Terrifying? Good for public safety? A disincentive against doing bad things to yourself in public? From First Coast News:
In less than a decade and with little opposition, the city has linked thousands of cameras – on street poles and skyscrapers, aboard buses and in train tunnels – in a network covering most of the city. Officials can watch video live at a sprawling emergency command center, police stations and even some squad cars.
“I don’t think there is another city in the U.S. that has as an extensive and integrated camera network as Chicago has,” said Michael Chertoff, the former Homeland Security secretary.
New York has plenty of cameras, but about half of the 4,300 installed along the city’s subways don’t work. Other cities haven’t been able to link networks like Chicago. Baltimore, for example, doesn’t integrate school cameras with its emergency system and it can’t immediately send 911 dispatchers video from the camera nearest to a call like Chicago can.
Even London – widely considered the world’s most closely watched city with an estimated 500,000 cameras – doesn’t incorporate private cameras in its system as Chicago does.