Solutions | Homeland Security
Cameron County Veterans Bridge
The Cameron County Texas Department of Transportation operates three of the busiest international crossing bridges in the southern Rio Grande valley. These bridges are gateways between Brownsville, Texas and Matamoros and Reynosa as well as the industrial city of Monterrey, Mexico and support a main transportation artery from eastern Mexico into the United States. Every year, the department monitors the crossing and collects tolls for over 8 million vehicles and pedestrians. Their mission is to serve as the most convenient and safe crossing points for all citizens and tourists of both U.S. and Mexico, as well as facilitate the crossing of all freight and import-export trade in a timely and efficient manner.
The Problem
Due to the high traffic demands of these bridges, it is essential to have a comprehensive video surveillance system. Toll booth operations require on going monitoring. Video recordings are required to assist in accident investigations, stolen vehicle identification, non payment of tolls, and border violations. Most importantly, county bridge personnel work closely with US Customs and Border Protection to ensure border security.
The Solution
A team from the Bridge authority led by Francisco San Miguel began an extensive search for a comprehensive video surveillance system. He found Video Insight on the internet and began discussing the implementation with the sales staff and technical support. He was very impressed with the capabilities of the product. However, the most important factor was the quality of the customer support and the personal involvement of Video Insight upper management.
Francisco has installed one Video Insight server at each of the international bridges that span the Rio Grande: the Free Trade Bridge, the Gateway Bridge and the Veterans Bridge. Each server supports from 16 to 32 cameras. Cameras are placed throughout the bridge including on top of the bridge, in the toll booths, viewing the traffic lanes, and the administration buildings. There are PTZ cameras that sweep each parking lot next to the administration buildings. Every bridge has a main office and two guards on duty 24/7.
The video surveillance systems have been very effective in reducing toll violations, border crossing violations and have been used in criminal prosecutions. They are also a deterrent to potential crime in the various parking lots associated with the bridges.
The Future
Cameron County has great plans for the video surveillance systems moving forward. They plan to connect all of their servers to their network and use the Network Client and Web Client to view live and recorded video in one display. Once the systems are connected to the network, they will also implement the Web server software to provide web browser access over the internet from anywhere in the world using a standard browser. Finally, they will begin to install IP cameras on their surveillance networks. Video Insight's ability to provide a hybrid solution which includes viewing of both analog and IP cameras from one display offers a tremendous amount of flexibility.
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