Hailed as Europe's biggest new entertainment destination, the former Millennium Dome is an exciting city-within-a-city housing a wealth of bars, restaurants, cinemas and stadia.

An innovative voice alarm solution was required to meet the very different specifications of the two levels of Urban Inc. The ground floor restaurant was fitted out with full range suspended loudspeakers providing voice alarm signals and background music, whereas suspended loudspeakers with high sound pressure output were required within the busy nightclub on the first floor due to the high ambient noise levels/concentration of people.

The LinX combined PA/VA and background music system is powered by three of SigNET's Pulse 2.200 LS amplifiers and automatically broadcasts pre-recorded messages in the event of an emergency. However, as with all the other life safety systems within the O2, the LinX VA system in Urban Inc accepts an audio feed from the O2's landlord/main fire alarm & VA system enabling live messages to be broadcast should the entire 02 site need to be evacuated in the event of a full-scale emergency. If the main system should fail, Urban Inc's in-house LinX voice alarm system immediately reverts to failsafe mode and will function independently of the host system.

"SigNET's LinX voice alarm was specified because the project required a very straightforward and easy-to-install system. We needed to complete site wiring, second fix and commissioning of this project at breakneck speed over a 3 week period as the life safety systems had to be up and running before the official opening of The O2 in June. I am delighted to say that we achieved our objective with time to spare" says Giles Palmer of Clarity UK. However, the project did not run completely smoothly as Clarity UK faced some major construction obstacles along the way.

One of the main difficulties was sourcing the high efficiency unusual colour loudspeaker specified by Urban Inc to match the interior décor of the club. After much investigation, the loudspeakers were purchased from specialist manufacturer DNH in Norway. Special consideration also had to be given to the rest room areas. Each small cubicle is separately boxed off and therefore required an individual low powered loudspeaker to comply with the requirements of BS 5839 Part 8 as did all other loudspeakers on this project.