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September 30, 2005

Smart Cameras in a Train Station

From CIO | Seeing Is Believing:

Another excellent article from CIO full of anecdotes on the role of smart camera systems in Secaucus Junction train station in New Jersey.

Even with the security funding that followed 9/11, Transit couldn't justify buying IP-based cameras, and wireless cameras would have raised reliability issues as well as the price tag. Instead, Slack and Bober focused on camera density. They invested in dozens and dozens of inexpensive, fixed cameras, and in a handful of more expensive pan-tilt cameras that swivel and zoom.

The DVRs run software from Nice Systems that does intelligent video analysis. This means that the software can be set up to count customers, detect dropped bags, track intruders in secure areas such as tunnels, monitor cars stopped in no-parking areas, or detect unusually large crowds that might indicate some kind of problem.

Slack pulls up a stream of video he's downloaded from a DVR. It shows Secaucus Junction's passenger drop-off point. A yellow circle appears around an idling car in the kiss-and-ride area, and then later automatically turns red. Slack won't share specifics about how the system is set up, but he says the software can automatically trigger an announcement on the public-address system that parking is not allowed in the area. More important, it can send alerts to either a pager, mobile phone or wireless PDA. Then, an officer onsite can investigate what's going on, and either make sure the car gets moved or override the alert if the idling vehicle is a police car.

Bober says that during the Republican National Convention last September in New York City, the software also helped prevent an entire station from being evacuated. Transit police were able to quickly trace back, see who had dropped a bag and determine that the person was not a threat, just a forgetful employee.

In fact, says a spokesman for Transit, only half of the benefits of the system are related to police activities and security. There are as many other examples of benefits as there are passengers. If a passenger says the last train of the night blazed by, customer service can view the video of the tracks just after midnight and see whether the train did indeed fail to stop. If a passenger says a ticket booth operator was belligerent, customer service can pull up the video of the transaction. If a late-night train is running a little behind schedule, train operators (at least in theory) can hold another train to give passengers enough time to make their connection. If there's a storm, the maintenance crew can see how much snow has accumulated on the tracks. If an escalator breaks down, operations could even have the Nice software calculate how many people have travelled on the escalator since its last maintenance.

Slack couldn't provide specific numbers, but he says that the number of customer injury claims that are filed and paid out has decreased significantly. Once, for instance, Slack says that the cameras recorded a man try to catch his train by jumping off a platform, crossing Amtrak's high-speed train tracks and climbing up the platform on the other side. As Slack remembers, the man fell and cut his head, was nearly killed and missed his train anyway. "Without the video," Slack predicts, "he would have walked upstairs to station management and said, 'I tripped and fell and cut my head. Give me a claims form.'"

The surveillance system has transferred liability as well. In May, when the Portal Bridge near the Secaucus Junction station caught fire, disrupting service for the entire Northeast corridor, Chief Bober says he was able to prove that New Jersey Transit was not responsible. (Amtrak owns the bridge, but New Jersey Transit uses it - part of a delicate arrangement that often leads to disputes up and down the Northeast corridor.) "We were able to go back to the digital recordings and substantiate how the bridge caught fire," Bober says. "If we didn't have that system in place, New Jersey Transit more than likely would have been liable."

Posted by rshah at September 30, 2005 02:52 PM

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