In a remarkable installation, 1st Active Security took just 17 working days from the date the order was received to install a comprehensive access control system at an internationally renowned art college. The whole system was installed and tested, with 2100 students enrolled, photographed and issued with cards.
Internationally recognised as an architectural work of art itself, the Glasgow School of Art attracts a huge number of visitors who come to admire the main building as well as the school's regular exhibitions.

But the rising costs of manned security combined with the desire to introduce a more sophisticated level of security, led the school to re-examine its security requirements last summer.

  Scottish Installer, 1st Active Security, was approached to design a scheme introducing access control, incorporating CCTV cameras, and the creation of a manned monitoring station in the reception area of the school's Mackintosh Building, designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh.

  Steven Collins, Managing Director of 1st Active Security, describes the challenge he faced: "The school presented multiple challenges to an installer. As a Grade 1 historic building, the Mackintosh Building itself is a very difficult environment in which to work. Secondly, the whole campus is a semi-public and very busy site with several internal exhibition spaces that are visited by members of the public. This means introducing access control on internal doors and even on lifts, not simply on external doors.

"Thirdly, the campus is not on a single site but spread through ten academic buildings on half a dozen streets in central Glasgow. This meant the laying of 6,000 meters of twisted pair (CAT5), with the longest runs of up to 500 meters. Finally, students don't work a nine to five day. The school needed a system that could accommodate different operational modes according to the time of day."

Up to 200 doors
The initial CCTV scheme features 24 colour vandal resistant fixed domes (Vista VVRD4V8C) and three Sanyo high resolution colour cameras (VCC6572P) fitted with Vista 1/3 inch direct drive 4.0mm lenses mounted in Vista housings.

The access control system installed is Net2 from Paxton Access, a PC based system that can accommodate up to 200 doors and 10,000 cards or tokens. Each door (or other access point on the system) is fitted with an access control unit with a stainless steel Touchlock keypad and/or a Proximity vandal proof card reader suitably sited nearby.

Situated in the school's reception area, the monitoring station features ten 14 inch and two 17 inch Vista monitors (PVD1400DG) with three hard disk digital recorders for recording CCTV. A terabyte (1000Gb) of hard disk storage allows evidence archiving and a separate PC acts as a server for the Net2 access control.

Said Collins: "We recommended fixed domes, to reduce the ongoing maintenance cost of the system and suggested a Paxton access control system for its simplicity, both to use and administer. It's very user friendly and offers exactly the right functionality and flexibility for the task at hand."

Individual access rights vary according to the category of user, time of day and buildings accessed. In general, during the normal day, students and staff operate the doors just using their tags, but out of normal hours this switches to a combination of card and PIN.

Many external doors are wheelchair accessible and these have secondary access pads positioned at a suitable height. With the addition of automated doors this provides a very wheelchair friendly solution.

All doors have alarms that sound if a door is not closed within twenty seconds of it being opened. Paxton's software can generate usage reports by individual user or group of users and can also generate warnings of potential misuse.

   'Very fast' implementation
One of the School's most pressing needs was for a very fast implementation. 1st Active won the contract on a Friday with implementation set to start the following Monday.

Just 17 working days later the system had to be completed and working in time for the start of term. This time also had to include the special manufacture and printing of all the students' cards.

  "Not only did we meet the deadline," explains Collins, "the whole system was powered, checked and configured in just a few hours and not a single fault was found in over 4,500 connections.

He added: "Part of the success of the project can be traced back to the quality of service we receive from Norbain."

He said they had products shipped next day to Glasgow from as late as 7pm the evening before. The distributor's staff were "sensitive and knowledgeable about the needs of engineers on the ground. This makes a tremendous difference on a project that is on a very tight timescale."

Eliot Leviten, the college's Director of Finance and Resources, said he was delighted that it was possible for 1st Active to meet a very tight delivery timetable: "Only a very robust and capable system can have 700 students photographed, registered and trained to use the cards in a single day. The system purcha-sed, Paxton, has proved very good in this regard.

Far less complex
"The nature of our business is that the access control systems must be able to handle thousands of new users in a very short period of time and through a combination of a good system, good planning and a good contractor, the system is working well. 1st Active were quick and competitive – an ideal combination – and, as a medium sized organisation, matched us for size very well. Their recommendations were far less complex than other systems we considered, but ultimately fitted perfectly to our requirement".

"As a result of this project we have made efficiency improvements and we are looking at an initial payback period of less than twelve months. But this exercise was never simply about saving money. It is also about providing health and safety reassurance to students. Beyond that, we now also have an infrastructure in place that can be expanded to meet our growing needs.

"We are already looking at how we can use the system as imaginatively as possible ... this system has given us many new options."

Source

Security Installer