SKYSCRAPERS | Security Systems Visualization

The visualization of high-rise buildings is distinguished by several characteristic solutions. When implementing a system integrating security devices in this type of facilities, functionality is certainly the priority, but we cannot forget about aesthetics and presenting content in a way that is legible to operators, property managers and technical services.

CHOOSE WHICH FLOOR...

Skyscrapers are constantly growing in urban landscapes, increasingly creating dense networks of glass offices. Once it is a single so-called a skyscraper, sometimes a complex of buildings. The concept of visualizing high-rise buildings in this context should take into account at least several factors, including:

- whether the visualization should cover one central building or the entire complex;

- whether there is one central system service station or several local ones (e.g. per building);

- to what extent operators on individual workstations are to manage events at specific facilities.

A professional platform integrating security systems should offer functionalities that enable flexible assignment of the scope of visualization to specific workstations.

For example, the operator can fully handle events in his building A, while events from buildings B and C are available only on a preview basis (he knows that an alarm has occurred and the operator from another building has already responded to the event, but he cannot send orders to security systems there). But at the same time, a trained superior administrator is defined in the system, who from each building - A, B and C - can display all available statuses, add comments to reported alarm messages or verify the actions and real activity of local operators.

However, in terms of visualization, at the concept stage, care should be taken to select the appropriate system navigation mechanism. The basis is a clear numerical grid with storeys, but a cross-section of the building is a good complement. As part of a properly prepared cross-section visualization and imported into the system, you can, among other things:

- clearly distinguish the floor where the alarm event occurs (red highlighting of the alarm area, flashing in the event of evacuation, etc.);

- perform a dedicated, predefined action (calling the necessary controls related to releasing access control and turning on voice messages by clicking one button).

Apart from the fact that the cross-section significantly improves the aesthetics of the system, this approach allows operators and facility technicians to more effectively - through manual controls - evacuate individual floors, which may prove useful during such unexpected events as an act of terrorism or a chemical attack.

...FIND A TENANT...

We already have dozens of plans in the system - so we need to manage them somehow so as not to look for useful information for too long. The first aspect is content search. In modern office buildings, the number of tenants sometimes reaches dozens. It happens that an operator who is less familiar with the facility needs to urgently disconnect a group of detectors on the premises of a specific tenant, but does not remember the number of the appropriate group defined in the fire control panel, and manually "clicking" through 50 floors in search of a specific tenant simply takes too much time. Therefore, it is good if the implemented visualization system:

- have the option of defining multi-element descriptions of detection points, containing, for example, the tenant's name, floor number, room number and room name;

- to enable searching for detection points both by the tenant's name and by the fire group/ring number (search for any set of characters and presentation of the result in the form of an interactive summary);

- to have the functionality of saving generated results to popular digital formats (printout to PDF or Excel format along with the current states of each detector).

The second thing is the aspect of visualization and readability. Cross-sections have already been mentioned, but some interesting solutions can also be introduced on the site plans themselves. It is practically standard to introduce additional areas in the projections reflecting the architecture of the facility, but they are not always interactive (triggering an action via the context menu), and a common omission is the inability to exclude such areas on the basis of the site plan layer (a situation may arise that the area worsens readability of some part of the visualization). If we visually highlight tenant areas on site plans, and - depending on the range of available integrations - we also consider the visualization of fire zones and burglary zones (arming and disarming such zones via the context menu), the integrating system will certainly gain in readability and functionality.

...AND TAKE THE ELEVATOR THERE

The spectrum of technical integration in skyscrapers is very wide. These increasingly include detailed monitoring:

- IT devices (e.g. switches and power strips in server rooms);

- key depositories;

- central batteries and emergency lighting fixtures;

- generating devices/sets (including UPS power supplies and generators);

- passenger lifts, also for rescue teams.

In the case of elevators - which are the main means of transport in the discussed category of buildings - it is worth paying attention to the fact that the communication interface not only provides basic conditions regarding the elevator failure (electric drive failure), but also informs operators and technicians about:

- overload

- upcoming inspection date;

- incorrect opening of the door;

- emergency stop/incorrect position;

- operation in emergency power mode;

- activation of the seismic detector.

If you want to learn more, write to us or visit us here:

https://www.g-u.com/en/PL/products/gemos-advanced-psim/gemos.html

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