[Clips] Brinworld: 'Ring of Steel' for New York?

[R. A. Hettinga]

--- begin forwarded text


  Delivered-To: clips at philodox.com
  Date: Wed, 25 Jan 2006 18:51:07 -0500
  To: Philodox Clips List <clips at philodox.com>
  From: "R. A. Hettinga" <rah at shipwright.com>
  Subject: [Clips] Brinworld: 'Ring of Steel' for New York?
  Reply-To: rah at philodox.com
  Sender: clips-bounces at philodox.com

  <http://online.wsj.com/article_print/SB113815677585855548.html>

  The Wall Street Journal

  January 25, 2006


  'Ring of Steel' for New York?
  To Protect Lower Manhattan,
  Police Study London's Effort:
  Cameras, Controlling Access

  By CARRICK MOLLENKAMP and CHRISTINE HAUGHNEY

  Staff Reporters of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

  January 25, 2006; Page B1

  As New York law enforcement agencies and businesses consider how to improve
  security as part of the plan to rebuild lower Manhattan, they are looking
  to London for ideas on guarding against potential terrorist attacks and
  fighting crime.

  The hallmark of London's strategy is what officials call "the ring of
  steel." The phrase refers to closed-circuit cameras and narrow roads that
  encircle the City of London, the neighborhood that houses London's
  financial district as well as such historic sights as St. Paul's Cathedral.
  The narrow roads create just a few entry points to the area that police can
  block off, if necessary, while cameras photograph anyone entering or
  exiting the area. The neighborhood also has its own police force.


  The New York City Police Department is considering erecting a similar "ring
  of steel" around lower Manhattan. Paul Browne, NYPD's deputy commissioner
  of public information says that while it's "still too early in the process"
  to comment on specifics, police officials are most interested in the
  elements of the "ring of steel" model that involve using more
  closed-circuit TVs and introducing controlled entrances and exits into the
  area.

  "In creating the plan for the World Trade Center site, we are looking at
  best practices around the globe as we seek to create a new state-of-the-art
  security model," James Kallstrom, counterterrorism adviser to New York Gov.
  George Pataki and designer of the new World Trade Center site's security
  plans, said in a statement last week. Mr. Kallstrom declined to comment
  beyond the statement.

  The NYPD declined to say which lower Manhattan streets, if any, may be
  narrowed. It's unlikely New York City officials will allow a separate
  police force to cover lower Manhattan -- defined as south of Chambers
  Street and West Street to the East River by the Downtown Alliance, a
  nonprofit group comprised of companies and business owners. While recent
  discussions have focused on lower Manhattan, a law enforcement official
  close to the situation said the NYPD's plans may extend to midtown
  Manhattan as well.

  New York officials have been looking at London systems since last summer,
  after suicide bombers attacked London's subway system and a bus on July 7.
  Cameras captured time-stamped photos of the bombers as they entered the
  subway, and others who attempted a similar crime a few weeks later, and
  helped identify the suspects. A team of New York police officers visited
  London for five days in September and were given access to the City of
  London's security and investigative procedures and talked to officers,
  according to James Hart, the City of London's police commissioner.

  Similarities between lower Manhattan and the City of London are likely to
  help authorities with their planning. Both neighborhoods are about a square
  mile in area. Some 300,000 commuters travel through each area daily. Both
  are global financial hubs, with banks and stock exchanges that remain
  targets for terror attacks.


  In both cities, the subways are major funnels bringing people into the
  neighborhoods and vulnerability points. Closed-circuit cameras monitor the
  London Tube, as the subway is called. In New York, the subway system went
  further than the rest of the country -- though still not as far as London's
  -- when it unveiled a $212 million project with Lockheed Martin Corp. in
  October of 2004 to install 1,000 closed-circuit cameras with 3,000 sensors.
  The project, which isn't expected to be completed until 2008, includes a
  command center that will monitor the cameras in real time.

  The New York police have 3,100 closed-circuit cameras in 12 housing
  projects and additional cameras in select parts of the city, including
  lower Manhattan. New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly has said that the
  city should install additional cameras. Police say the cameras have slashed
  crime rates by double digits in the housing projects. Mr. Kelly declined to
  comment for this article.

  London implemented the ring of steel in 1993, after Irish Republican Army
  bombings struck the city and other areas in the early 1990s. Many of the
  measures in London largely go unnoticed. The City has 16 entry and 12 exit
  points where the roads were narrowed and marked with iron posts painted a
  decorative red, white and black. The posts also deter truck bombs. Recent
  upgrades include extending the security zone to the north and west, and
  adding cameras, Mr. Hart says.

  At each entry point, a camera screens license plates and feeds the data to
  a computerized system that can flag stolen or wanted vehicles. If a wanted
  car is spotted, a control room at police headquarters can be alerted within
  four seconds. Last year, the system read 37 million plates and identified
  91,000 positive matches for wanted vehicles. Nearly 550 arrests were made
  as a result. In London, "you're always on CCTV somewhere," says City of
  London police constable Phil Rudrum.

  A network of closed-circuit cameras are mounted on the sides of building or
  on poles. The images are streamed live to police headquarters in the City
  and are monitored around the clock.

  Civil liberty concerns have been raised but following IRA bombings in the
  1990s, many Brits haven't raised civil-liberties objections to the cameras.

  "The trade-off is that the prevention and disruption of terrorist activity
  is certainly worth the risk," says Mr. Hart, adding that the force has
  pledged that the monitoring system will not be used to prosecute minor
  crimes such as littering.

  Such measures, though, will face privacy concerns in New York. To bolster
  its objection to the potential for the government to use photos invasively,
  the New York Civil Liberties Union last summer sent 10 college students to
  count surveillance cameras in the city.


  The City of London, a neighborhood that comprises London's financial
  district, uses steel posts in the streets to control traffic flow.


  They found the number of cameras in lower Manhattan had increased to 1,300
  from 446 in 1998. The group says it plans to recommend to the New York City
  Council and state legislature limits to how the city uses CCTV photos.

  "The NYPD has to develop policies that protect individual privacy and that
  do not turn us into a surveillance society where people have to worry that
  every move is being captured on camera," says Donna Lieberman, executive
  director of the liberties group.

  The NYPD's Mr. Browne disputes the notion that surveillance data would be
  misused. "Our interest in cameras is for crime suppression," he says.

  The City of London's police force is separate from the rest of London,
  which is serviced by the Metropolitan Police Service, also known as
  Scotland Yard. The U.K. government is weighing whether to merge the two, a
  move the City of London and businesses oppose.

  Many investment banks in the City of London appreciate the presence of a
  special police force. One cold gray afternoon this week, for example, Mr.
  Rudrum, the constable, walked his beat, checking in with security officers
  at each building where he stops. His stroll takes him past a pub and then
  Merrill Lynch & Co., where he also visits with security.

  Security experts from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. have also been involved in
  the discussions.

  Just weeks after the London bombings, Mr. Hart met in Manhattan with
  security experts from the investment firm, which is building a 2.1 million
  square-foot headquarters near the site of the World Trade Center.

  "We regularly report possible terrorist and criminal activity to the police
  and receive a first-class response," Goldman Sachs managing director Paul
  Deighton wrote in a letter of support for the City of London force.
  "Normally a police officer will be at our offices within two minutes of our
  making a telephone call."


  --
  -----------------
  R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
  The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
  44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
  "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
  [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
  experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
  _______________________________________________
  Clips mailing list
  Clips at philodox.com
  http://www.philodox.com/mailman/listinfo/clips

--- end forwarded text


-- 
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'