Philadelphia boosts traffic situational awareness with Barco collaborative visualization

At one time, Philadelphia was the only city among the 10 largest municipalities in the United States without a Traffic Operations Center (TOC). Now, a new Barco video wall solution, complete with Control Room Management (CMS) software and integrated with a Genetec VMS, helps the third largest signal system in the country better manage traffic flows and handle problems in real time to respond immediately to issues.

Barco and AV integrator Vistacom developed a solution to enhance situational awareness, with the goal of reducing traffic congestion on its intracity roadways as well as better identify, analyze and respond to incidents. With the new video wall, the City can monitor real-time data about the arterial system, and actively manage thousands of traffic signals to improve traffic safety, efficiency and innovative service for residents and visitors.

The video wall displays feeds from more than 5,000 cameras in a single, large common operational picture. The system ties into Philadelphia’s federated Genetec VMS, which allows the TOC to send, receive and display critical information from the Streets Department, Police Department, SEPTA, the University of Pennsylvania and the Delaware Valley Intelligence Center (DVIC). Traffic engineers can identify problem areas on the roadways in real time, and make better, faster decisions to provide the most efficient response to incidents.

Comprising 10 OLF-521 front-access, rear projected LED displays in a 5x2 configuration, the wall is powered by Barco’s Control Room Management (CMS) software and TransForm N. CMS software configures how and where content is displayed. Operators can create perspectives (user-defined layouts) to view data/images/video in the most optimal way.