Parking Garage Motion Detector System

Status
Not open for further replies.
Greg Swartz

Greg Swartz

Senior Member
Location
Colorado Springs, Colorado
I have just been asked to provide a parking garage motion detector system.

This is a new one to me. I was figuring there was a product out there that someone knows about that will fulfill this requirement.

The owner wants (as required by the city) a motion detector system that will activate lights when set off. The key is that when 1 motion detector is set off, ALL the lights need to go off. (So that people know there are vehicles moving... so that nobody gets run over???)

This is not my first parking garage, but certainly the first motion detector system.

Anyone out there with some experience in this area?

I'm really trying to avoid running a bunch of wires to some ice cube relays...

Thanks,
Greg Swartz :cool:
 
Sorry, Greg, it looks as if no shared experiences. All my outdoor commercial work for three years has had one control in common, a little monster called ET 70213c.

I swear Intermatics' lobbying with the title 24 people was as good an investment as Mssrs Doheny, Stanford, Huntington and the other I forget, who put together the 'Southern Pacific Railroad Company' with $7000 cash.

Here are a couple internet resources... bounce it off an inspector?

http://www.lightsearch.com/search/controls/sensors.html

http://www.aboutlightingcontrols.org/education/index.shtml
 
Motion sensors in garages are not required by the energy code. You say the city requires this? Are these HID fixtures? What about restart time?
 
Watt Stopper(I think that is the brand name) makes quite a bit of control options. You can link alot of sensors together. The controls are low voltage. I do remember them making a fail safe option(seems like a good idea in your application) Try googling them.
 
Sorry about the misunderstanding:

The parking garage has normal HID lights. They are constantly on.

What the city is requiring is... because the parking garage is private, AND that there is not enough room to make 2 lanes (1 each direction), the owner needs to provide some sort of flashing light. Something like a yellow flashing light. This will be wall mounted at each level and turn spot. It will flash for some pre-determined amount of time.

What they want is, if someone starts moving on the 3rd level, all of the yellow lights need to flash... even the ones on 1st level.

The owner is going back to the engineer about this. He never designed anything for it, so I was looking at designing it myself.

I was figuring of putting a 12x12 j-box in the electrical room with several ice cube relays. Tying the motion detector (that has not been chosen) relay into the flashing light relay (which I have no clue where to get), and tying all of the lights (which have not been chosen yet) onto seperate relays (that haven't been bought yet). I was dreading this, but maybe the engineer will come up with something! Nah!

Peteo, I did a google search of your little monster and this is what I got:

Parking Garage Motion Detector System - Mike Holt's Code ForumAll my outdoor commercial work for three years has had one control in common, a little monster called ET 70213c. I swear Intermatics' lobbying with the ...
www.mikeholt.com/code_forum/showthread.php?t=82724 - 37k - Cached - Similar pages

Gotta love it. :wink: Thanks for the input though guys.
Greg :cool:
 
How about a Programmable relay. Try searching for Teco SG2. You could use several sensors to detect motion, then use an output to a contactor to flash the lights for however long you like. You could get really slick and have two colors of lights to flash depending on traffic going down or up. :cool:
 
The problem is going to be the sensor... infrared sensors won't work well due to the heat rising from parked cars. And ultrasonics don't work well in drafts. You could test a dual-technology sensor but it would probably still falsely trip. You could use an "electric eye." All of the above would react to pedestrians. The last hope would be an in-floor loop like those used at traffic lights and parking gates.

You wouldn't need multiple relays if the load is low enough to put on one circuit. Seems like it would be...
 
Last edited:
I have done 5 garages in the past 9 years and only one had a light system. It was at the street level to alert pedestrian traffic outside the garage near the gated exits. We installed sensor loops in the concrete triggering a wall mounted flashing light with a horn. I do not see the need inside the garage since the vehicle lanes have to be wide enough for vehicles to back out but the sensor loops will work there as well. As mentioned above wattstopper does make occupancy sensor systems that will do exactly what you need.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top