An eye on The Oracle
G1 has installed and repaired over 30 static and pan/tilt/zoom cameras at The Oracle shopping centre in Reading, Berkshire.
The cameras monitor activity both inside and around the shopping centre. Images generated from the cameras are monitored and recorded digitally in the central control room.
Shops at The Oracle include Debenhams and House of Fraser, as well as Boots and a further 90 retail outlets. The River Kennett runs through the middle of the centre, providing an outdoor performance area. There is also a 10-screen Vue cinema.
G1 director Chris Best said: “We have serviced and maintained the CCTV system at the Oracle so it provides the best pictures at all times and runs as smoothly and efficiently as possible.”
The Oracle’s general manager, Steve Belam, said: “G1 provided us with excellent service and the quotations we received from them are clear and precise. We are delighted to have them working with us to create an efficiently running system.”
Tip-off on lazy businesses
Plymouth-based Universal Security (UK) Ltd has installed a Vehicle Number Plate Recognition system for Cornwall County council at a waste transfer station, to counter tipping by rogue companies.
The waste facility is run for the use of local residents, but lazy businesses have been using the premises to tip rubbish instead of paying for skips or travelling to sites set aside for them.
Following the introduction of the VNPR system, there has been a vast reduction in tipping by businesses. In addition, staff members on site are no longer being subjected to threatening behaviour.
The additional revenue generated from the businesses having to tip at the correct sites more than pays for the installation and upkeep of the system, according to Universal managing director Mark Gibson.
Somerset upgrade
SRT Security Systems and Advanced Vision Systems have both been involved in upgrading a 34-camera street surveillance network and connecting it to a new monitoring and control room in Wells, Somerset.
SRT was responsible for installing cameras in Shepton Mallet, Glastonbury and Frome, as well as ten cameras in Street which operate independently of the Wells control. Advanced Vision Systems installed 12 cameras in Wells.
Both companies used Bewator’s Surcha domes, connected via fibre optic cabling and/or copper cabling and a Bewator V3i matrix to three Bewator keyboards in the control centre. These control views shown on 13 monitors. The centre also has a further monitor for reviewing images.
Mendip District Council’s Community safety Officer Jenny Davies said: “Crime is not generally high in these areas, compared to Bristol, for example, but businesses, especially, were keen to see this project completed. Cameras help people feel safe, especially in the evenings, and that is good for trade.
“The area also has to manage the influx of visitors every summer, in particular at the time of the Glastonbury festival.”
SRT managing director Steve Taylor said: “We chose Bewator products because we have used them before and have proved their reliability for ourselves. The Bewator matrix, which enables three keyboards to programme and control 34 of the cameras, offers cutting-edge functionality.”
Reflex in Rotherham
Reflex has received three civic contracts from Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council for audio conferencing and video surveillance systems.
In Rotherham Town Hall’s main council chamber, Reflex installed an audio conferencing system, providing each delegate with an individual controllable microphone and a global PA speaker system. The system is able to be upgraded for changes in future years.
In Bradgate Park, where RMBC and Safer Rotherham Partnership are investing heavily in resources to encourage leisure activity and deter crime, Reflex has installed the latest generation video surveillance systems, with cameras providing full coverage for the well being of anyone using the park. Coverage is provided for the main carparks, pedestrian areas and perimeters, day and night.
And as part of a separate crime reduction programme in key strategic locations, two new surveillance cameras have been fitted near Millmoor, and at another location closer to Rotherham town centre.
Powerful solution
Eclipse Digital Software Ltd has installed JVC TK-C1480 dome cameras equipped with Pentax 12~660mm zoom lenses with 2x extenders at Cottam power station, on the west bank of the River Trent.
The power station’s site covers a total area of 650 acres, with the main parts enclosed by a 4.5km perimeter. It operates 24 hours a day, year-round, and is capable of producing up to 4% of the UK’s total energy needs.
Pole-top dome systems make up the majority of the cameras on-site. But the problem of how to monitor a 3.5km linear area, covering the coal storage area, weighbridge and several sensitive administrative areas, threatened at one stage of the planning process to halt the project in its tracks. Both budgetary and practical constraints simply excluded the installation of dome poles to do the job.
“To protect a 3.5km stretch to our magnification levels with domes, we would have needed 10 to 15 poles,” says Eclipse director Alan Drinkwater. “The Pentax 12~660mm zoom lens presented the perfect solution. Two of them – used in conjunction with the JVC cameras – do the job perfectly. The project could never have afforded to go ahead if these Pentax lenses weren’t available.”
Dome help
Universal Security (UK) Ltd has helped Plymouth Dome by interfacing two colour monitors to six cameras situated outside the top of Smeaton’s Tower on Plymouth Hoe.
