The Municipal Museum of The Hague is a museum for modern art, crafts, fashion and musical instruments. The museum is located in a unique building that was designed by the famous Dutch architect, Berlage. The museum has organized major exhibitions that have drawn large numbers of visitors.
The Municipal Museum of The Hague is a museum for modern art, crafts, fashion and musical instruments. The museum is located in a unique building that was designed by the famous Dutch architect, Berlage. The museum has organized major exhibitions that have drawn large numbers of visitors.
To secure the building and the surrounding public area, the museum originally used 64 analog security cameras. This system was extended in an ad hoc way in recent years with a number of separate systems. This led to a fragmented environment with different systems. In the emergency control center, the images were followed on a collection of different monitors. But there was no total overview and images were only stored for a limited time. When incidents occurred, employees had to find the available images manually. Finally, the cameras were not integrated with other security systems such as fire alarms.
The choice to implement a central security management system provided the museum with an opportunity to really modernize the video system. “We wanted a central video system that we could connect to the new security system. In this way we were able to further optimize security. Security requirements in the museum world are increasing all the time. In addition, we wanted to be ready for extensions to our own system and to nearby buildings of the museum and the photo museum. In order to realize this, it was necessary to improve the flexibility and scalability of the system. An important requirement was that we wanted to continue to use previous investments. The cameras we were using at the time still worked well, so we wanted to connect them to our IP network too. This enabled us to minimize costs.” said, Karel Kolk, Head of Building and Installations.
Smart combination
“Together with Videotronic and Fensis, we were successful in bringing our video environment to a whole new level while limiting costs. We equipped the existing cameras with a video encoder and connected them to the surveillance system.” said Kolk.
“This smart combination of existing equipment and new IP-based solutions provides our organization with several advantages. All images are now stored in high definition on efficient storage equipment. We have enough storage capacity to be able to expand if necessary. In the event of an incident, the images can be found and viewed quickly. By connecting the CamIQ system to the central security system it is also possible, for example, to see the area of the fire alarm immediately with the cameras.”
Video wall
Parallel to renovating the system, the museum also modernized the emergency control center. “Previously, the images were shown on different monitors, some with quadrant distribution” said Kolk. “Since the system has grown over time, it was not always easy for security personnel to maintain an overview. Also, switching between the different cameras was only possible to a limited extent. In addition, the traditional CRT screens took up a lot of physical space. Security personnel can now call up the image from a specific camera and organize the screens flexibly, for example, to monitor a specific area. It is now also possible to arrange the video wall on the basis of groups of cameras, for instance for the day and the night. These are all practical advantages that make security easier.”
The museum has already expanded the original system with new IP cameras from Axis. At present, security can keep track of the building and surroundings with 108 cameras. “With 500,000 visitors per year, the museum is one of the five most frequently visited museums. We want to guarantee the safety of these people as much as possible. Meanwhile we also want to protect our building and the collections as much as possible. With the new video system that we have developed together with Videotronic and Fensis, we can view images from all the cameras from our central emergency control center. With our smart mixture of existing and new technologies, we have a scaleable and future-proof video system. And we managed this with minimal investment.” said Kolk.