Protecting Carparks & Other Public Buildings From Vandals & Rough Sleeping

The problem

People using stairwells in carparks and other publicly accessible buildings to sleep, drink and smoke. This results in several issues

• Often leaving a mess that costs time and money to clean up
• Can be intimidating for regular users who want or need to use the stair access
• Can potentially cause safety issues in relation to emergency egress
• Potential liability concerns

The most cost effective solution

The Mosquito Anti-Loitering system.

Since 2006 Mosquito has quietly and gently been solving such issues for thousands of customers. From Luxury hotel carparks, to international fast food outlets to law enforcement and local government as well as individuals homes, Mosquito has brought peace and quiet, reduced anti-social behaviour, moved on groups of intimidating teenagers and rough sleepers the world over.

Since the end of the Pandemic, we have noticed a big increase in enquiries from companies managing public buildings and car parks, specifically relating to the above issues.

Most people know the Mosquito as a device to disperse groups of anti-social teens, however, it also has the facility to affect older people if required.

The effect the Mosquito device has is ‘annoyance over time’, rather than, as many incorrectly believe, being loud and immediate. This means that it has little to no impact on normal building users who would be ‘passing through’ an area covered by a Mosquito rather than ‘hanging around’.

Coverage

Effective coverage per unit on maximum volume in a structure such as a parking level in a multistorey carpark is 30 meters with a spread of 60 degrees. The sound will not (when used on the high frequency tone for people under 25) penetrate doors or windows, so sound leakage is negligible. The sound will, however, reflect of hard surfaces such as walls, floors and ceilings and so will likely cover more than the stated range.

In a stairwell, open through the middle with smooth floors, walls and ceilings and doors out to each level, one Mosquito generally covers 3 levels effectively. Mount a Mosquito at the top level at ceiling height aimed downwards and the sound will reflect off all surfaces to fill the well.

Who does The Mosquito effect?

There are two frequency setting options, one for people under 25 years old and another that people of all ages will hear (note, this will not adversely affect people wearing hearing aids). This allows the user complete flexibility to target anyone loitering in the stairwell or, if the problem is always with under 25’s, to target that age segment without causing any annoyance to older users.

Installation

Mosquito is a 24v DC unit. In most applications the Mosquito is simply plugged in to a standard 13v socket and suitable for DIY installation, however, in public areas it will be necessary to have your electrical contractor hard wire the system.

The Mosquito can be activated manually by on site staff via a WIFI App or remote control. It can be triggered by operators monitoring live CCTV, by motion or by timer.

Most carparks and stairwells do not have 24 hour staff or monitored CCTV so the timer is the most common method of controlling the Mosquito in such applications.

Durability

Built from a cast Zinc Alloy, the Mosquito housing will withstand significant force, however, it is prudent (unless the building has very high ceilings) to protect the unit with our steel security cage to prevent tampering.

If you would like to discuss a potential solution to problems on sites you manage, we suggest initially sending us the following information via our contact form or by emailing simon@themosquito.co.uk

• Your contact information
• Address and postcode of the site in question. This allows us to see the area on Google Earth.
• Picture(s) of the specific location on site where the problems occur.
• Brief description of the problem.

The above details will allow us to assist you more effectively.

Car Park Testimonials

We were having significant issues with anti-social behaviour in one of our multistorey car parks including graffiti, damage and rough sleepers. When I contacted the team at Mosquito, they were very helpful in explaining the solutions available and how each of them works. They were able to help us build a solution specific to our situation and were very engaging through out the process including the installation and after sales questions. I really appreciated the honestly with them being clear around the limitations in certain circumstances and making sure we had the right set up for our needs rather than what they wanted us to have.

The alarms were easy to install, easy to use and the team at Mosquito have been helpful in offering advice and adjustments to adapt the solution if needed. We have already seen a very pleasing reduction in the issues we were having and have received positive feedback about the improvement from regular customers while having no complaints about the system being in use on the site. We are already working on deploying to more of our sites and with the variety of solutions on offer we are confident it will be great for all the different challenges we encounter within our industry.

Kind Regards,

Tom Hodson – Commercial Manager, North Midlands
National Car Parks Limited, 7^th Floor,
Saffron Court, 14b St Cross Street, London, EC1N 8XA 

“As a local authority we manage and maintain many assets, including multi storey car parks. Unfortunately, there have been incidences of anti-social behaviour and vandalism. We looked at methods to try and reduce this, including the Mosquito alarm and felt this could be a suitable option so a trial was arranged. The Mosquito alarm has been in place for approx. one month and we are pleased to report that it has been very effective. Due to the suspected wide age range of perpetrators, the unit was programmed to the audible setting, supported with a timer, to operate overnight. We have seen a reduction in anti-social behaviour and vandalism since the alarm’s installation in one of the car park stairwells”.

Megan Wilson | Parking Maintenance Manager | Parking Services | Medway Council