Taking policing out into the community

To serve communities more effectively, West Midlands Police adopted a neighbourhood policing strategy. But local officers still needed access to the same information resources as their headquarters-based colleagues.

However, with small community sites across the region served by a variety of low bandwidth connections, accessing critical briefing systems and intelligence databases was either slow – or impossible.

Our fully-managed Metro Ethernet VPN service provides a scalable and flexible way to deliver the high-speed connectivity needed by neighbourhood police officers – while reducing costs.

Meeting changing requirements with flexible, scalable communications

As well as being one of the second largest police forces in the country, West Midlands is also one of the best performing. Covering the three major centres of Birmingham, Coventry and Wolverhampton, it serves a population of almost 2.63 million in an area of 348 square miles. Our Metro Ethernet VPN solution is supporting a neighbourhood policing strategy by incorporating community-based police sites into the flexible, high-speed central network.

A local approach

By introducing neighbourhood policing teams, West Midlands Police aims to reach out to local residents – connecting with communities and making them feel safer. Officers work from small local sites ranging from a room at a school or hospital, to a semi-detached house. This presented IT staff with a challenge. “We needed to make sure that the neighbourhood teams have access to all the same facilities they’d have if they were sitting at headquarters – so they can pick up emails, search national crime databases or access briefing systems,” explains Max Corney, Communications Manager at West Midlands Police.

However, officers based at smaller community sites found accessing central resources slow and inefficient. “The existing connections didn’t provide enough bandwidth and officers were complaining they couldn’t do their jobs properly as a result,” says Max.

Best-value solution

West Midlands Police looked for a supplier who could help. ”We needed a cost-effective solution that would fit with our existing network, and would allow us to increase bandwidth quickly and easily when required,” comments Max. “The Metro Ethernet VPN network offered by ntl:Telewest Business was very attractive both in terms of the costs and the technology.”

Now officers based at the neighbourhood sites have all the bandwidth they need. And because capacity can be scaled up incrementally to meet requirements, the solution is also cost-effective – West Midlands Police only pays for the bandwidth it uses.

New sites can also be added into the network easily and quickly. “The main contract included around 100 sites but we’ve already added more,” comments Max. “And because ntl:Telewest Business manages the network, it makes the necessary changes – freeing up our IT staff.”

Keeping the project on track

Regular meetings between ntl:Telewest Business consultants and West Midlands Police ensured that the project stayed on track. Max believes that the strong relationship between his team and ours was key. “We worked very closely together,”says Max. “The ntl:Telewest Business project manager even had a desk here so that he could sit with our IT staff.” The transition went smoothly, and the faster, more reliable connectivity provided by the network is helping users to work more effectively – and efficiently. “We’ve had good feedback from the users – they’ve really noticed a difference,” says Max.

Jenny Dunn, Account Manager at ntl:Telewest Business adds: “Being an emergency service, it’s important that the network’s up and running 24/7. We’ve proven that we can deliver the high level of service that’s required, as well as providing technology that works efficiently.”

Max believes that the project has been critical to the success of the neighbourhood policing strategy. “The Metro Ethernet VPN network makes it possible for officers to be based locally,” he confirms. “Without it, they couldn’t do their job.” The high-speed network will also allow West Midlands Police to adopt new applications that will help improve efficiency in future. “We’re looking into running videoconferencing and CCTV over the network. In addition, we’re currently rolling out IP telephony across all our sites, reducing operating costs,” concludes Max. “As new technologies are developed, we know our network can support them.”

True resilience is therefore critical to delivering today’s citizen-centric services.