Subway security in Oslo

Security on Olso, Norway’s five-line, 104-station subway system took a U-turn in 2004, when the public transportation company Oslo Metro Company decided to not only change security providers, but change its whole security approach from incident response to visibility and service. One result is that passengers feel safer.

As in any other metropolitan area, the system’s 200,000 passengers per day faced the usual problems: pickpockets, drug addicts and vandalism. “Our passenger survey revealed that people didn’t feel completely safe in traveling with the subway, especially not senior citizens late at night,” recalls the company’s Security & Safety Manager for Subway Operations, Frank Kilen.

“Before we replaced our supplier with Securitas, we were primarily using security officers to prevent graffiti and vandalism. We started to ask ourselves whether we should really focus all our resources on the handful of people who cause damage or the other approximately 200,000 people who don’t.”

The answer led to the strategy that the company continues to pursue today: Security officers keep a high profile at subway hubs and work pro-actively with service, instead of standing at remote stations waiting for something bad to happen.

In addition to new assignments, the officers themselves have a whole new look. Boots and batons have been banned. Instead, the team of approximately 60 security officers: wear slacks, dress shirts and ties; carry mobile phones and a first-aid kit; keep handcuffs out of sight; receive training in conflict management; receive training about practical ethnic issues, and are recruited to reflect the Oslo’s demographics in terms of age, gender and ethnicity.

Partly because the job requires considerable skill and is an interesting challenge, many of the security officers stay with the job for years. Along the way, they gain a thorough knowledge of the working environment, including the identities of many of the undesirable passengers such as gang members, drug-dealers and assorted troublemakers.

Because the subway system’s security needs fluctuate depending time of day, day of the week and season of the year, Oslo Metro Company meets weekly with Securitas to allocate resources for the following week, based on traffic report, incidents report, experience – and gut feeling. The officers’ rounds are also changed constantly to keep them unpredictable to potential troublemakers.

Response from the public, media and employees of the transportation company has been consistently positive. “We haven’t done a passenger survey in a long time, but we do get a lot of spontaneous feedback, both from commuters and employees,” concludes Kilen. “Basically, they all appreciate the security officers’ presence and want more."

“Our long-term goal is of course to increase the number of annual commuters and to do that, safety and security needs to be even more increased.”

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