The foundations of the City Monitoring Systems in Turkey were laid in Istanbul in June 1996. In Habitat II (United Nations Conference on Human Settlements), which is an international congress, analogue cameras were transmitted to the main center with fiber cables and recorded on cassettes as analogue. Only the valley between Harbiye and Maçka was monitored by cameras.
In 2004, the 17th NATO Summit was held in the valley between Harbiye and Maçka. At this time, the lines of Türk Telekom were used in the infrastructure due to advances in technology. Network was established with the bandwidth of 2 Mbit/sec from each camera pole to the center. A total of 160 analogue cameras were placed at 40 locations around the valley. These cameras were capable of making real-time MPEG4 broadcasts to the center while taking local records through 4-channel DVRs. The resolution was at CIF (352x288) quality.
While only camera images could be viewed from the main center in Habitat II and the 17th Nato Summit, so many requirements began to arise. Particularly, the requirements, and even the obligations, for integration with other systems arose. The first city monitoring system planned accordingly is Istanbul MOBESE (Mobile Electronic System Integration) that covers the entire Istanbul in 2005.
Istanbul MOBESE consisted of the integration of 7 different systems:
Antalya City Security Management System was established in 2007. The initial integrations were made herein. 112 First Aid, 110 Fire Brigade, 155 Police and Gendarmerie could manage Antalya from one center. All emergency call numbers were being transferred to this center. For the first time, the Geographic Information Systems were also integrated, and if any person asked for emergency help by home or mobile phone, his/her location could be automatically marked on the map and the vehicles could be easily sent to the area.
Analogue cameras were being converted into IP cameras with encoders for the first time and sent to the center and recorded on NVRs. On that date, 25fps recording could be made in D1 (720x576) resolution at the main center.
In Istanbul MOBESE and Antalya KGYS, all systems were basically running side by side but almost as completely independent from each other. Each system was being managed with its own software. This was slowing down the information exchange and making the personnel trainings difficult.
The Ankara City Security Management System was established in 2009. An upper software was developed in this system. With this software, all systems were managed via one interface. Calls from emergency numbers such as 155, 112, 110 were being directed to the relevant departments via the same software interface and the data was being written into the same form base. More than 100 client computers were capable of monitoring and managing data at various locations of Ankara. The Camera Systems, Video Content Analysis Systems, Traffic Systems, Call Management Systems, User Authorization System, Geographical Information Systems, Mobile Monitoring-Management and GBT Inquiry Systems could be integrated with e-identity protection via one interface. The camera resolutions were 2-4 Mega pixels and the network infrastructure was a completely fiber optic network.
Systems independent from each other have been established in almost all big cities and districts over time. In 2016, City Security Management System Convention of Turkey was entered into for approximately 900.000.000 TL. Thus, the Camera and License Plate Recognition Systems will be overhauled and modernized in all city centers and districts, the systems that have become out of date will be renewed, and new systems, most of which are national, will be installed in the places where there is no system.
The company awarded the contract will develop an upper software and all of Turkey will have cameras and license plates inquired and monitored through one interface. We wish success to this mega project across the world.
