They have been used here at Bolton Museum & Art Gallery for about 20 years.
'Traditionally' a figure of 40% of the total has been used for visitor
monitoring purposes.  However, I know that we need a better way of
calculating this.  Staff movements are probably fairly constant, which means
that they form a smaller part of the total the more visitors we have.  (I
hope that this makes sense).  Another problem arises from where your
electric eye is sited; how wide the gap is.  We have a separate aquarium
with a narrow entrance where people can only pass through in a maximum of
twos.  In the main Museum the gap is larger, so a 'block' of several people
is only counted as one.  I am also suspicious of its accuracy when counting
a large school party.  The only way to solve this is a bit of direct
observational research; someone counting people through for sample periods.
I can then maybe try to find a statistician who can give us a better way of
calculating numbers!?

The advantage of the electric eyes is that they are consistent in the way
that they measure, even if they are wrong!  They show trends in visitor
numbers.

Another problem with electric eyes arises if bright light such as sunlight
can shine on the equipment.  Because they run using infra red light,
sunlight can render them completely inoperative for periods and may only
happen at certain times of day at specific times of the year (personal
experience!) depending on the angle of the sun.  Our equipment many years
ago was very unreliable, but the current set-up (5 yrs old) is very trouble
free.

Steve Garland
Chief Museums Officer, Bolton Museums, Art Gallery & Aquarium
Le Mans Crescent, Bolton BL1 1SE
Tel:(44) 204 332211 Fax : (44) 204 442241
E-mail: [log in to unmask]
http://www.boltonmuseums.org.uk/

-----Original Message-----
From: Museum discussion list [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of Evans, Linda
Sent: 23 October 2000 15:30
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Automatic Visitor Counters


We're thinking about going to an automatic visitor counter and wonder ...

1. Any successes or problems with electric eyes?
2. How do you allow for staff, workmen, special events setups - where one
person may be going in and out numerous times during a day?

Hope everyone has a great week, and thanks for any feedback. You can reply
off-list if you'd rather.

Linda Evans
Greensboro Historical Museum
130 Summit Ave.
Greensboro, NC  27401-3016
336-373-2610
fax 336-373-2204
[log in to unmask]
http://www.greensborohistory.org

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at
http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed
information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message
to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help"
(without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to
[log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff
Museum-L" (without the quotes).

=========================================================
Important Subscriber Information:

The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes).

If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).