A case study of CCTV on the Luton-Dunstable Busway.
The 6.1 mile, £91m busway operates separately to all other traffic and is designed to ease congestion. It’s, part-government funded by Luton and Central Bedfordshire Councils and part-funded by the Luton Town Centre Transport Scheme. The Maidstone-based security installer Secure Engineering had a brief to protect passengers and manage safety.
Secure Engineering provided CCTV coverage for the Busway at each of its eight passenger shelters and intercom help points. Other CCTV coverage was provided at the Luton Bus – Train Interchange, where passengers transfer for rail links to Luton Airport and London. The CCTV is monitored as a standalone system at Arriva’s bus depot in Luton and operates with Luton’s town hall CCTV.
Buses using the route are modified with two small wheels which allow them to travel through a 4.8-mile, specially designed concrete guide-way section. The guide-way has lanes in each direction, with buses travelling smoothly in the metropolitan area at speeds of up to 50mph. The modified buses are free to leave the Busway at designated access points and travel on roads as normal.
Secure Engineering operate in southern England and London. The firm reports public space security experience, including government and local authority clients. Clifford Corne, director of Secure Engineering, said: “We have used Redvision’s X-Series PTZ dome cameras in the Luton-Dunstable Busway because they are affordable, reliable and have engineering support in the UK. Intuitive pan, tilt and zoom functionality allows CCTV operators to respond immediately to any incidents and take appropriate action. Camera features, such as a wiper for keeping rain and dirt off the camera view, and infra-red (IR) illumination for night time and low-light operation, ensure we always capture high-quality images day and night. The camera is also rugged-looking and suits the architectural design of the busway.”
Paul Hucker, MD at Redvision added: “Redvision cameras are used at the bus – train interchange, passenger shelters, intercom help points and at each of the bus access junctions along the route. Secure Engineering required a robust PTZ camera with low-light and night time operation. As a UK manufacturer we were also able to allocate engineering support during the project to ensure the installation ran smoothly.
“Our X-Series PTZ dome cameras are popular with local authorities and those responsible for public space and transport sites. They have low power consumption ratings, so work well in projects designed to actively cut carbon emissions – essential to this scheme. They can be installed on buildings and poles, so no part of a site is missed. They can also be finished in any required RAL colour to blend in with the environment. Above all they offer a very high performance solution to protect people and places.”
About the Busway
Three bus companies, Arriva, Centrebus and Grant Palmer, operate the busway routes. Together they provide core services between Dunstable and Luton, running every eight minutes at peak times, linking the two town centres in just 15 minutes. The buses receive priority at junctions, bypass congestion ‘hotspots’ and deliver the shortest possible journey times for passengers.
Contact Redvision on 01420 448 448 or visit redvisioncctv.com.
