Spy cameras spreading rapidly in NYC

NEW YORK, Nov. 13 (UPI) -- New York City is almost halfway to its goal of installing 3,000 surveillance cameras, police say.

The Police Department announced the Lower Manhattan Security Initiative five years ago as a proposed web of cameras, license-plate readers and radiation detectors.

About 1,300 cameras are connected to the network as of this month, NYPD spokesman Paul Browne told Bloomberg News. In June, the network had only 450 cameras, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly has said.

Browne said the cameras installed so far are about evenly divided between the original downtown area below Canal Street and Midtown between 30th and 60th streets. They include 586 subway cameras added last month in Times Square, Pennsylvania Station and Grand Central Terminal.

The system's projected cost has grown from $81.5 million in 2006 to $201 million. It is 90-percent funded by the U.S. Homeland Security Department.

Installation, which officials expect to complete by 2013, has been sped up in a year that saw federal convictions on plots to bomb Times Square, Kennedy airport and synagogues in the Bronx.