Aria’s Surveillance System Hits High Notes
Anchoring the posh CityCenter development, the Aria Casino & Resort is equipped with a state-of-the-art hybrid video surveillance system that blends IP HD and 360° technology with analog. Learn why it ranks among the world’s best gaming solutions.
Cost Savings Realized in System Architecture Design
By creating a system architecture that he refers to as “video on demand,” Whiting figures a cost savings of $800,000 was realized by using less materials such as conduit, fiber cable and fiber modules. The design, he says, is easier to maintain and has a much smaller footprint compared to traditional systems.
Video surveillance cameras throughout the casino are connected with Cat-6 cable, which runs back to communication rooms. From the comm rooms, fiber runs back to the head end to NVRs. RAID storage is direct attached and designed with full redundancy in the event of a failure. Each server-RAID combo is capable of recording 32 channels of analog video and four IP streams and 4CIF 30 frames per second. Video is stored anywhere from seven to 90 days.
Whiting elected to depart from the traditional method of running a wire from every analog camera to a comm room to the head end. “Every analog camera, of course, has to land in the comm room where it hits our encoders,” he says. “Once it hits the encoder, we put it on a network switch, and then we send it down to the surveillance equipment room. What that means is we don’t have all the cameras coming to the room at the same time. We don’t need all those strands of wire.”
The Aria’s 5,000-square-foot monitoring control room is equipped with 64 monitors set among six workstations. Instead of bringing every individual analog camera feed back to the surveillance equipment room, the Aria’s system brings back only what is called for on the monitors. There might be 300 analog cameras running to a comm room, but only 64 come back at once. “It would be impossible for me to look at more than 64 cameras at one time,” Whiting says.
From the project’s onset in 2006, the assumption from most outside observers was surely Whiting would pursue an all-IP surveillance solution to match the grandeur of the CityCenter development. But that assumption failed to account for gaming commission red tape.
“We knew it would be hybrid. When we designed the system five years ago, IP p/t/z [pan/tilt/zoom] cameras still had latency. The Nevada Gaming Control Board would never have approved them,” he says. “And let’s face it, the analog p/t/zs still work great so why would I change them?”
However, if he had his druthers, Whiting would have used IP cameras for all fixed positions. But those at the time also did not meet the gaming regulation of capturing 30 frames per second. One year after opening, they were able to find a fixed IP camera that met gaming requirements — Honeywell’s 720p model, and more recently they have gone to a 1,080p version.
“Even though we installed analog cameras over the gaming tables and all our fixed shots, we made sure that we were always in distance; we kept it under or around 90 meters so we could just take those analog cameras and plug in an IP camera when the technology caught up with the regulations. Now I probably have 100 of those 1,080p cameras. They are fantastic, and especially the low-light performance.”
The MaxPro VMS allows personnel to quickly retrieve and view video from any camera. A license plate recognition solution has been integrated into Aria’s surveillance capabilities in garages, as well as access control functionality to identify persons at certain doors. As part of the vendor selection process, Honeywell agreed to integrate cameras from other manufacturers into its system, including megapixel cameras from Arecont and 360° technology by Oncam Grandeye (see sidebar). CityCenter is also using Honeywell’s Integrated Data Manager (IDM) transaction monitoring software that ties data from point-of-sales systems, slot machines and cash counters back to the VMS.
Integrator Rises to Challenge of Multiple sites
Due to the stringent timeline once NAV was awarded the project, there was little time available for them to program and install the head end if they had to do it all onsite. Instead, NAV’s offsite build facility, which was outfitted with UPS and HVAC, allowed them to turn on the equipment in a safe environment where the system was fully wired, commissioned, programmed, tested and burned in prior to delivery to the site.
In addition to building equipment offsite, NAV deployed a separate team that worked in parallel onsite to address the work that was required on both sides.
“We worked closely with the vendors and product manufacturers far in advance to ensure on-time delivery of all equipment to our Las Vegas facility so we could begin working in advance on items that were critical such as the access control system, mantrap control systems and the network,” Smock-Jackson says.
The biggest challenge NAV faced during the project was having to closely monitor and manage teams that were deployed in disparate areas, both at the offsite build facility and the construction site.
“There were multiple parties involved in the installation of field devices and one of the key components of the labor portion of this contract was for NAV personnel to oversee the union labor staff who physically installed the cameras and field hardware,” she says. 
NAV also had to endure budget cutbacks due to the state of the economy once construction commenced. This affected the integrator’s original proposed design halfway into the project. So NAV went back to the drawing board. Multiple engineering efforts were made to accommodate the owner’s requests, which deviated from the original design.
“Our engineering staff worked very closely with Honeywell and the MGM staffs to ensure these obstacles weren’t issues in the end. We were able to offer value engineering efforts that reduced the cost, but not the functionality of the system,” she says.
NAV, as well as the surveillance team at the Aria, credit constant communication from inception to completion for a successful project that was completed ahead of schedule.
“We were approved by the gaming board seven days before we opened,” Whiting says. “The other properties that I know of in recent history were getting approved seven minutes before they opened.”
Rodney Bosch is Managing Editor for SECURITY SALES & INTEGRATION. He can be reached at (310) 533-2426 or [email protected].
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About the Author
Rodney Bosch, Senior Editor
Although Bosch’s name is quite familiar to those in the security industry, his previous experience has been in daily newspaper journalism. Prior to joining SECURITY SALES & INTEGRATION in 2006, he spent 15 years with the Los Angeles Times, where he performed a wide assortment of editorial responsibilities, including feature and metro department assignments as well as content producing for latimes.com. Bosch is a graduate of California State University, Fresno with a degree in Mass Communication & Journalism. In 2007, he successfully completed the National Burglar and Fire Alarm Association’s National Training School coursework to become a Certified Level I Alarm Technician.
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