The Cumberland Basin is the main entrance to Bristol’s docks and also provides a route into the City Centre. During the rush hour the number of vehicles passing through can be extremely high and in order to ensure that traffic flows smoothly, operators in the City’s Traffic Control Centre are tasked to keep a close eye out for any incidents or parking violations which might lead to traffic jams. They are able to do so by monitoring images captured by just two Samsung SCP-3430H PTZ dome cameras mounted on the top of one of the City’s landmark buildings, Tobacco Bond B.

Built in 1908, Tobacco Bond B is no longer used as a warehouse, but is instead the home of the Bristol Records Office. “It was very helpful that the building is owned by Bristol City Council,” said Edward Booth Ray, Managing Director of Select Electrics Ltd who recommended and installed the dome cameras. “We didn’t therefore need to worry about obtaining permission from a third party to install the dome cameras on the roof and connect them to the City’s network infrastructure via fibre run inside of the building and we were therefore able to maintain the aesthetics of the building.”

The weatherproof SCP-3430H is a Wide Dynamic Range PTZ dome camera which is able to capture very high quality images over a wide area thanks to its 43x optical zoom capability. Incorporating Samsung Techwin’s A1 DSP chipset, the SCP-3430H is able to utilise progressive scan technology to achieve very high quality video capture of moving objects, making it possible, for example, to read car number plates without a motion blur effect.

“It is quite remarkable how just two widely available dome cameras are able to achieve so much for us,” said Gordon McLanaghan, the Emergency Control Centre Manager for Bristol City Council. “They are located high up on the top of the Tobacco Bond B building to provide an unrestricted field of view and it is therefore extremely impressive how good the quality of the images is, despite the fact that more often than not we are taking advantage of the cameras’ 43x zoom feature. The cost of the project was relatively small compared to the invaluable information the cameras are providing to our Control Centre operators which is helping them to make quick and effective decisions when dealing with any developing incidents. The images are also available to the police should they need to monitor any suspicious criminal activity and the low light capability of the cameras means we can monitor the area 24/7.”