Westminster City Council is standardising on a hosted CCTV enforcement platform. The decision was taken after a 12-month comparison exercise between Videalert and the incumbent provider. Marston Holdings group companies Videalert and NSL were selected, after a test across a range of enforcement activities including yellow box junctions, banned turns and restricted access. Pictured: Shaftesbury Avenue.
Darren Montague, Business Implementation Manager in Westminster City Council’s Parking Services team says: “The decision to extend the Videalert platform was taken after a number of successful deployments across the West End with high volume traffic and complex moving traffic scenarios. Videalert delivered the highest capture rates enabling us to meet our compliance objectives, a significantly higher level of performance compared with the previous manually-operated system, as well as providing the highest availability. The platform also delivers better value as future-proofing is built-in and additional camera assets and enforcement applications can be cost effectively added as required.”
Videalert is now the single platform standard for all CCTV enforcement throughout Westminster. The product company says that its latest ONVIF-compliant digital HD cameras are now used at these locations to capture images which minimise discard-rates, increase productivity and help reduce the number of appeals. The cameras are also playing a part in helping to deliver the council’s joint strategy with the London transport body TfL, which aims to improve public spaces by reducing traffic congestion and tackling poor air quality. The council hopes to extend the use of the Videalert platform to Oxford Street West scheme and traffic exclusion zones around schools in Westminster.
Mark Hoskin, Managing Director of NSL says: “We are delighted to have been awarded this high profile contract as it shows how Videalert and NSL can jointly deliver complete solutions that streamline every aspect of the traffic and parking management process from enforcement and PCN processing through to collections. This unique, integrated approach not only removes the risk element when working with outside contractors, but also enables councils to increase efficiency and maximise compliance in short timeframes.”
And Tim Daniels, Sales and Marketing Director at Videalert says: “The joint Videalert and NSL service proposition demonstrates how close collaboration between the public and private sector can deliver better outcomes. Improving traffic flows will help to reduce congestion and the corresponding air pollution whilst increasing road safety for the millions of people that visit the Westminster area. It also shows how councils can extend enforcement to further improve compliance without incurring major additional capital expenditure.”
