People should evacuate Berkeley Hills during extreme fire weather: study

(KRON) — A new study recommends that residents of the Berkeley Hills evacuate during extreme fire weather rather than waiting for a fire to break out.

The study highlights that evacuation could take up to four hours once a fire has begun, depending on the day, time and month.

“The idea of getting out before fire breaks out is not a new concept for many who live in the Berkeley Hills,” said Cheryl Simeone, a Berkeley Hills resident.

The report also finds that restricting parking on narrow hill roads is less effective than originally thought in speeding up evacuations. Instead, the study suggests that changing pre-timed traffic signals to ones that can automatically adjust in response to real-time traffic conditions could significantly improve evacuation times.

Implementing these recommendations could enhance the safety of Berkeley Hills residents during extreme fire weather conditions.

All facts in this report were gathered by journalists employed by KRON4. Artificial intelligence tools were used to reformat from a broadcast script into a news article for our website. This report was edited and fact-checked by KRON4 staff before being published.