Winsted Partners With Univ. of Toronto to Build Control Room for Small Space
IMAGE COURTESY OF WINSTED
Within a few months, the newly designed control room at the University of Toronto Campus Police was fully outfitted and operating smoothly.
The University of Toronto is located in the downtown area of the city, so the campus has foot traffic from approximately 100,000 students and patrons every day. Ensuring the safety of its students is a tall order, and the responsibility falls on the university’s public safety unit — the campus police.
Ensuring student safety against a variety of threats is no easy task. Campus police must be able to respond and react to a situation at a moment’s notice. To do so requires seamless communication over miles of campus space with tens of thousands of people. Communication, whether it is with each other, fellow students, faculty, local police or more, is the key to the job.
TotalGuard
3xLOGIC Inc., working alongside Sonitrol of Fort Lauderdale, completed a security system upgrade to provide IP cameras for Junior Achievement of South Florida (JASF) at the organization’s JA World Huizenga Center at the Lillian S. Wells Pavilion (JA World). JA World is located on the Broward College North Campus in Coconut Creek, Fla.
Working in tandem, Sonitrol of Fort Lauderdale and 3xLOGIC designed a system upgrade that, through a combination of discounts and donations, JASF could afford. In order to fit JASF’s budget, Sonitrol of Fort Lauderdale installed a 3xLOGIC hybrid NVR, enabling JASF to protect their analog camera investment, while adding in higher-resolution IP cameras for expanded coverage. The hybrid solution also creates a migration path, allowing JASF to continue improving visibility with new IP cameras over time as their budget allows.
Jennifer Thomas, vice president of operations for Sonitrol of Fort Lauderdale, said, “We are actively designing phase II of the camera upgrade, which will include improved coverage and image clarity for camera views outside the front doors. We are also ready to deploy our latest technology for the main lobby area — TotalGuard. TotalGuard is a great solution for emergency situations; it allows JASF personnel to alert the Sonitrol central station and transmit real-time audio and video to the monitoring center, for prioritized verified police response.”
Campus police realized their communication center, which services the entire tri-campus university, was in need of a renovation to better serve and protect the students. But the space itself had its challenges. The University of Toronto Campus Police had very limited workspace, compounding an already challenging situation. These space limitations can be common among universities. As student populations rise, space becomes a valuable commodity.
“We knew we had space restrictions because everything needed to be housed in one central room, and that space is roughly 20 foot by 40 foot,” said Alan Truong, manager, security systems and services of the University of Toronto Campus Police. “When we were looking at our renovation and development plan, we were trying to fit everything in terms of access control, 24/7 employee utilization along with all of the operational systems required.”
This 800-square foot space needed to include multiple desks, a video screen and a scalable computer monitor stand for the 80-plus employees to use on an ongoing basis.
NAVCO Web Services
The first Dos Toros taqueria location opened near Union Square in New York City in 2009. The concept has been successful and now 16 locations dot New York City with four opening in Chicago in the last year. The original Dos Toros locations were outfitted with video surveillance when they opened; but they weren’t all the same brand or model and there was no way to simultaneously connect to multiple locations remotely. It was costing them time and money to train staff to use divergent systems and for their IT staff to have to manage multiple user accounts at each location.
Dos Toros selected NAVCO as their integrator to help standardize on a single solution to meet current and future needs. NAVCO retrofitted existing locations that already had camera systems with new OpenEye hybrid recorders. New recorders and IP cameras were installed in all of the new locations. OpenEye Web Services’ (OWS) ease of setup made switching from the previous systems to OpenEye easy. All of the recorders can be accessed and managed remotely using the plug-in, free, browser-based client, mobile app or the Command Station software for more advanced features.
“OpenEye Web Services helps our team succeed,” said Grant Lieberman, Dos Toros director of technology. “It’s super easy to use; it’s an enterprise solution and it’s easy for team members to use. It’s plug and play, easy to add new users and easy to connect to mobile apps.”
Campus Police began working with Minneapolis-based Winsted Corporation, a manufacturer of technical furniture and control room consoles. Winsted has installed control room consoles and furniture for universities, company world headquarters, national monuments, casinos and many more sites.
Working with a local architecture firm, the campus police engaged Winsted to partner with them and help meet the challenges of the small, but critical control space. Tasked with meeting the specific needs of campus police in a confined space, the Winsted team scouted the location to determine how best to maximize square footage.
“Although our space was limited, Winsted presented us with a variety of options that would have worked well for our needs,” Truong said.
The Winsted team was able to offer the police service many different types of desk setups, stains and more — all that fit within their space constraints. The winning solution was Winsted’s Prestige Ascend Sit/Stand Consoles.
AVIOTEC Visual Early Fire Detection System
MKM is a leading manufacturer of copper and copper-alloy precursor and semi-finished products. The company wanted to achieve better protection from fire hazards in two of the halls at its Hettstedt site in Saxony-Anhalt, a state in the eastern part of Germany.
“Due to the large size of both halls, in the end we decided that only one solution was up to the job: the AVIOTEC visual early fire detection system from Bosch,” explained Christoph Dammann, administrator of fire and alarm systems at MKM. Bosch experts planned and configured the solution for MKM and then took care of integrating it into the existing fire detection system and connecting it to the monitoring center of the plant fire brigade. If a fire is detected in either of the two halls, it sends signals to the central fire detection system as well as directly to the fire brigade. Then the firefighters can check the video monitor and take targeted appropriate action to extinguish the fire before it can spread.
Campus Police was outfitted with six Ascend consoles with custom millwork. The Ascend consoles include many features that lend themselves to critical control rooms, including a Versa-Trak monitor mounting system, electric-lift legs, easy-access cable management and multiple-purpose doors.
The consoles offer three programmable height settings for versatility and comfort, allowing the desks to be adjusted to any height. This is a particularly helpful feature when multiple communications officers use the same space on any given day.
Within a few months, the newly designed room was fully outfitted and operating smoothly.
“Winsted was with us since day one,” Truong said. “Communication was always open and their reps would follow up with everything we asked of them. They still follow up with us to make sure we have absolutely no problems.”
Matrix Biometric Security Solutions
Coca-Cola established its manufacturing units in Kudus and Pirangut, Maharashtra, India, and was looking for biometric solutions to secure its premises. Coca-Cola required individual servers at both locations. Their prime requirement was to restrict unauthorized user entry into secured areas. However, a shortage of power supply ports at both the locations was a major problem. Providing separate power for the door lock, biometric device and exit switch was a concern. Coca-Cola was in search of a solution where the basic requirements of user events as well as power issues for devices are solved easily.
In order to overcome the challenge, Matrix offered individual software platforms that act as a server for both locations. To resolve the challenge that shortage of power supply port presented, Matrix offered its premium range of biometric devices, which offers power to the door lock and exit switch. Thus, the Matrix biometric solution helped solve both challenges faced by Coca-Cola.
