The city of Lille has just taken a new step in the implementation of its video surveillance system with the entry into service of the brand new urban supervision center (CSU). The municipal police officers assigned to this service can now view the images provided by the dozens of cameras already installed in real time.
The socialist mayor of Lille, Martine Aubry, took a very long time to cross the Rubicon of video surveillance. She nevertheless had to resolve to give in to the security concerns of her constituents during the last municipal election campaign, promising not only to install cameras but also to build a municipal police station and a CSU. Work is underway to transform a former school on rue Frédéric-Mottez into a super municipal police station that will bring together in one place officials currently dispersed over several sites.
24 hour monitoring
This is also where the nerve center of the city’s video surveillance system, the CSU, is located. In a secure room which is accessed through an airlock, we immediately come across a giant wall of screens on which agents can display, at their convenience, the number of cameras they want. “To date, 51 cameras are operational and there will be a hundred by the end of the year,” recalls Arnaud Deslandes, deputy mayor in charge of territorial cohesion. Behind the control desks, the municipal police officers take turns to ensure a permanent presence of at least two agents.
Technically, Lille has equipped itself with the latest equipment, particularly in terms of high definition cameras. It must be said that the budget followed: 2.3 million euros for the CSU and the cameras. A policewoman shows us how a dome camera can zoom in and allow the license plate of a car parked 800 m away to be read. An undeniable asset for video verbalization which will also be “used as soon as possible”, affirms Jean-Claude Menault, deputy in charge of security.
The latter, former boss of the police in the North, presents the three pillars of his new toy: deterrence, intervention, elucidation. According to the security assistant, the installation of a camera in the Lion d’Or district avoided the installation of drug trafficking: deterrence. Less than a week after taking office, the CSU allowed an arrest in flagrante delicto: intervention. The images from the nomadic cameras, now linked to the CSU, have been the subject of a hundred requisitions by the police and facilitated numerous police investigations: elucidation.