A multi-criteria decision-making approach to minimising fire risk in detached house designs

Purpose: House fire risk would be minimised if fire safety principles were incorporated at the design stage. This issue is rarely addressed in the literature. The purpose of this study is to propose a multi-criteria decision-making framework to evaluate fire risk of detached house designs in the United Arab Emirates and countries of similar cultural background. Design/methodology/approach: The framework was developed based on function areas where (detached) house fires start, expert opinion and recommendations derived from the published literature on residential fire safety. This framework was applied to a sample of ten public detached house designs to check the applicability of the framework and to determine how safe these designs are from a fire safety perspective. Findings: The proposed framework is proven to be an effective preliminary fire risk evaluation tool of detached house designs, and more research is needed in this area. Research limitations/implications: The proposed framework is an encouraging first step in incorporating fire risk minimisation at the design stage of detached houses based on determining the preferred location of function areas but requires further development and validation, especially in other design settings. Practical implications: The proposed framework is an initial endeavour in helping designers of detached houses to minimise fire risk and its potential effects on residents. Originality/value: This research proposes a way to minimise fire risk at the design stage of detached houses.