The video surveillance systems have been hugely successful in keeping the centres safe

Hikvision USA, a leading North American provider of multiple award-winning video surveillance products, teamed up with the City of Philadelphia to ensure success of their “Fun Safe Philly Summer” initiative. The program connects youth and their families to free and low-cost summer activities, including many events at the recreation centres spread throughout the city. With the safety of the community in mind, the city council has pledged significant budget investment to outfit all 140 centres with CCTV by 2016. After careful evaluation of all the products on the market, Hikvision’s high-performance cameras, NVRs, and VMS technology were selected as a cost-effective solution to protect the city with cutting-edge video surveillance.

With over 600 facilities serving thousands of people each year, the Department of Parks and Recreation worked closely with City of Philadelphia Engineer Pedro Pinto to develop a high standard for CCTV design criteria. A primary concern was finding a system that could stay intact as existing infrastructure was gradually upgraded throughout the city.

“The system needed to be scalable and had to be networked at some point in the future,” explained Sheeba Money, Special Systems Designer at Arora Engineers, Inc., a firm involved with CCTV design for the City of Philadelphia. “With every department of the city operating on a different system, it was crucial to provide a video surveillance solution in the rec centers that could be linked into a central management system.” Because Hikvison’s Video Management Systems easily communicate with each other and with systems made by other manufacturers, the feature-rich, reliable, VMS 4200 was a perfect fit.

The video surveillance systems have been hugely successful in keeping the centres safe. In most cases, the presence of the cameras alone has been enough to prevent crime. Susan Slawson, Deputy Commissioner of Parks and Recreation, noted: “Where we were faced with vandalism, loitering, and burglaries before, the numbers decreased immediately once we outfitted our facilities with cameras. We don’t just want a ‘fun, safe, Philly summer;’ we want a fun, safe, Philly. With introduction of Hikvision video surveillance equipment, not only are we covering our sites, we can tell what’s going on in the streets and coordinate with the police department if need be,” Commissioner Slawson, herself a 20-year veteran of the Philadelphia Police Department, affirmed. Superior image quality from the Hikvision cameras plays a key role. “We have good video,” Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey confirmed, “that should help us a great deal.”

Fidelity Alarm installed the 7254 3MP Outdoor Network Camera in several of the rec centers due to the camera’s wide dynamic range and true day/night functionality. “In addition to gathering footage from the immediate vicinity, it captures clear images from as far away as across the street,” explained Pat Phillips, Sales Manager at Fidelity Alarm. This month’s shooting at the Dell Music Center is a tragic example of criminal activity dealing a blow to the community, but the police had a head start on the investigation due to cameras stationed on the building’s exterior by Fidelity Alarm. Footage was provided to the police and images were released to the public so that the perpetrators could be swiftly identified.

Jeffrey He, president of Hikvision USA, remarked, “Hikvision USA is proud to provide versatile, convenient, and efficient video surveillance solutions to the City of Philadelphia. Hikvision technology protects our society’s most invaluable asset – our young people – in municipalities across the U.S. and Canada. As we continue to rapidly expand, we look forward to bringing even more success stories to the North American market.”