West Midlands Metro staff are to start wearing body-work cameras as part of a new safety initiative which aims to provide additional peace of mind for anyone travelling on the tram network. Its hoped that the cameras will help front-line staff further reduce the risk of serious incidents involving anti-social behaviour and other unacceptable activity.
Anthony Stanley, Head of Quality, Health and Safety and Environment at West Midlands Metro, said: “The new bodycams will provide an additional layer of security for anyone using the tram, supplementing our extensive network of fixed cameras across the network and on board the trams. Trials of the system earlier this year proved popular with both customers and Metro colleagues, and we’re delighted that the bodycams will be offered to front-line colleagues starting from Monday the 11th of December 2023.
“While serious incidents are fortunately extremely uncommon on the network, we hope they will act as an effective deterrent to anyone thinking of misbehaving. Anyone who abuses or threatens our colleagues, or members of the travelling public, will know that they have been caught on camera, and the footage will be shared with the police, who we work closely with to ensure our tram is as safe as it can possibly be.”
The new cameras form an integral part of an advanced system developed by Halo, a global security firm, that stores high-resolution footage and audio recordings in the Cloud that can be shared with the Police to identify any offenders and as evidence if cases end up in Court. Real-time images and GPS data is also provided to the control room which will aid response time to incidents as they happen.