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![TMCNet: 'No down time whatsoever': New emergency center keeps Lowell on call at all times [The Sun, Lowell, Mass.]](http://images.tmcnet.com/siteart/invisible.gif)
'No down time whatsoever': New emergency center keeps Lowell on call at all times [The Sun, Lowell, Mass.]
(Sun (Lowell, MA) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Nov. 19--LOWELL -- There have long been stories about it happening -- a dispatcher walking in the city's 911 call center putting a foot right through the raised floor, into the mass of wires and equipment below.
Even more seriously, there were times when the power would go out in downtown Lowell, and the center's aging generator wouldn't start.
The city would be left without a 911 center, and calls would have to be routed elsewhere.
"It was a very, very dangerous situation," said Police Superintendent Kenneth Lavallee.
Those problems should be gone, though, with the opening of a new 911 dispatch center and emergency operations command center inside former garage space at the John F. Kennedy Civic Center on Arcand Drive.
Lavallee, Fire Chief Edward Pitta, Mayor Edward "Bud" Caulfield, City Manager Bernie Lynch and other dignitaries and public-safety officials cut a ribbon Tuesday to ceremonially open the center, which dispatchers have been using for several weeks.
Under construction for more than a year, the $3 million center comes with a new generator that can provide power for 24 hours, and a system that turns on the generator instantly, so computers in dispatch do not go down.
"There's no down time whatsoever," said Officer Mark Trudel, who was co-manager of the project with Dave Blazon, deputy commissioner of land and buildings for the Department of Public Works.
Once those computers lose power, they must be rebooted and reconnected
to various networks, Trudel said.
There is also a very sturdy floor.
New equipment in the dispatch center includes digital broadcasting equipment, which will soon lead police to switch their radio broadcasts from analog to digital.
There is also a server that can handle video feeds, which should soon give dispatchers the ability to call up live footage from city-owned video cameras on two plasma televisions in the center.
Eventually, police may be able to call up footage from others cameras as well, such as those on Lowell Housing Authority properties.
Each dispatcher sits in front of a phalanx of five computer screens and various other equipment in the center, where there are stations for two fire dispatchers and four police dispatchers.
Lavallee said the new center alleviates the cramping in the old center, where dispatchers' stations were so close together they would often get feedback in their radios.
Lt. Thomas Meehan, who oversees the center, said the switch to digital broadcasts will be made once all cruisers and unmarked cars are equipped with digital radios.
Officers already have digital portable radios.
Pitta said with the new dispatch, the city's fire alarms are being changed to a wireless system, replacing an aging system that uses telegraph wires and which has grown increasingly expensive to maintain.
Pitta said all city-owned buildings are already using the wireless system and within a year all fire alarms should be on it.
The Emergency Operations Center will provide more space to representatives of city departments who meet for major emergencies, such as the floods of 2006 and 2007, according to Lavallee.
The former Emergency Operations Center, on the second floor of the Police Department, barely had enough room for representatives of each department, leaving officials cramped around a single table.
Planning for the new center had been under way since about 2007, the brainchild of Assistant City Manager T.J. McCarthy.
To see more of The Sun, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.lowellsun.com.
Copyright (c) 2009, The Sun, Lowell, Mass.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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