SAFETY & PASSENGER INFORMATION
What can our railways learn from airport security?
Daniel Wan of Honeywell Security Group discusses the security lessons that railway stations can learn from airports. R
ecent statistics from the Home Office revealed that between January 2012 and
June 2013, four of the top 10 UK crime hot spots were major railway stations: Manchester Piccadilly (1,508 incidents), London Victoria (1,483), King’s Cross (1,322) and Euston (1,283). Set alongside a close-to-10% increase in rail passenger theft between April 2012 and March 2013, the figures suggest the UK’s railway stations remain a top target for thieves. So where can security managers on the UK’s rail network turn to for inspiration to combat the ever-present threat of crime? The answer is airports.
International airports have invested heavily in solutions and strategies designed to better protect their passengers, assets and cargo. What is more, there are strong parallels between airports and railway stations beyond the fact that both serve as transport hubs. In this article, we will explore some of those parallels and examine the best practice – systems, processes and approaches – that can be leveraged by UK railways for the safety of all of us.
Pre-empting incidents
Both airports and railway stations are some of the world’s busiest and most congested spaces. Picture the departure lounge at international airports during the summer holiday season, with thousands of people and their luggage in one relatively small space. Equally, walk through major railway stations on a Friday
106 | rail technology magazine Feb/Mar 14
night in rush hour and the sheer number of people is overwhelming.
Airports approach this in an innovative way, deliberately adopting a strategy that enables security managers to prevent scenarios from turning into incidents rather than just reacting to events after the fact. Imagine that a passenger leaves a bag in one of the terminals and walks off; technologies such as video analytics help security staff to spot the suspicious behaviour in a busy crowd and pre-empt a potential problem. In addition, by integrating cameras together into a single unified view – using a video management system – it’s much easier to spot a person behaving in an unusual way and quickly guide the security personnel to the source of the trouble. This proactive approach to managing situations should serve as an inspiration to railways.
24/7/365
Another commonality is that both transport networks never stop their operations and therefore, their security systems must perform to the highest standard both day and night. Continuing to operate without interruption, whatever the circumstances are and even following an incident, is key.
Take for example when an airport suffers a power outage affecting the operational systems at the terminal. This failure can cause major flight delays and chaos at the
terminal, with big crowds moving around the building, demanding information about their flights. In this type of scenario, security is more important than ever. So how do airports ensure they deliver a 24/7/365 security solution that runs smoothly even in extreme circumstances? The answer is integrated security systems that are designed with automatic fail-over to back-up systems so that in the event of a power failure or a security risk, site security is immediately picked up and controlled by a secondary security site. Like
airports,
railway stations can also be affected by adverse conditions outside of their control – severe weather, flooding or fire – that disrupt critical operational systems and put thousands of passengers at risk. Investing in back-up security solutions – like those used in the airport sector – will give security managers at railways stations the peace of mind that comes from knowing their system can stand up to the toughest conditions and ensure security is maintained on site.
Trusting your employees
Airports and railway stations both have different contractors – cleaners, maintenance, shop staff, engineers, train operators – with access to sensitive areas of the facilities. Airports are managing their staff with state- of-the-art access control functionality and integration with HR and building management systems ensuring that no unauthorised personnel can access restricted areas.
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