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| Alvarion is the sole equipment provider for the City of Geneva's extensive wireless broadband network |
Mobile Broadband
After providing broadband to the police department buildings, city officials recognized that extending that network to police officers while on patrol would greatly increase their effectiveness in fighting crime. They decided to provide real-time, high-speed connectivity to the seven police vehicles in the city enabling officers to send and receive data messages, still images and full-motion video using mobile data terminals.
In each police car, the mobile data terminal (or in-car computer) is connected to a BreezeACCESS 900 mobile subscriber unit (SU-M) located in the trunk of the car. The SU-M is powered by the car battery and connects to the nearest BreezeACCESS VL base station at any time. When the police car is moving, data transmission continues uninterrupted as the signal is transferred seamlessly from one base station to another.
Operating at 3 Mbps, or the equivalent of a single bidirectional T1 per car, the network enables officers to access police databases to download mug shots, criminal records or other critical information on suspects.
The network also provides voice capabilities in the event of an emergency. In the future, the network capabilities could be expanded to provide IP video recording and remote surveillance capabilities from each police vehicle.
Introducing VoIP Services
In 2004, as additional bandwidth on the network became available, VoIP services were introduced enabling the broadband wireless network to replace 130 telephone lines citywide resulting in further cost savings. Voice packets having priority over data to ensure good call quality. Today the VoIP network is used by 15 different city buildings including several police offices with excellent results. For example, one particular VoIP PBX now supports approximately 18,000 calls per month.
Video Support
Video is supported on all the broadband wireless networks in the City of Geneva and is used for traffic control as well as recording and monitoring behaviour in hard to patrol areas in support of the city police.
The Result
Using Alvarion's single network management system for all its networks along with sharing deployment infrastructure - towers, masts, city properties, the City of Geneva has shown how a city can be in control of its broadband destiny.
