"We are pleased that our surveillance and security system is now in place and will provide full coverage for the parade in the Riverfront and Market Street areas to give our police 'eyes in the sky' and provide greater security for the nearly three quarters of a million people that will be here for the St. Patrick weekend," said Brad Goodman, network manager for the city.
Surveillance cameras have been installed and overlaid on the Tropos MetroMesh network in the Riverfront and its side streets, providing police officers with remote viewing of security surveillance videos from the field through laptops in their squad cars. In addition, the police have equipped their Mobile Command Center with a Tropos 4210 mobile wireless router and cameras in the front and rear of the unit plus portable tripod cameras so that the units can be deployed anywhere in the network for crowd control.
To further reduce crime, the city is also currently in the process of installing additional wireless connectivity using Tropos MetroMesh routers and surveillance cameras in 22 of the City's historic squares with backhaul connections to fiber being laid to the squares.
"Public safety is the first of many applications for the city. Our goal is to be a completely connected City, with wireless connectivity citywide so that all of our workers can do in the field what they can do at their desks. This will enable greater worker productivity and efficiencies and, as a result, the customer satisfaction of our community," continued Goodman. Future applications include arming municipal workers and building inspectors with handheld mobile devices in the field to automate paper processing, automatic meter reading for water and other utilities, vehicle tracking, to name a few.
After reviewing various bids and field testing from wireless equipment suppliers and integrators, the city chose NetMethods and Tropos Networks.
"We chose the NetMethods and Tropos solution because of their extensive wireless experience, successes in the market and because their solution provides the best performance for our environment with lots of trees," said Goodman. "We are able to get the best coverage with the least amount of overhead. Plus the multi-use capabilities of the Tropos network are ideal for our citywide and public safety applications."
