How does one catch a vandal? Sometimes it’s often a bit too late when you come across graffiti on the wall and you have no idea who did it, and this becomes a rather expensive task and process of removing it. Last year it was estimated that Australian taxpayers had to shell out $34 million to remove graffiti from Sydney’s commuter trains, why is why the Australian Department of Transport has rolled out a new tool that will help catch these vandals.
Basically this tool is an electronic “nose” of sorts. It will be installed on the commuter trains and when the tagger starts his/her vandalism by spraying the walls with paint markers or spray-cans, the nose will be able to pick up on the fumes and will then engage a closed circuit recording of the crime while alerting the police at the same time. Given that in Australia police can be found patrolling various train stations, it would not be a hard job for the authorities to identify and arrest the vandals at the next stop.
According to CBC News, so far it seems that the program has been rather successful during its testing phase. Authorities have managed to catch 30 vandals red-handed to date. That being said it doesn’t look as if every train will be outfitted with the device as it is expected to be swapped between service lines at random intervals.
Sydney Trains chief executive Howard Collins was quoted as saying, “Our customers hate it – it’s one of the top customer complaints and cleaners work hard to remove about 11,000 tags from trains each month. We know customers feel unsafe when they are using a train which is covered in graffiti and offenders often place themselves and others in danger by trespassing on the railway or being somewhere they shouldn’t.”
[Image credit – New South Wales Police Force/Australia Broadcasting Corporation]
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