Allied Telesis solution smooths travel for footie fans

California light rail passengers are enjoying the benefits of a new Allied Telesis CMS solution and upgraded digital signage technology after 30 real-time information signs were deployed on Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority platforms.

The project, designed to upgrade the experience for passengers and improve communications, saw older LED displays replaced with 42-inch ruggedised video monitors, deployed across a wide area, with the system based on Allied Telesis' EtherGrid private cloud platform.

The new monitors enable the Santa Clara Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) to extend the amount and types of information it can share, including real-time arrival information, emergency announcements, informational slides and advertisements. The previous screens had only been capable of showing the next arriving train.

Using Allied Telesis' CMS, VTA can schedule content for display on the signs, manage the network that delivers the content using Allied Telesis AlliedWare Plus operation system and the company's Management Framework, and get real-time information on the health status of each device in the system.

Real-time alerts can be delivered to relevant signage to react to developing situations.

The CMS was installed in an Allied Telesis EtherGrid-DC deployment in VTA's data center, as well as EtherGrid-Mini solutions at each sign to cache content and drive the display.

Allied Telesis IE200 Series Gigabit Industrial Ethernet PoE+ switches were also deployed.

The VTA routes are used by thousands of regular passengers, with tens of thousands of football fans expected to converge in Santa Clara County for the Super Bowl 50 later this week.

Richard Bertalan, VTA technology manager, says by working with Allied Telesis to run the CMS communications applications on the backbone of its network infrastructure the company knew 'we would have a winner' for both VTA and passengers.