Gardendale, AL
Gardendale, AL's wildfire risk, in USFS's own numbers
Gardendale sits at the 73rd percentile nationally for wildfire risk to structures — well above the national norm for wildfire risk — per USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities model, built from its 7,171 counted buildings, not vegetation cover alone. (Source: USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities methodology.)
Separately from the risk score above, Gardendale's burn probability — fire likelihood with no building count factored in — sits at the 77th percentile nationally.
What "at risk" means for the buildings here
56.5% of Gardendale's 7,171 buildings sit in USFS's Direct exposure zone, roughly 4,049 structures close enough to burnable vegetation for flame contact, not just embers — 43.5% fall in the Indirect, ember-only zone and 0% are Minimal. At 7,171 buildings, this is a substantial built environment, so the shares below describe a real population of structures, not a handful of edge cases.
How Gardendale compares
Inside Alabama, Gardendale sits at just the 55th percentile even though it scores 73rd nationally — the state's overall wildfire exposure is high enough to make this a relatively quiet corner of it. Among the 31,521 US communities USFS scores, Gardendale ranks 8,370 for wildfire risk (1 is highest) and 2,387 by building count (1 is largest). Within Alabama alone, it ranks 269 of 592 places by risk. See the full county-by-county picture for Alabama on its state page.
What this risk score means for insurance
Gardendale's 73rd-percentile, high rating is the kind of score behind a broader national pattern: insurers pulling back from the highest wildfire-risk markets, non-renewing or declining new policies outright, most visibly in California. Shopping around, not assuming automatic renewal, tends to matter here.
What would actually reduce this score
With 56.5% of Gardendale in Direct exposure, defensible-space clearing and ember-resistant construction (vents, Class-A roofing) address the exposure this page's own numbers describe, not a generic checklist. See the home-hardening guide.
Where Gardendale's figures come from
Every one of the two percentiles behind Gardendale's 8,370-place national rank traces to USFS's Wildfire Risk to Communities dataset — see the methodology guide. The exposure-zones guide covers what Gardendale's dominant direct exposure actually means, with real examples from across the dataset.