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The first ever city centre video surveillance system in Italy has recently been
installed at Bergamo in Lombardy to the north-east of Milan. All of the CCTV equipment has been supplied by Vicon Industries.
Vicon have supplied over 30 of their Surveyor dome cameras together with the Kollector digital video recording station. The contract award owes much to Vicon’s close links with a local installer, Mega Italia. Vicon’s Surveyor dome cameras have been installed throughout the modern lower town which was constructed between the wars.
Vicon Surveyor cameras are also providing video monitoring in the old town area including several medieval buildings around the Piazza Vecchia and the thoroughfare past the twelfth century church of Santa Maria Maggiore.
The installation is also notable in that Bergamo has opted for an entirely digital solution to its video surveillance recording needs. The Kollector range of digital recorders are standalone or networkable. They provide extended continuous record times well above the nearest competitor, a fact that is being consistently endorsed by independent industry observers.
The Kollector units at Bergamo are housed in an extensive, purpose-built control room within Bergamo’s main civic offices. From here municipal staff are recording from 16 cameras simultaneously while also benefiting from multipoint switching for general surveillance. They are also utilizing video loss and alarm relays for automatic video switching.
Bergamo security officers are storing images on the Kollector’s standard 60Gb hard drive. Additional drives can be added for further extended recording. Live or recorded video is viewed through a PC monitor. Video scenes can be exported easily from the system in standard JPEG format from the hard drive or to removable media using proprietary software. The Bergamo Civic Council have already benefited from this facility by supplying local police with pictures of suspected vandals.
Chris Fletcher of Vicon comments: “The municipal authorities in Bergamo were anxious to avoid the logistical problems connected with storage and archiving to tape. As a purely digital solution the Kollector is virtually maintenance free. The system at Bergamo has been configured to allow significant expansion without disruption to the core installation.
Vicon have a strong Italian presence with a local office in Milan, headed by country manager, Celestino Gheoni. Other recent contract awards in Italy include work for TNT Group, Carrefour, the Italian Airforce and the Metro Group.
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