They could leave one guy in the station to drive the engine to the fire and drive the rest of the crew in the small van to the fire, where they then man the eng

They could leave one guy in the station to drive the engine to the fire and drive the rest of the crew in the small van to the fire, where they then man the engine. There is probably more to it, but at least the way you describe it doesn't sound convincing. Also I should add the in the previous cities I lived in they of course didn't do that. They just used small vans for medical emergencies. Originally when I moved here i thought it was burning a lot more when I saw all those engines on the street all the time, but it wasn't that. My suspicion is that it's related to justifying having so much of the big equipment. But if the big engines are overused too much they likely break down much faster too, driving a vicious circle of needing more and more of them, creating bigger budgets, more power for the fire chief etc.etc.