Security measures for the local Hong Kong economy

Recent news about delays to Hong Kong’s cross-border railway project has raised some serious concerns in the city. People are understandably looking forward to the economic benefits arising from the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong Express Rail Link.

Unfortunately, the HK$67 billion Hong Kong to Guangzhou section of the network is facing a delay of up to 2 years due to unforeseen challenges. Coming on the back of frequent disruptions to regular rail services, the delay is a frustrating development.

Hong Kong’s MTR carries, on average, 5.1 million passengers every weekday. In 2013, the MTR Corporation Limited submitted 671 railway-related incident investigation reports to the Electrical and Mechanical Services Department (EMSD).

Reports show that the majority of these incidents were caused by passenger or public behaviour and other external factors with the remainder caused by railway equipment failure or staff behaviour.

It was a similar story outside the rail industry. According to EMSD reports, external factors were the main cause of the reported elevator incidents in 2013: 319 were due to passenger behaviour, whereas five were due to faulty lift equipment.

In light of the above issues, public utilities and transportation systems operators, such as lift contractors and railway operators, would do well to assess the video surveillance across their facilities and transport networks.

Natural disaster, public behaviour, and other external factors can all play a part in unexpected delays and disruptions in public services and construction projects. These risk factors can to a certain extent be alleviated with wireless, real-time video surveillance systems which guard the safety of workers, the railway network, signaling systems, tunnel-boring machines, etc.

In a city as densely populated as Hong Kong, any kind of delay or disruption has a snowball effect which quickly spreads across the wider network. Wireless video surveillance could protect both business and the general public while identifying potential trouble spots before they were able to cause chaos.

Whereas installing wired surveillance requires digging up roads to lay fibre or copper wire networks, wireless video surveillance solutions can be relatively rapidly deployed and scaled. For instance, it is possible to have a new camera in place at a new location within days.

Mission critical tasks in public utilities – such as the construction, repair, or maintenance of railways, lifts, power stations, etc. – require workers to operate in hazardous workspaces, like machine rooms, tunnels, and lift shafts.

Real-time video feeds provided by wireless video surveillance could allow experts to provide live guidance or analysis, and ensure the right judgement was on hand for tricky situations and the safety of workers.

Wireless video surveillance systems also have the ability to collect video for evidence in investigations. In allowing organisations to identify the cause of specific incidents, controls can be put in place to prevent similar accidents in future. Video can also help to identify the responsible parties where it is necessary to apportion blame.

Public utilities and transportation systems operators should consider the full range of solutions available to minimise the occurrence of incidents that could potentially negatively impact the local Hong Kong economy. The wide deployment of wireless broadband video surveillance networks could be a sensible step for safeguarding the city’s economic growth.