360 Vision Technology has supplied the camera surveillance technology for a flexible, rapidly deployable CCTV town centre network extension for Plymouth City Council. Designed to cover hot spots of activity, both criminal and anti-social, the extension was required to tackle areas of rising anti-social behaviour and surfacing security issues at disparate areas around Plymouth.
“We had considered a hard-wired permanent extension to the existing camera network to cover the required areas but were put off by the cost of this option,” says Stuart Venn, CCTV & Street Lighting engineer, Street Services, Plymouth City Council. “Plus, many of the reports of criminal or anti-social activity in the areas concerned had yet to be confirmed, so a permanent extension was a big commitment without any guarantee of making a significant impact and benefit to each area.
Plymouth City Council turned to 360 Vision for advice on an alternative solution to extending the existing CCTV network to cover the emerging hotspots.
“Once we had our Community Team involved, it was clear from the reports we were receiving about the requirement for coverage, that a network of redeployable cameras would yield the best coverage and return on investment, to provide the communities involved with the best protection,” says Stuart. “Using redeployable and rapidly deployed cameras would allow us to assess and confirm the problem at each individual location – without committing to a permanent camera installation. Our close technical relationship with 360 Vision really paid off here, with the team suggesting a network of Invictus PTZ cameras similar to the Invictus Hybrid camera we had purchased to extend the network previously, but this time, equipped with 360 Vision TX technology, to enable simple and rapid deployment utilising video transmission over mobile phone networks.”
360 Vision Technology’s TX wireless video camera transmission technology delivers camera video and PTZ control from 6 Kbps, full 1080p HD edge recording, remote retrieval on demand, and saves the council time and money on fixed camera video transmission infrastructure costs and on-going cost of ownership.
Keeping running costs down to a minimum, the Invictus TX Range of 3G/4G LTE/5G TX wireless CCTV cameras operate without the need for airtime contracts. With complete control of bandwidth used, Plymouth City Council can choose the resolution and frame rate to transmit, to suit the bandwidth available. Additionally, operators can switch between low and high bandwidth video streams, dependent on network capability, adjusting CCTV camera video quality to suit.
“With our network of 19 Invictus TX cameras, we can rapidly install a unit at the site of a complaint, sometimes within hours of the complaint arising,” continues Stuart. “Once installed, we can assess the real-world requirement for surveillance at the site, and the effect a CCTV camera impacts on the area.
“If the camera is not required or has helped to tackle the issue, we can then remove it, usually after three months and the unit either goes back into storage or because of demand, goes straight back out to another site awaiting surveillance. Being able to set-up cameras where they are most needed ensures we are using our resources in the most economical way and extracting the maximum return on our camera investments.”
Such has been the success of the cameras that they are being used within Plymouth’s traffic camera network, where they are deployed to cover large highway construction projects, covering health and safety, and traffic flow monitoring while work is being carried out.
