Introduction

In need of upgrading their aging system, the Idaho Maximum Security Institution (IMSI) in Boise selected Engineered Control Systems (ECS) as the systems integrator. ECS was hired to design and implement a comprehensive integrated communication system at the State of Idaho’s single largest maximum security prison.

The design challenges for ECS were numerous. They needed to offer a state-of-the art Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) system, integrated door control, and an audible announcement system. All three systems were required to be monitored and controlled at the central facility as well as at each of the distributed facilities in the four independent cell-blocks. On top of this, all systems needed comprehensive redundancy to insure no single point of failure would compromise the system.

Traditional approaches to this problem would have mandated three independent systems with independent infrastructures: First, an analog CCTV system with coax distribution and video switches with a master control and secondary switching facilities. Second, a door control system with a complex array of programmable controllers and wiring. Finally, an announcement system with typical voice infrastructure would be required.

ECS faced many challenges in the network architecture:

• Scale: Five physical locations with 80+ cameras and 875 doors to control and monitor
• Resiliency: A fully redundant transport network was required
• Simplicity: No dedicated IT staff to operate the network so it had to be plug-and-play with a simple maintenance plan

Taking requirements, budget, schedule, technical maturity, and ease of use into account, ECS decided to collapse the CCTV and door control systems on to an IP/Ethernet network. This minimized costs while dramatically enhancing flexibility and ease of use for the staff at IMSI. The announcement system was implemented in a traditional fashion with an independent infrastructure since the operational model for IMSI gained little from migrating to IP in ease of use. Further, this mitigated risk for ECS and allowed them to focus on the CCTV and door control systems where the largest gains could be had in both usability and cost.

IP – with a twist

IP CCTV systems naturally facilitate centralized and distributed monitoring, which as mandated was a huge blow against an analog CCTV solution. Further, with Network Video Recorders (NVR) becoming main-stream, IMSI would have a much more complete video archive that was instantaneously accessible.

The immediate problem was one of securing the cameras. In the maximum security business cameras have to be nearly impenetrable and current IP camera solutions struggled to meet the bullet-proof requirements and not exceed the maximum size specified. ECS struck a balance utilizing proven analog CCTV cameras throughout each cell block, home-running the coax back to the communications control room within each cell block, and then using MPEG-4 compression systems to convert the video to IP for transport over Ethernet.

Door control was architected with a similar approach where Programmable Logic Modules (PLMs) controlled the door relays with Ethernet interfaces to the PLMs for all command and control. Again, this highlights ECS’ requirement for a door control system the customer would be comfortable with, but at the same time eased the infrastructure requirement for centralized and distributed control.

Scaling the Network with StreamCast™

ECS had implemented IP CCTV networks before and knew all too well the complexities involved in deploying a traditional enterprise solution with routers to manipulate the multicast traffic. Since the MPEG-4 IP encoders generate a multicast video stream, ECS would be faced with a large mesh of peered multicast routers running complex multicast-routing protocols. Add the redundancy requirements to the equation for over 80 cameras, and it became unbearable in both cost and configuration.

ECS was forced to search beyond their traditional enterprise IP/Ethernet vendors. This is when they discovered World Wide Packets’ solution. WWP’s LightningEdge™ Ethernet switches provided ECS the scalability, resiliency, and ease of use they were looking for at a reasonable cost point.

The solution became immediately apparent for the IP CCTV transport: WWP’s StreamCast. With StreamCast ECS was able to connect all 80+ cameras in a distributed, full-mesh topology with access to any camera’s multicast stream at any point on the Ethernet network. With StreamCast, all the camera streams were fully contained and only forwarded to a monitoring or recording site when requested, a feature most often found only in a fully routed network.

Providing Ring-Based Redundancy with ResilientStream™

IMSI mandated a network that had no single point of failure for the transport. ECS met this requirement using World Wide Packets’ Rapid Spanning Tree Protocol (RSTP) solution with ResilientStream. ResilientStream provided the nearly instantaneous switching of traffic around the ring in the event of a link failure due to a hardware, optic, or fiber failure. ResilientStream required no special configuration; it just worked and insured that the multicast traffic always reached the desired destination with minimal packet loss in the event of a transport failure.

Due to the nature of MPEG video buffers, even minor packet loss can cause the buffer to restart. So, in the worst case scenario, impact to any path for one or more multicast streams appears as no more than the approximate one second delay to fill the buffer and begin decoding the MPEG stream.

With the transport redundancy requirements met, ECS then cross connected the MPEG-4 encoders to two unique LE-311 LightningEdge switches. Again StreamCast played a vital role in containing the redundant feeds for each multicast stream from the MPEG-4 encoders.

As mentioned previously, ECS planned on implementing an Ethernet transport for the door control system. The network architecture facilitated by the LE-311 for video was easily extended to meet this challenge as well. Again, ECS cross connected the PLM redundant Ethernet interfaces to two unique LE-311s for door control. While the port capacity on the LE-311s aggregating the video cameras was sufficient to service the door control needs, the additional hardware was demanded from a resiliency perspective and to plan for future growth.

Keeping it Simple with the LightningEdge Network Supervisor

World Wide Packets’ LE-NS provided an easy to use Element and Network Management Solution. With LE-NS ECS was able to quickly deploy the network and configure the LE-311s with a simple Graphical User Interface (GUI). LE-NS facilitated the immediate turn-up of the entire in-band management network with no out-of-box configuration requirements for the LE-311s. Maintenance tasks like software upgrades are easily performed with LE-NS and modules are available for sophisticated event correlation, alarm management, and network topology mapping.

Since the network is enabled with the StreamCast and ResilientStream features of the LE-311, the configurations of the devices are common throughout the network. This greatly simplified both the installation and the ongoing maintenance of the network, a key requirement for IMSI. Further, this made the deployment of the cameras completely plug-and-play, just like the LE-311.

ResilientStream™ Ring Architecture with StreamCast™

The LightningEdge Advantage

Clearly the IMSI LightningEdge network designed and deployed by ECS is a comprehensive, resilient, and efficient network enabling the most demanding integrated IP applications like IP CCTV in a maximum security prison. From simple hub-and-spoke architectures to sophisticated ring topologies the LightningEdge solution delivers an easy to use, deploy, and maintain network with a full compliment of multicast enabling features to insure every IP CCTV network delivers the high quality images required. The ability to scale and the redundancy available at a competitive cost all allowed this to be a very successful implementation.

For more information on Engineered Control Systems (ECS) contact:

2702 N Perry
Spokane, WA 99207
tel: +1.509.483.6215
fax: +1.509.483.5102
www.ecs-systems.com