A MTS Case Study. Digital Video Surveillance Security System at The Mall At Short Hills

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Brianne Stewart
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1 A MTS Case Study Digital Video Surveillance Security System at The Mall At Short Hills

2 Case Study Digital Video Surveillance Security System at The Mall At Short Hills Background. The Mall at Short Hills (TMASH) presented a design objective to create a state of the art digital video surveillance solution to provide high percentage coverage and 100% coverage on critical areas. Other design objectives included a state of the art command console area, remote access to the video, the ability for police to remotely access the video, the ability for digital zoom for forensic review, license plate recognition for parking lot egress points, and the ability to incorporate intelligent features as they become feasible and desirable (e.g., face capture or face recognition). Additionally, TMASH had a current analog CCTV DVR-based system in place. It was agreed that this investment had some value and would be integrated into the overall solution. Other design requirements included the ability to scale or grow in cameras, camera locations, storage, and capability. Finally, the ability for Taubman Corporate to use this system as an architectural pilot to replicate at other locations was a consideration. Challenges. The biggest challenge was the physical layout of the mall with a significant footprint this meant wiring the system to a centralized head-end presented itself as the biggest challenge and cost. Other challenges included the existing system and the poor craftsmanship and unknown variables of that implementation. Finally, maintaining this all within a reasonable budget. Design Overview. MTS designed the system based on a loosely coupled architecture. Each architectural component is independent of the next, permitting a more open architecture that is future proof in that it can accommodate technology advances as they become desirable and affordable.

Other design objectives included a state of the art command console area, remote access to the video, the ability for police to remotely access the video, the ability for digital zoom for forensic

3 MTS designed the system around VMS technology Video Management System. VMS is a software-based solution that is hosted on standard servers. The key to this overall architecture was the network. Regarding the network, MTS evaluated three different design alternatives: Centralized home runs, distributed servers, and a MDF-IDF architecture, which became the design chosen. We basically created a network infrastructure dedicated to the digital video system that had distributed Intermediate Data Frames (IDF) with Gigabit TCP/IP networking throughout. Each IDF had fiber optic runs back to a centralized Main Data Frame (MDF) and had copper runs to the cameras. It was the quickest to implement, the most cost efficient, the most manageable (intelligent), and the most flexible for growth.

We basically created a network infrastructure dedicated to the digital video system that had distributed Intermediate Data Frames (IDF) with Gigabit TCP/IP networking throughout.

4 Implementation Overview. MTS designed the entire system and laid out three simultaneous and dependent projects and a fourth project, new cameras. Project 1 was the building of the network infrastructure for the new IP-based system. Project 2 was the building of the head-end. Project 3 was the discovery, stabilization, and re-termination of the existing analog system. Once Projects 1 and 2 were mostly complete, Project 4, the installation of new megapixel IP cameras could begin. The system uses a number of VMS servers and supports both NTSC (analog) and IP cameras. Existing NTSC cameras were re-homed and encoded by internal encoder cards in selected servers. New outdoor NTSC cameras are encoded at the closest IDF with external H.264 encoders. The remaining cameras are IP, both VGA and megapixel HD cameras, located throughout the facility. Technical Specification. The digital video surveillance solution at TMASH is based on an expandable and technology agnostic architecture. Different brand cameras, servers, and applications can be used such that lock-in to a single vendor was avoided. Currently, the system consists of the following:

Project 3 was the discovery, stabilization, and re-termination of the existing analog system.

5 a) VMS Servers. HPZ800 platforms (dual Xeon) with TVISS8 240 fps encoder boards are used for the analog (NTSC) cameras. Each server has three (3) TBytes of storage for video (expandable). For the Application Servers (IP only) HP DL160 (dual Xeon) servers with three (3) TBytes of storage are used. Currently, there are two (2) Z800 and four (4) DL160 servers for video management. In addition, there is one (1) DL160 server running Windows server 2003 and functioning solely as an Archiver server. b) Network. MTS designed and installed a 100% Gigabit Layer 2 Managed network with fiber optic links bewteen IDFs to the MDF and Gigabit copper extensions from IDF to IDF extensions. Cisco Layer 2 managed switches and DLink Layer 2 managed switches support three class C subnetworks. c) Storage. Pivot3 RAIGE storage subsystem configured as a network attached storage (NAS) array is used for secondary storage. RAIGE Director is hosted on the Archiver platform. The NAS is configured as a RAID 6 platform, fully managed through a SNMP platform at MTS. d) VMS Application. Intelligent Security System s SECUROS video management software is the backend application for the surveillance system. It is a Hybrid system capable of analog (Video Servers), IP (Application Servers), and remote operators workstations. This system includes an Archiver function (described below) and has a license plate recognition module, a face capture module, and a face recognition module. It also offers good support for the Mobotix camera line. e) Power Management. The whole system is on uninterruptable power supplies and generator power this includes cameras, network, and head-end. Additionally, MTS has IP-addressable power modules that allow us to remotely turn-on and off power to selected components. f) System Management. All computing and networking components are managed by an agent and agent-less systems management architecture that monitors the health of the hardware and software associated with the solution. This includes active polling of the system and agents that report (push) information back to the management head-end. g) Archiving Design. The system was designed with a two-tiered archive. Short term archive occurs as the video is captured, on each server s local hard drive (3 TBytes) this typically holds about two to four weeks, depending on activity.

In addition, there is one (1) DL160 server running Windows server 2003 and functioning solely as an Archiver server. b) Network.

6 Every night at midnight till 9:00 AM each server runs an archiver routine and sends the video to the Pivot3 RAIGE storage system described above. In order to extend the storage duration, we reduce the frame rate of the second tiered archive to 5 fps to keep the costs of storage down. h) Command Center. MTS designed and built a command center for 24x7 operations that includes multiple large screen displays, an interactive map function that allows users to choose camera views based on a map model of the mall, and a dedicated system for the production of optical disk evidence. For more information, info@mts-iss.com

MTS designed and built a command center for 24x7 operations that includes multiple large screen displays, an interactive map function that allows users to

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