commander

What are those new streetlamp type things dotted all the way down...

Are they some kind of camera?

Arcadia

Yeah, I think it has something to do with the new security system thats being Implemented..Has to be in place for Sept..all brought on by the killing of the Hammas leader in Dubai.

al dente

The rumour is that they are top of the range (natch) surveillance cameras with face recognising software. Slightly odd in a country where wearing a burqa is a common occurance. Perhaps they are just speed cameras.

Grace O Malley

They are top of the range CCTV with face and car plate recognition, pathetic> Might start wearing an abaya

al dente

Are they going to appear on all streets soon then? Very bizarre. What about the burqa issue??

Grace O Malley

Apparently they want them on every block. God knows, they will know all are secrets soon,

Roadking

Maybe they will ban the burqa like France.

Bahtatboy

They've banned France?! Now that's a bloody good idea

Really heavy posts for what they've hung on them so far. I thought they were gallows for hanging speeding motorists.

Chicago had an idea a few years back that they wanted every square inch of the city monitored by surveillance cameras. OK in principle (if you're a security camera maker / installer, as we were), but nonsense when you come to actually assessing what you're monitoring--you'd need a whole army of people to just to analyse. And if you did it properly they'd have to be security-cleared, too.

I know a bit about this, and for the life of me I can't work out why the posts are so close together. I installed the cameras on the M42 using-the-hard-shoulder-as-an-extra-lane project, and we needed to cover every inch of the lane, and the posts are at about 200m intervals. I can't quite make out what the cameras are they're installing here, but they're titchy. If they've got ANPR (automatic number plate recognition) and face recognition, then its gonna make the drive to work a lot slower...

busybee2

yep did you notice today they have added the cameras to the sticks from 27th to 19th on 30th. i suspect a few more will be added at "dead of nite" for the rest of the forthcoming months, as there are quite a few..! they are distance/face recognitition/number plate recognition and cctv, but wont they will have to be calibrated. they are going to be put up 90% of ad eventually. big brother is a coming.

but i did notice today that there were plain clothes "police cars" stopping people today, good on them.

Grace O Malley

As far as i know they are CCTV, face and plate recognition, for security and not speed, there will be a huge control center. Freak show

Bahtatboy

If they've got ANPR then its just a bit more programming to make them do measured-distance speed monitoring.

Grace O Malley

whatever its purpose is, I think its quite scary if they have them on each block, lol especially if they are outside the Hilton, Sheraton etc, all the pissy nights out will be on CCTV,

busybee2

i believe they will be distance cameras, ie on the number plate recognition etc, so it can work out your average speed, so even if you are doing the speed limit, if you should suddenly speed up it will catch you out. need to go at a steady speed, but thats of course, if you know what the speed limit is, they need to put more signposts up especially when entering a road, as the speed limit can change quite a lot on one short section.

busybee2

apparently 120m spent on these new cameras, you can see why, they have them so close together, sometimes they the distances are not logical but forgetting where i was there.

Confucius

Oh aye...Cars should definitely wear burqas and abayas...