Rail securityRailway stations should adopt some of the security strategies deployed by airports: Experts

A 2013 study by the U.K. Home Office recorded crime rates across every postcode in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland, and found that four of the top ten U.K. crime hot spots are major railway stations — Manchester Piccadilly, London Victoria, London Kings Cross, and London Euston.

Railway stations experience large volume of crime due to their highly congested environments, which gives pickpockets and thieves opportunities to find a target. Large stations are also introducing more retail outlets, which increases the likelihood of more shoplifting offenses. In addition, railway stations are home to a large number of cars and bikes parked and left unattended for hours, making them easy targets for thieves.

Railway Technology notes that airports have many of those same characteristics, but they fare far better in crime rates. James Somerville-Smith, Honeywell’s EMEA channel marketing leader, believes that rail stations should adopt some of the strategies deployed by airports around the world.

“Picture the departure lounge at international airports during the summer holiday season with thousands of people and their luggage in one relatively small space,” says Somerville-Smith. “Equally, walk through major railway stations on a Friday night in rush hour and the sheer number of people is overwhelming. Airports approach this in an innovative way, deliberately adopting a strategy that enables security managers to prevent scenarios from turning into incidents rather than just reacting to events after the fact.”

Airports have traditionally invested a great deal in security, adopting the latest security solutions better to protect their passengers, assets, and cargo. Airports do not rely on a single security system, Somerville-Smith notes, instead they take a multi-tiered approach, embrace flexibility, and practice risk management. He believes that rail stations should invest in advanced surveillance technologies such as video analytics. These investments will help security staff better identify suspicious behavior in a congested hallway or a parking lot.

“They will be enhanced by more advanced analytics such as emotional and facial recognition, enabling operators to pick out people who are stressed,” he says. “By integrating cameras together into a single unified view, using a video management system, it’s much easier to spot a person behaving in an unusual way and track them easily across, say, a concourse, as well as quickly guide the security personnel to the source of the trouble.”

Somerville-Smith adds that modern perimeter systems could help protect passengers’ vehicles by ensuring only authorized personnel can enter and leave parking structures.

Rail stations must also monitor staff who may have access to retail shops after closing time and to sensitive areas of the facilities. “Airports are managing their staff with state-of-the-art access control functionality and integration with HR and building management systems ensuring that no unauthorized personnel can access restricted areas,” continues Somerville-Smith. “These systems are linked to payroll and as soon as a member of staff leaves or a contractor stops working for the organization, their physical access credentials are updated simultaneously. Additionally, full integration between the HR and security departments makes staff registration seamless, and saves time for both security operators and HR staff while eliminating administrative errors.”

Rail stations tend to have smaller budgets than airports, therefore it may be a challenge to adopt many of Somerville-Smith’s recommendations. Railway Technology insists that passengers should be encouraged to remain alert and keep their belongings close by while traveling. Already some rail stations in the U.K. have begun to implement that advice. The British Transport Police recorded 3,000 fewer crime victims in 2013 than there were in the previous year. This includes an 18 percent drop in recorded robberies and a 17 percent drop in theft of passenger property. Somerville-Smith warns, however, that passengers should not be burdened with the responsibility of reducing their susceptibility to crime. “It is imperative that security systems provide peace of mind to travelers and staff in any transport hub.”