SoCal City’s Surveillance Acts as Force Multiplier When city officials in Torrance, Calif., decided to green-light a proposed video surveillance project, they had more in mind than to simply put additional “eyes” on the streets to help combat crime. Located near Los Angeles amid a web of freeways, the police department in this coastal city of 150,000 residents was mainly interested in monitoring major intersections that are considered likely escape routes for criminals. Having secured a federal grant to help foot the cost of the system, the city drafted a request for proposal (RFP) to identify a systems integrator that would provide Torrance its first entry into municipal video surveillance. The project called for wireless communications to transmit video feeds, as well as solar power in one zone to accommodate a state agency that would not allow the city to tap into a power line that it controls. Read on to find out the details behind the integrator’s winning bid and how the project came to fruition. City of Torrance Identifies Its Integrator Partner Following the release last year of a public bid for the project, Torrance officials hosted a job walk that attracted about 20 installing security contractors. Of that group, seven companies went on to submit proposals. Taking the prize for the $190,000 project was Digital Networks Group of Aliso Viejo, Calif. “We were not the lowest bidder by any means. However, I was very detailed with my presentation and I gave them a lot of details on the products we would be providing,” says Trey Cox, an account manager with Digital Networks Group. “When they compared the products and capabilities, they felt the system I was providing was going to do the best job for them and that’s why we won.” While Digital Networks Group has been in business for 25 years, the company’s video surveillance division, which Cox manages, was launched about five years ago. The firm specializes in open architecture design and installing voice, data, video, sound and security networks along with media retrieval, broadcasting and video conferencing systems. Its clientele is largely K-12, private schools and hospitals. “We have all the experience and know-how to do IP video surveillance. It is just a different device you are hanging on the end of the cable so it was real easy for us to migrate into video surveillance and start doing that,” Cox explains. Because the Torrance RFP called for wireless capability as a requisite, Cox consulted with multiple manufacturers of wireless systems and landed on Fluidmesh Networks to assist him with the proposal. “Fluidmesh was more responsive with giving me the information that I needed to engineer the job and do the pricing,” he says. “Their price point was also more competitive. They have good technology built into their radios that allow for easy installation and long-distance wireless transmission.” Wireless Radio Deployment Goes Smoothly The camera system envisioned by Torrance officials would be a test case of sorts. The idea was to deploy a high resolution camera at four major intersections for investigative purposes. The intersections have been deemed likely traffic routes for perpetrators to use given the proximity to freeway onramps. “We have seen other agencies that have had success with it. We wanted to do a small sample to monitor the traffic. We are putting our foot in the water to see how it works for us and to see if we want to deploy it more wide-scale,” says Lt. Tom Starks of the Torrance Police Department. The Fluidmesh Network gear that Cox selected for the project in fact was his first wireless video surveillance installation. His design called for eight wireless radios to transmit video feeds to a server housed at the Torrance PD command center. Seven of the radios are point-to-point and one is a mesh-end radio. “A point-to-point sends information from one radio to another. A mesh will send multiple radios to a single radio. For example, the police station itself has the mesh radio because that radio is reaching out to all the other radios at all the intersections,” Cox explains. Radios mounted on intersection traffic poles, along with a corresponding dome camera housed in a Dotwortz bullet-resistant enclosure, talk from that point to a single radio down the road. The mesh radio mounted at the police station provides the hub where all the radios transmit to, and then the video feeds are directed to the head-end switch. Installing the wireless radios proved to be less of a chore than originally anticipated. Cox was expecting he would likely have to contend with signal obstruction issues. “We thought that would be very challenging. They say you need to have absolute line-of-sight and the way the streets are shaped they are not perfectly straight,” he says. Wireless devices were mounted in varied positions on the traffic poles to achieve optimal signal strength. “We had to close down the streets and get up in lift buckets and take our time in order to line them up by hand,” Cox explains. Solar Power Necessitates Low-Wattage Camera Going into the project, Cox was aware that three of the intersections would present no issue where power was concerned. He would simply install his own breakers and breaker boxes on the traffic poles and run high-voltage power to the cameras. The fourth intersection was a bit more of a pickle since it is controlled by the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans). “They control the signals and they wouldn’t let us tap into their power. We could use their poles to mount the camera and radio equipment, but we could not access anything inside their poles to tap into their wiring,” Starks says. So the city wrote into the RFP that solar power would have to be equipped instead. For Cox, this added a twist to the type of camera he would eventually select to install. The three city-controlled intersections were each equipped with a 2-megapixel pan/tilt/zoom (p/t/z) camera by Sentry360, featuring 1,080p resolution and 30x zoom. But Cox had his work cut out for him to find a camera with a lower power draw to match with the solar unit. The photovoltaic system he installed comprises a solar panel mounted in a southerly direction. The panel is wired to a series of four car batteries. When the sun is not shining, the batteries kick in. “The batteries power a 110-volt inverter. So we go from a 12-volt system back out to a 110-volt system,” Cox explains. “The 110-volt system powers our cameras and wireless radio, as well as the blowers and housing and everything.” Although the Fluidmesh wireless radios use very low-voltage PoE, the additional power draw of the Sentry360 camera forced Cox to conduct an extensive search for a different model in order to meet the limits of the solar panel system. “We had to go with a very low-wattage camera. The Sentry360 drew a little bit too much to meet our needs. So, we went with a Canon p/t/z that uses a lot lower wattage, which allowed us to use a smaller solar panel system,” he says. Completing the installation in January, Cox also provided the police department’s head-end equipment for the system, including a seven-foot equipment rack and the server. He custom built an 80TB file server by Seneca that stores data for up to two years. Cox also selected the Ocularis video management system (VMS) by OnSSI for streaming, recording and managing the video. Officers can view video feeds on a large wall-mounted screen in the command center; plus, in a separate workplace, the officer in charge can view and manipulate the cameras from a desktop PC monitor. “We can monitor the cameras in real-time, but they are more for the purpose of reviewing video after a crime and look to see if the car drove through an intersection,” Starks says. “The video plays extremely smoothly and we have the ability to zoom in to retrieve license plates from both live and recorded feeds.” 3 Keys to Playing in the Municipal Video Surveillance Market There are many variables unique to working with municipalities, including law enforcement agencies, when it comes to winning video surveillance projects. Here are three important factors to consider. Funding A big challenge in working with municipalities and law enforcement is funding. The most successful integrators have a very in-depth understanding of all the purchasing vehicles available and provide not only guidance on the technology but also on how to get grants and funding for the project. In the past five years, federal funding has been shrinking dramatically so it is becoming harder and harder to get large grants. This is forcing many municipalities to put projects on hold and postpone them or to find more cost-effective solutions. Interoperability A significant aspect of working with municipalities and law enforcement is interoperability. Any integrator that wants to be successful should have a very in-depth understanding of all the technologies and tools available today to assist a police department in addressing interoperability. Wireless networks are a key component of the interoperability challenge as they provide a common platform that can be used to connect multiple agencies and assets together. There is an ongoing desire in being able to access and share information with other departments and other counties in a seamless way. A standalone video surveillance system is not going to cut it anymore. Due Diligence When deploying a wireless mesh network for municipalities, an integrator should direct particular attention at what assets are made available to them to mount the equipment. Increasingly, integrators are getting into trouble because they have not conducted the right due diligence in understanding who owned the physical infrastructure and wasting months to get permission to use it. Light poles, buildings, and traffic lights may be owned by different authorities that may or may not be involved or even aware of a project making the process very costly and time consuming. Source – Securityinfowatch
Posted on: Mon, 04 Nov 2013 15:22:55 +0000
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