This allows the disabled and the less energetic an opportunity to see six views from the top of the Tower without having to climb the steps.
Centre manager Andrew Gator said he is confident that the interactive display, with two monitors and a computer-generated history of the Tower, will attract further visitors to the Dome, especially as refurbishment of Tinside Pool and the promenade has been finished.
The display is situated just inside the main doors on the front of the Dome.
University Expert
Milton Keynes-based Expert Security has helped upgrade the Open University’s access control system at its Walton Hall campus.
Following the introduction of the Disability Discrimination Act, the OU upgraded its existing ‘tactile’ card reader system to non-contact proximity technology, making it easier for disabled staff and visitors to gain access.
Expert was chosen to implement the new card reader solution – a combination of hardware and software provided by HID and MAXxess Systems. Expert installed 345 HID iClass proximity card readers and the MAXxess Security Management Software. The system provides security personnel with immediate information on who is on site and where they are.
On any one day up to 4,000 Smartcards are used by staff and visitors. The OU is currently installing similar systems at its Bristol and Newcastle sites, which will be networked to Milton Keynes.
Safe gates for golf course
LR Stewart & Sons of Hornsey, north London, has installed FAAC underground operators for the new wrought iron gates at the entrance of Highgate Golf Club. The club, 100 years old last year, is the closest to the centre of London.
Installer Simon Hollins said the FAAC operators and equipment were chosen because they were consistently reliable.
“The FAAC 760 system is perfect for installations where it’s important that the operator does not detract from the looks of the gate,” Hollins said.
Automated access at Highgate Golf Club employs an FAAC digicard entry system, a well as proximity card readers.
Port protection
Goldcrest Surveillance Division Limited has installed around 80 cameras at the Port of Tilbury in Essex, to enhance its existing CCTV and ensure compliance with the new International Ship and Port Facility Security Code – designed to help detect and deter threats to international security.
The contract involves the installation of cameras at all main entry and exit gates, where security operatives control the movement in and out of the port. All main berthing areas, including the main shipping access points into the dock area via lock gates, high value containerised cargo compounds and building deemed sensitive to general port operations, also come within the installation criteria.
The cameras installed by Goldcrest were fixed high resolution colour models with lenses, housings, brackets and 5 PIH-76251P colour domes supplied by Merit Li-Lin.
“We have found that the new IP domes from Li-Lin are user-friendly, easy to install and are running at optimum capacity on the PCs,” said James O’Brien, Goldcrest managing director.
“The domes are being networked back through a matrix to Tilbury Port Police Station. We can choke the IP data stream to suit the accommodation in the aerial network, quite a dynamic mechanism for multiplexing, sending back either pulse or live IP pictures. We can also get broadband 1 volt peak video at 25 fps, which is unusual in a network. This has proved very popular with the client and is compliant from a policing standpoint.”
Safer insurance
Legic Identsystems, working with a division of its parent company Kaba, has installed an access control system on two sites at Canary Wharf for one of the UK’s leading credit insurers, using the latest contactless smart card technology.
Legic said securing the two sites at Canary Wharf while retaining ease of access for staff and visitors was a demanding brief which required a particularly flexible solution. The answer was to develop a number of controlled entrances using door-based readers – some of which were concealed out of sight within the fabric of the doors themselves – and working with Legic’s proximity smart cards, all integrated with an extensive CCTV system.
All new casino system
Engineers from PI Vision’s UK and USA offices have assisted Harrah’s Cherokee Casino and Hotel in North Carolina, USA, to install a PI Vision network video recording system.
As part of an upgrade which will see the size of the hotel and casino doubled, video surveillance recording is being migrated from VCR/analogue to hard disk recording, using PI Vision’s Universal Video Management System.
Dubai upgraded
Dubai in the United Arab Emirates recently completed a GB pound 200,000 expansion of its city centre CCTV system.
Installed by leading Middle East firm Al Taaraf, the new system utilises a Synectics advanced CCTV video matrix switcher to interface and control a mix of third party manufacturers equipment
It also uses new state of the art cameras installed at strategic locations across the city.
Al Taaraf’s Michael Pedersen said: “The Dubai Police are evolving a CCTV surveillance system that will provide the depth of systems integration required to cater for future requirements and emerging technologies.
With this in mind, they chose Synectics’ switching and control equipment, with a determining factor being the company’s comprehensive range of equipment integration interfaces, open systems architecture and ability to combine analogue, digital and IP technologies, via a zero redundancy migration path.”
The system features a 128×64 Tesseract SL matrix and X250 system controller keyboards, and is capable of handling expansion requirements up to 512×264.
