Case Studies

Bluewater radio

by Mark Rowe

Land Securities, the commercial property company in the UK, owns and manages more than 26 million square feet of property, including offices and retail parks and shopping centres such as Bluewater. The centre in south east London totals 1.8m square feet and offers over 300 retailers and places to eat, plus a Showcase Cinema de Lux. The smooth running of the site depends on everyone – security, engineering and housekeeping, car parking attendants, control centre staff and retailers – being able to communicate at any moment, no matter what the situation or where.

From mopping up spills to monitoring suspicious activities, communication is critical, protecting the safety and well-being of all on site. So when Bluewater took the decision to upgrade to digital two-way radio, it had to take into account the needs of multiple departments and user groups.

Alongside instant calling and text messaging to individuals or groups, communication prioritisation and support for lone workers were all safety requirements needed to protect staff in emergencies. Bluewater also needed to ensure its new solution featured easy-to-use radio handsets that deliver these transmissions with clarity – regardless of background noise. Alongside enabling managers to coordinate teams across the complex, a new digital radio had to integrate with the site’s Everbridge mass communications platform which keeps retailers informed in real-time of routine events and incidents.

Hytera’s DMR range, of digital handsets, repeaters and XPT digital trunking, was integrated with the CALM solution developed by Hytera partner Chatterbox, delivering integration, coverage and connectivity for Bluewater, and supporting communication applications. Should wireless or mobile networks be compromised during an incident, the Hytera DMR radio offers uninterrupted crisis communications, the firm adds. The Hytera products supports a variety of voice and data services – including man down, lone worker monitoring and emergency response coordination. Caller ID ensures central control teams can identify every radio user, taking advantage of caller interrupt to break into radio traffic to send out priority transmissions.

Control room teams can use text messaging to send short custom or pre-set messages to groups, or give users the option to speak or text on a one-to-one or one-to-many basis. Meanwhile, real-time tracking assures the safety of every handset user, with all transmissions being monitored and recorded.

Hytera’s XPT digital trunking effectively doubles existing spectrum resources to maximise available traffic channels and capacity. It’s enabled Bluewater to use its existing infrastructure and give end users access to more user groups and shared channels. The XPT system automatically assigns available channel resources, for multiple users across departments to contact each other, even when voice and data traffic across the site is high, without the need to change channel.

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