By Susie C. Spear
News & Record
GREENSBORO, N.C. — Greensboro fire officials and a city administrator say the city needs to build 11 fire stations by 2040 to keep pace with the city’s growing population and incoming industry.
The Greensboro Fire Department outlined its plans in the department’s annual report.
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Each station would cost an estimated $5 million and provide jobs to 15 employees, according to fire officials.
The city is expected to break ground next year on the first new facility, dubbed Station 62, along Short Farm Road in the southeastern part of Greensboro near Sedgefield, where population growth has been heavy, fire officials said.
With the city’s population estimated at 300,000 and its residents’ median age at 34, the city’s existing 27 stations and 37 companies will be challenged to accommodate Greensboro’s needs without building 11 more stations in the next 14 years, city planners and fire officials forecast.
Station 62 is in a critical zone, said Assistant Fire Chief Dwayne Church.
The department chose to prioritize Station 62 “due to the significant recent development and population growth in that part of the city,” Church said.
“As the community has expanded, we have seen an increase in call volume and service demands. Establishing a station in this area allows us to better serve recently annexed neighborhoods and ensure that residents receive emergency services within the response time standards we have committed to providing.”
Quick response saves lives and property
The fire department’s goal is to have stations close enough to populated areas that they can respond within four minutes of travel time, 90% of the time, Church said.
“Additionally, for a moderate structure fire, we aim to assemble our Effective Response Force of 17 personnel within eight minutes of travel time, 90% of the time,” Church said.
The city and the fire department have been working together on the fire station replacement plan for a decade, said Assistant City Manager Andrea Harrell.
“Certainly, there are areas where we’ve been looking to buy property for quite some time,” Harrell said. “It’s certainly something we look toward. Those plans started at least 10 years ago.”
Funding for new fire stations will not fall directly on taxpayers, Harrell said. “No, when we look (for funds to build new stations), we look at money we already have, federal grant funding, bond funding,” Harrell said. There has never been a tax assessment for such a project, she said.
Data drives decisions
Decisions about where to place new stations are driven by data, Church said, explaining that analysts within the department monitor and evaluate call volume, response times, population growth, and development trends across Greensboro.
“This analysis helps us identify areas where a new station will have the greatest impact on improving service delivery and maintaining our response standards,” Church said.
“We also collaborate with city planning staff and other community stakeholders to understand future growth and community priorities,” Church said.
Over the next decade, Harrell said she expects a population surge of about 100,000 new residents.
“I think in the next 10 years we could be at 400,000,” she said on Thursday. “With Jet Zero and Toyota Battery, we have the potential to grow a lot, obviously. And we’ve got requests for annexing property all of the time.” The only way we can annex property is if we can show that we can provide them services, such as fire, public safety and utilities, Harrell said.
By contrast, the state is expected to grow from 11.7 million to 11.9 million residents by 2030, an increase rate of about 0.42%, according to economic development forecasters.
And the nation’s population is expected to grow by about 2.46% over the next decade.
Harrell’s prediction is based on an influx of industry in and around Guilford County.
JetZero’s manufacturing site at Piedmont International Airport is forecast to deliver 14,500 jobs by 2063.
Toyota Battery Manufacturing North Carolina (TBMNC), a maker of battery packs for electric cars, began shipping products from its Liberty location, just 28 miles from Greensboro, in 2025. The plant is expected to employ 1,750 people on four production lines.
And tech giant Lenovo is expanding its Greensboro / Whitsett operations, creating 420 new jobs by the end of 2027.
Boom Supersonic, a manufacturer of supersonic passenger jets with a plant at Piedmont Triad International Airport, is expected to create 2,400 new jobs by 2032.
“By planning proactively,” Church said, “we can ensure that Greensboro residents continue to receive the high level of fire and emergency services they expect as the city continues to grow.”
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