San Francisco Fire Department Ambulance Dispatch Center, 2. Editorial Photo

In 1997 the San Francisco Fire Department and the Department of Public Health Paramedic devision merged. Unlike fire stations, which is for the deployment of trucks and engines directly to the local emergency, an ambulance station is more for the restocking of the ambulance, and a break facility for the ambulance personnel. Fire trucks, being very big, can not just street park in neighborhoods the way cars can. Ambulances, being much smaller, more like cars, are able to just park around town, waiting for dispatch calls. This is why neighborhoods have their own fire stations, but not ambulance stations.