Leeds City Council is expanding the reach of its CCTV enforcement network to a further six sites as a direct result of the improvements that the Videalert-based system has delivered over the last four years. The council will now be enforcing bus lane contraventions at thirty sites throughout the city and expects to achieve further reductions in the number of offences committed and continue to meet its strategy of faster journey times for public transport users.
The Videalert system was originally installed in 2011 to monitor bus lane offences in five city centre sites where is has helped reduce contraventions by more than 90%. Leeds City Council has subsequently extended the number of locations monitored and the system is now considered to be an integral component of the Council’s strategy to keep the city moving.
According to Councillor Richard Lewis, executive board member for regeneration, transport and planning at Leeds City Council: “In order to ensure quick movement of public transport, we need to make sure other vehicles obey the rules of the road. The Videalert system has proved to be extremely flexible. It is a vital part of our strategy to speed traffic flows, improve timetable efficiency and reduce bus journey times to encourage more people to use public transport and make the city a better place to live and work.”
The system is based on Videalert’s unique Digital Video Platform, an innovative multipoint solution that uses standard off-the-shelf equipment and seamlessly integrates with existing analogue and ONVIF compliant digital megapixel cameras and infrastructure. This future-proofed solution combines ANPR technology with sophisticated video analytics to provide the most reliable enforcement of moving traffic offences such as bus lanes. It will also enable the council to run additional civil traffic management and enforcement applications simultaneously including, if needed, vehicle plate read data to Police ANPR databases (BOFII) and traffic management systems (UTMC).
According to Tim Daniels, Sales and Marketing Director of Videalert: “Leeds City Council has proved that installing the latest digital systems can make a major impact on reducing moving traffic contraventions and reducing congestion on the roads. The Videalert platform also provides Leeds with a future proofed solution so, if and when legislation is enacted to allow Councils outside London to extend enforcement activities to other moving traffic offences such as banned turns, box junctions and restricted access areas, the same system can deliver these requirements out of the box. This eliminates the need to procure multiple point solutions thereby substantially reducing costs over the lifetime of the contract.”
The system expansion is incorporated within a new five year maintenance contract recently awarded to Imperial Civil Enforcement Solutions, a leading provider of fully-integrated business processing and IT solutions to local authorities.
For further information, please visit www.videalert.com
