Designing The Right Security Booth for Your Facility
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Physical Security is a very important aspect for all facilities, whether you are protecting a company, school campus, or government facility. However, the needs for each facility can vary greatly. For example, the same security measures installed into the Pentagon would likely be overkill for a scrapyard. Because of these great variances in needs, Panel Built offers a wide range of options and features that can be implemented into your facility's security booth.
First off, in the world of physical security, the best way to create a well-protected facility is to provide many layers of security. "Defense in depth" describes this notion that the best way to protect assets is to force a criminal to defeat many layers in order to achieve their goal.
Acting as the first security layer, one of the primary functions of a Security Booth is to deter would-be criminals from targeting your facility. When picking an objective, criminals will choose the facility with the least resistance to theft. With a security booth at the entrance of your facility, they will immediately see your facility as one which emphasizes physical security and will be more likely to move on to another target.
Second, the booth will operate as a screening point for incoming and outgoing traffic, actively denying threats coming into the facility. Of the Four D's of physical security: Deter, Deny, Detect, & Delay, your security should always be actively deterring and denying would-be offenders. However, depending on the security booth design, the building can serve as a security hub for your facility, implementing all four D's to protect your facility. In this post, we will go over some of Panel Built's many features and options used to create the perfect security booth for your facility.
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Standard Security Booth Components
With practically every security booth, Panel Built provides a specific set of features in order to provide a good foundation of security. First, Panel Built recommends giving your security booth attendant a 360-degree field of vision. This is accomplished by installing windows into all four sides of the booth. This 360-degree field of vision prevents blind spots for the officer inside the booth and ensures they are able to view all those entering the facility. To help accommodate these I.D. checks and screenings, Panel Built can easily substitute our fixed picture windows for horizontal sliding glass windows, both of which are standard on our line of security booths.
Inside the booth, our standard 'Quick Ship Booth" design includes roof-mounted LED lights with a light switch positioned by the door. Most booths include a stainless steel countertop to create a small workstation for the officer. Electrical outlets are included to charge phones and laptops, and finally, a through-wall HVAC system can be found underneath the countertop.
How To Upgrade Your Security Booth Design
Depending on the facility, your security booth may need to serve as more than just an initial access control point. Corporate headquarters, warehouses, and other facilities will employ a larger security booth to house more security officers and additional security equipment.
One of the first security options that most companies will request is exterior mounted floodlights. If your security booth is going to be manned 24 hours a day, these floodlights allow for a much greater field of vision for the officers. However, they can also act as a deterrent as well, signaling to would-be offenders that the security booth is currently occupied with a guard on duty.
Of course, while the officers inside are on duty, they will not be screening incoming vehicles at all times. To help maximize their productivity, many companies incorporate a CCTV system into their security booth design. Our interior mounted stainless steel countertops offer plenty of room for multiple computer monitors so they can monitor the entire facility the security booth.
Adding a CCTV system to your security booth allows the officers to also detect threats while actively deterring and denying threats.
High Threat Level Security Booth Options
Although every company wants to provide top-of-the-line security to their facility, these Panel Built options are generally reserved to the highest threat level facilities like government buildings, military bases, and armories. The first and most effective option we can provide these buildings constructing the booth from ballistic rated materials. Panel Built can fabricate our security booths to meet all levels of NIJ, UL-752, and STANAG bullet-resistance levels including ballistic glass and impact-rated doors. These ballistic levels are standardized and provide protection ranging from 9mm to 7.62mm rifle rounds.
Along with ballistic protection, these high threat level booths can incorporate additional defensive and offensive measures to help protect the officer in case of an armed threat. Emergency security shutters can be installed over the windows and doors of the building, preventing entry into the booth.
Another common feature for high threat level buildings is the incorporation of gun ports into the booth design. Gun ports are small slots in the walls of the building. Gun slots will always be closed off unless there is an armed threat outside the facility (like the portable security booth to the right). At that point, the officers inside the booth can open the gun ports and fire through the opening, allowing them to safely neutralize the target from inside the booth.
These features ultimately delay the intruder from entering the security booth and the rest of the facility, keeping them at bay until additional forces can arrive.
Take A Look At More Security Booth Features!
[ngg src="galleries" ids="18" display="basic_thumbnail" thumbnail_crop="0" show_slideshow_link="0"] Each of the features shown in the gallery above is available to you when creating your own one-of-a-kind security booth for your facility. In some cases, you may want to increase the aesthetics of the boost rather than adding more security features. Many schools and universities will elect to give their booths a custom color, rock or brick paneling, or a special standing seam metal roof in order to ensure the booth fits in with the rest of the campus's architectural theme.
Overall, Panel Built offers a variety of options to customize your security booth to best fit your facility's needs. Whether you are looking to add security features or the general aesthetics of the building, we are always open to incorporating new tools and designs into our buildings.
If you would like to get a quote on your own security booth design just let us know! You can give us a call at 800.636.3873, send us an email to info@panelbuilt.com, or let us know in our LiveChat feature in the bottom-right of the page. We're more than happy to answer any questions that you may have.