[Case Study] Elmbridge Borough Council

Client: Elmbridge Borough Council
Location: Rangers Huts Beechwood Drive Cobham

Background:

Elmbridge Borough Council Green Spaces Team has a compound deep in the woods near Chobham. The site has been the subject of several attacks on its stores by gangs armed with angle grinders to gain access to the shipping containers, which are used to store tools and equipment, used in the maintenance of Elmbridge’s green spaces. In addition, thieves have attacked the Fuel Bunker to steal fuel from the site. The site is on a public thoroughfare, favoured by local dog walkers and joggers, and as such has a reasonable amount of innocent human and wildlife activity.

Challenges:

Due to the remote location of the site, in Woodland close to the A30, and the fact that the site is spread out over a reasonably large area, coverage of the location, especially at night, did not lend itself to a traditional installation.

With no external lighting, at night the site is in total darkness. Communications to the site were also a challenge, as the only onsite communication was via a slow ADSL2 connection. This was vulnerable to having its line cut, resulting in the loss of any external communication.

Site power is provided from an external connection, terminating in a brick-built enclosure to the side of the site, adjacent to one of the shipping containers and as such vulnerable to attack.

Requirements:

To provide 360-degree coverage of the site, with independent external communications, in total darkness. To protect the vulnerable power source and shipping containers. Additionally enabling site managers to be able to simply access the cameras, remotely on the activation of the site intruder alarm system.

Solution:

VisionOn Systems installed a purpose-built secure enclosure housing a Hikvision 4TB NVR and 4G Teltonika Router with external access being provided via a secure connection to the HikConnect Platform.

Five AcuSense 4 MP IR Varifocal Bullet Network Cameras were deployed on specially constructed masts attached to two of the containers, with three cameras on the local mast and two cameras, connected via an onsite 5 GHZ 500 Mbps wireless IP bridge.

The installed solution provides total site coverage even in total darkness, with remote live site access off all the cameras, as well as playback of recorded footage.

The onsite managers were astonished by the coverage and quality of the images provided by the system and are confident that the system will be an effective deterrent against future attacks.