If your office, warehouse, commercial or industrial site has its own car park then you’ll want to ensure that it is protected because it is an entry to your site and therefore, a security risk to be assessed.
There are several different ways that your car park can be used against you:
- Surveillance – if it the car park isn’t protected, how long can someone sit there, monitoring the rest of your site without you being none the wiser.
- Targeting staff – attacking staff on the way back to their car; for physical gratification or to take their belongings including any access cards to your site.
- Easier targets – staff may keep valuables in their car, or the car itself may be stolen.
- Method of entry to the rest of the site – if there are no layers of security, it is pretty much opening the front door to opportunists.
- Getaway vehicles – if a breach to the site happens, the criminals could have a selection of vehicles to make their getaway without any resistance when leaving.
Security Measures
Barrier
A security barrier will allow only those who are permitted, to enter and exit. It ensures that only authorised people are present. There are a few different security barriers that you can install. The most common one is the drop-arm barrier.
Any visitors will have to wait at the barrier to be given authorisation before being admitted entry.
Access Control
Access Control integrated within the barriers is a good idea because only authorised personnel will be permitted entry without holding up traffic during busy times.
It is also a good idea to install access control at any other entrances for those walking into or through the car park so that, again, only authorised people are admitted.
We would recommend a fob or PIN code form of access control.
Palisade Fencing
Ensure your car park boundary is solid by installing palisade fencing. Palisade fencing is a simple solution to protect the boundaries of your site whilst maintaining a view of whether access is being attempted. The shape of the area doesn’t matter when you use palisade fencing; whether it’s regular in shape or not.
Palisade fencing acts naturally as a deterrent because of the height, lack of footholds to climb and the points at the top which makes it ideal for a car park.
CCTV
Should someone be up to no good in your car park, you’ll want to be able to monitor and record the incident. You’ll also want to be able to provide evidence to the authorities if need be and with the right CCTV system, you’ll be able to provide clear imagery, perhaps even number plates of any vehicles involved.
Be sure to comply with CCTV rules for business should you opt for this route.
Discover CCTV Rules for Businesses
Lighting
Unscrupulous people will use dark areas to find the opportunity to strike; limit the dark spaces by providing good lighting.
Also, it will ensure your employees feel safer when they go to their cars, particularly in winter when the days are shorter.
- Smaller car parks - you may want motion sensing lighting. They will light up when movement is detected so not only will it provide lighting to the car but also negates an opportunist being able to sneak up to a car to take advantage.
- Large Car Parks - you’ll most likely want to opt for high mast flood lights.
- Multi-story car park – you’ll need to be sure to have good lighting in all areas, particularly stairwells.
Beam Technology
You place the beam technology in places along the perimeter which are likely to be areas that will be breached, e.g. low traffic areas. It’s an extra line of defence, especially at possible points of entry.
When the beams are broken by someone it can do a few different things:
- Send a notification
- Trigger the intruder alarm and ring
- Trigger the CCTV to show a pop-up of the exact camera which is recording that scene to the watching security team
You can take it further by having thermal imaging set-up with your CCTV to ensure that the beams only notify you if it is a human rather than a small animal like a fox.
This was particularly useful for one of our clients with a Distribution centre – the thieves used a gap from the car park, to dive in and grab stock off the back of the lorry. This happened a few times, so we placed beam technology and integrated it with the CCTV which enabled the security team to be mobilised quickly.Where are your Access Points?
Likely, your car park will sit near your building so in effect, it becomes a point of entry. It is worth taking note of any access points to the car park but also leading to the main building(s) such as pedestrian entrances and ensure that they have to get through another layer of security. For instance, you may want a pedestrian gate leading from the car park to the path which takes you to the main building which is controlled by access control. That extra layer means one more layer someone has to get through.
Permits
Permits are a good way of controlling how many cars are allowed in the car park at any one time. You could take it one step further and assign each staff member a designated parking space which means that the more vulnerable employees are nearer to the main building.
You can also have visitor permits available for guests.
See Also
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