Thermal Technology System Acquires Heat Data to Count People

A non-intrusive people-counting system uses thermal detection.

October 1, 2008

Royal Boon Edam Group Holding BV & Irisys

The Flowslide, developed by Royal Boon Edam Group Holding BV, is a combination of a revolving door and curved sliding panels, installed at Charles de Gaulle Airport, Paris. The Flowslide offers a complete physical separation between two crossing passenger flows on a single floor, allowing arriving and departing passengers to use a single door. The entry and exit points open and close alternatively within the curved wall of the revolving door, while keeping the passengers separate. As the two sets of passengers never come into contact with each other — despite using the same doorway — the Flowslide has enabled today's higher levels of security to be met, without the need to redevelop the terminal.

The Flowslide combines a revolving door and curved sliding panels, providing complete physical separation between two crossing passenger flows on a single floor, allowing arriving and departing passengers to use a single door.

The large variations in numbers of arriving and departing passengers passing through the Flowslide on a daily basis could have caused major problems, and would have meant a backlog building up on either or both sides of the door. To solve this problem, Royal Boon Edam Group Holding BV called in the expertise of Irisys and incorporated the Irisys Thermal People Counting Solution into the Flowslide at Charles de Gaulle airport.

When higher volumes of passengers arrive, the Irisys people counter detects the increase in numbers and automatically alerts the control unit of the Flowslide door. This in turn temporarily keeps the door open for arriving passengers only, to speed up their flow and prevent passenger 'traffic jams.'

The Irisys people counter uses thermal technology to detect the heat emitted by people passing through the Flowslide door. This technology provides a highly accurate count of the numbers, in a non-intrusive and highly reliable way. The thermal detecting equipment is discrete and compact, and was ready to begin functioning as soon as it was installed, with no calibration or specific set-up required.

In addition, temperature and lighting conditions, which can destabilize other counting technologies, have no effect on the performance or accuracy of the thermal technology counter.

This article was contributed by InfraRed Integrated Systems Ltd. (Irisys). For more information, click here.