#x2F;wildfire&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.iturri.com&#x2F;en&#x2F;vehicles&#x2F;emergencies-and-fire-figh...</a>Probably another example of path dependence?

CAL FIRE has their own specialized fire trucks.[1] California has a huge number of wildfires, all over a big state.[2] CAL FIRE has about 3,000 pieces of equipment.Current CAL FIRE trucks are 4 wheel drive off-road heavy trucks. They&#x27;re shorter than municipal or airport trucks, for dirt roads with tight turns. They use a 500 gallon tank with a foam system.[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.fire.ca.gov&#x2F;what-we-do&#x2F;fire-protection&#x2F;mobile-equipment" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.fire.ca.gov&#x2F;what-we-do&#x2F;fire-protection&#x2F;mobile-eq...</a>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.fire.ca.gov&#x2F;incidents" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.fire.ca.gov&#x2F;incidents</a>

In the US, Airport fire operations have their own NFPA Standard<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nfpa.org&#x2F;codes-and-standards&#x2F;nfpa-440-standard-development&#x2F;440" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nfpa.org&#x2F;codes-and-standards&#x2F;nfpa-440-standard-d...</a>And their own standard for fire fighter qualification<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nfpa.org&#x2F;codes-and-standards&#x2F;nfpa-1003-standard-development&#x2F;1003" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.nfpa.org&#x2F;codes-and-standards&#x2F;nfpa-1003-standard-...</a>

In an earlier life I was an airport fireman. It was in the late 80&#x27;s so I&#x27;m pretty sure things have changed, but physics stays the same.Firstly the engines on these beasts are massive. My truck had 4500 gallons of water and 500 gallons of foam. It could go 60mph in a (very) straight line (that&#x27;s what taxi ways are for) but acceleration and breaking were ponderous.We had another vehicle carrying 500 gallons, with a huge twin-turbo motor, which had insane acceleration and could do 100mph. It&#x27;s job was to get there first, dump suppressant quickly and get out the way in the 20 seconds before I got there.Couple things I remember- these things go fast, but corner badly, so one slows down a lot before turning.Water is really dangerous to transport because it sloshes around moving the center of gravity. Best to drive with water tanks full or empty. If they&#x27;re only partially full you drive really slowly around corners. Like walking speed. Not surprisingly they were almost always 100% full.Mine had pretty much 0% suspension. I took a shortcut once and hit a dirt ripple made by a recent grader. Maybe 8 inches high. The jolt was so bad the plastic light covers popped off the flashing lights. The guy in the roof well almost got thrown overboard.Honestly, I was 18 years old and it was tremendously good fun. But I will say that the car accidents we attended turned me into a cautious driver. And I font need to &quot;go fast&quot; in a car - thats pretty tame compared to going fast in a 36 ton truck.

Fascinating to see how the engineering requirements drive such different designs. The 3,000 gallons vs 500 gallons water capacity difference is particularly striking, as is the acceleration requirements for ARFF vehicles. Classic example of how specialized use cases lead to specialized equipment.

I may write a post.
A lot of the effort was removing weight without killing the aesthetics. It has been an awesome outlet for creativity and fiddling.
I have built everything myself, with input from tradies - everyone just loves helping.
Maintanance I leave to the mechanics.So far it has (a) back bench converted into sleeper area (b) slushie machines, foam machine, beer keg pourer, slide out bbq (c) built a roof that you can sleep in. (D) roof lifts with linear actuators to expose dj lights&#x2F;smoke machine in the centre (e) plumbing &#x2F; electrics etc so we can use off-grid.It has heaps of storage space and is super fun and easy to drive!

You should write a an article&#x2F;share some pics :)Wondering how it went overall, how hard parts were to find, how hard maintenance is - do you do it yourself? Do you need special tools?

I randomly bought a fire truck a few months ago.
I was looking for something to convert into a camper van, and found my truck:
(A) low mileage, compared to other trucks because of the usage. Ambulances etc. are super high mileage.
(B) they have excellent maintenance, so it’s ship shape
(C) low comparable purchase cost due to tiny resale market.I’m loving it. Kids love it. Community loves it. Wife tolerates it. Converted it into a camper and party truck!

<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.govplanet.com&#x2F;for-sale&#x2F;Emergency-Vehicles-1985-Oshkosh-A%2FS32P-19A-4x4-Fire-Truck-Oregon&#x2F;13010158&#x2F;NSN&#x2F;4210-00-627-4063" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.govplanet.com&#x2F;for-sale&#x2F;Emergency-Vehicles-1985-O...</a>

The fill-ups would probably financially ruin anyone that doesn’t have access to bulk Jet A.

Back in the late &#x27;70s my dad bought a retired 1942 pumper fire truck from the city. Back then it was sealed bids submitting to the city. He was the only one who bid on it.I assume today you could buy an airport one from a government auction site.

I always love how futuristic they look: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;8weVJBGDpHI?si=mfIkPEgm44fSLQcc" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;8weVJBGDpHI?si=mfIkPEgm44fSLQcc</a>Also here halfway through it: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;9z1qetAaiBA?si=j78gg2HmUg-jCnTS" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;youtu.be&#x2F;9z1qetAaiBA?si=j78gg2HmUg-jCnTS</a>

The picture that shows the difference in visibility is a bit misleading due to a very different perspective?I&#x27;m assuming the visibility difference is still quite different, but it feels like one of the pictures is the perspective of someone in the back seat, as it were.

If you ever find yourself visiting Phoenix, and there’s 4+ hours open in your itinerary, I strongly recommend the Hall of Flame Fire Museum!<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;maps.app.goo.gl&#x2F;athmHCH2AG4sWk8F6" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;maps.app.goo.gl&#x2F;athmHCH2AG4sWk8F6</a>Among their exhibits is a 300-year-old wagon, and basically this is a gigantic warehouse and boneyard for old fire trucks and equipment which has been lovingly restored to pristine conditions.There are plenty of memorials for deceased firefighters who made the ultimate sacrifice with their lives, and there&#x27;s special memorial for the Hot Shots who perished in Yarnell several years back.

The airport truck is gonna be operated in a different regulatory setting under different incentives than the municipal truck. That counts for something.

The Difference Between Municipal Fire Trucks and Airport Fire Trucks