For whom the gate tolls - Product Information

Communications News, April, 2001 by Sean Kelly

The Golden Gate Bridge--one of the nation's most enduring landmarks--is a vital transportation link between San Francisco and its surrounding counties. The bridge' s fixed six-lane roadway cannot be expanded to accommodate the current average daily traffic of 120,000 cars. To reduce congestion at the toll plaza, however, an electronic toll collection system was installed. Drivers do not have to stop to pay tolls. Tolls are deducted automatically from drivers' prepaid accounts via a booth scan of a vehicle transponder mounted inside the windshield.

To guard personal transaction data, bridge administrators turned to Lockheed Martin Global Telecommunications and its Securedge virtual private network (VPN), which includes ordering, remote configuration, provisioning, monitoring and network management of the customer's end-to-end service. The VPN provides secure LAN-to-LAN and remote access services via the public Internet through use of a virtual tunnel--an encrypted path only the persons sending and receiving the information can access. Collection system operators can securely send and receive confidential data between service center computers and other system components with the Securedge VPN, which also permits maintenance and upgrade of systems supporting the Golden Gate Bridge toll system.

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