More than two million passengers a day travel on the Santiago metro, the backbone of the Chilean capital’s public transport system. Metro system management was keen to ensure the security of passengers – both in the sense of safer travel and reduced crime – and worked with Indigovision partner Diebold Bitelco Chile to find the solution.

Security personnel have been able to track individuals responsible for crime and apprehend them – including capturing images of an offender who shot and killed two passengers and wounded four others in a metro carriage in July 17th 2011. The movement of passengers can also be analysed, for safety and speed of transit.

Felipe Bravo Busta, Technology Sub Project Manager on the Metro system stated: “Indigovision’s solution has made for a safer Metro system in all senses – lower crime and less risk of accidents due to overcrowding.”

Indigovision won the contract from the Santiago authorities due to the quality of the system and the ability to search recorded footage and easily identify incidents, and to keep the project within budget.

The system now covers 48 stations. All existing cameras were able to be reused by connecting them to the network via Indigovision 9000 video encoders. There are 415 fixed and 406 PTZ cameras across the Metro network.

A key to the successful operation of the system was the decision to deploy a distributed and scalable IP Video solution. Indigovision's distributed architecture replicates the configuration data throughout the system so that no central server is required.

Video is recorded onto 43 Indigovision Windows NVRs (Network Video Recorders). Some backup NVRs units are also in place should any NVR be taken off-line – the backup NVRs will automatically start recording.

Due to the installation of a 56 node optical fibre network within 48 stations across the city, data can be transferred to Control Center, Indigovision’s video management software. Another system advantage is the alarm escalation integrated into Control Center, which ensures that all incidents will be registered and alerts relevant staff to incidents in their areas.