Use Santa Clara County's FireSafe Council's interactive map to check if you live in the wildland-urban interface and the fire hazard severity zone your home is located in. Please note that this map does not depict SJFD fire stations, which also respond to fires in Santa Clara County's wildland-urban interface.

What is the Wildland-Urban Interface?

While the City of San José is largely made up of urban and suburbans neighborhoods, it's also surrounded by wildland areas that have a history of serious wildfires—namely in the Santa Cruz Mountains and Diablo Range. Homes and neighborhoods that reside in or alongside these wildland areas are vulnerable to such wildfires given their proximity to vegetative fuels. This transitional area, where structures and other human development meet or intermingle with undeveloped wildland, is defined as the wildland-urban interface. Residents who reside within the wildland-urban interface should take actions to prepare for a wildfire.

FIRE HAZARD Severity ZONES

While all wildland-urban interface areas are vulnerable to wildfires to some degree, there are specific environmental factors that make some areas more hazardous than others. CAL FIRE maps these areas using a science-based and field tested computer model that assigns a hazard score based on factors that influence fire likelihood and fire behavior in a particular area. Many factors are considered, such as fire history, potential fuel, terrain, and typical weather for the area. These Fire Hazard Severity Zone maps evaluate the likelihood that an area will burn over a 30- to 50-year period; however, they don't take into account modifications such as fuel reduction efforts.