NEW YORK, July 9: By the end of this year New York City would have established a London style surveillance system, a network of cameras and road blocks, to foil any terror plot to disrupt Manhattan's financial district.
A news report in local media said that the Lower Manhattan Security Initiative, as the plan is called, will resemble London's so-called ring of steel, an extensive web of cameras and roadblocks designed to detect, track and deter terrorists.
If the programme is fully financed, it will include not only licence plate readers but also 3,000 public and private security cameras below Canal Street, (the border of the financial district) as well as a centre staffed by the police and private security officers, and movable roadblocks.
“This area is very critical to the economic lifeblood of this nation,” New York City’s police commissioner, Raymond W. Kelly told the New York Times in an interview.
The licence plate readers would check the plates’ numbers and send out alerts if suspect vehicles were detected. The city is already seeking state approval to charge drivers a fee to enter Manhattan below 86th Street, which would require the use of license plate readers. If the plan is approved, the police will most likely collect information from those readers too, Mr Kelly told the newspaper.
Three thousand surveillance cameras would be installed by the end of 2008. Pivoting gates would be installed at critical intersections; they would swing out to block traffic or a suspect car at the push of a button, the report said.
Unlike the 250 or so cameras the police have already placed in high-crime areas throughout the city, which capture moving images that have to be downloaded.
