Nearly two years ago, Edwin Thomas, a bus driver along the B46, was stabbed to death by a passenger who refused to pay his fare. It took over a year for the MTA to being a driver partition pilot program, and the unions have been pushing the MTA to improve bus driver safety in the interim. Today, we learn that the MTA will expand the number of bus equipped with surveillance cameras.
Beginning in the spring, Transit will begin to install cameras in 400 Manhattan buses, and by early 2012, the system should be up and running. According to the authority, “video surveillance is viewed as a vital element of [its] ongoing effort to maintain a safeand secure transit network for customers and employees.” They system, which will cost $9.75 million or $17,900 per bus, has been created by UTC to serve as a “visible crime deterrent.” It will assist law enforcement efforts and aid in the prosecution of criminal activity aboard buses.
The system carries a relatively high price tag because of its complexity. The system will include “multiple interior cameras and DVR functionality.” The images will be transmitted the the nine bus depots around the city where equipment can analyze the images and perform diagnostic checks. The authority tried to implement a similar system four years go but the contractor went out of business.
“Throughout the country video surveillance has clearly been shown to deter criminal activity on transit vehicles, and we also believe that it will be extremely valuable in investigating accident injury claims,” NYC Transit President Thomas F. Prendergast said. “This type of system will go along way towards ensuring the security of out customers and employees.”
Union leaders praised the move. “Our bus operators are assaulted three, four times a week across the city. I think cameras are a deterrent,” TWU head John Samuelsen said. He also requested that the city “beef up the police presence on buses.”
If this initial trial is successful, the MTA can exercise an option in the control for another 1150 cameras. Those would be installed in “high-crime routes” in the outer boroughs.
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Those must be some serious cameras to cost $18,000 each to simply “outfit each bus” (quote from the WSJ article) – whatever that means. I assume by “outfit” that the $18,000 does not include ongoing video upload/storage/maintenance.