Alameda County Transportation Commission
(Alameda CTC) - GoPort Freight Intelligence Transportation System

APPENDIX D. BENEFIT-COST ANALYSIS

BACKGROUND

The Alameda CTC GoPort Freight ITS Implementation Plan consisting of 14 carefully integrated technology deployments, centered on advanced ITS and freight-centric information exchange among Port operators and users is planned for the Port of Oakland to help improve Port operational efficiencies. The 14 technology deployments can be categorized into the following:

• GoPort traveler information dissemination.
• Communications and collaboration.
• Observation and detection.
• Traffic and incident management.
• Goods movement support system and technology.

BENEFIT ANALYSIS

Benefits for the GoPort Freight ITS were estimated using:

1. Port truck data from the Port Traffic Counts and the Traffic Operations Analysis Report prepared for this project;
2. Statistics on outcomes for past freight-related traveler information deployments and similar projects can be used to estimate benefits, such as time savings and reduced operating costs⁶;
3. Turn times for Port of Oakland-specific trucks, as reported by DrayQ⁷, a mobile application for the intermodal drayage industry, used to calculate potential economic benefits to the freight industry if increased operational efficiency can lead to an increase in turns per day; and
4. Valuation of benefits (time, crashes, non-fuel operating costs, and air pollutants) from Draft Plan Bay Area 2040.⁸

The annual estimated benefit associated with the GoPort Freight ITS Project over the life of the project is $24.71 million for a discount rate of 7% using 2020 traffic forecasts, and $27.91 million for a discount rate of 7% using 2035 traffic forecasts. Detailed results are shown in Table D-1.

Table D-1: Overall Estimated Benefits for GoPort Freight ITS Over Project Life

Benefit Category	Year 2020 Quantitative benefit	Year 2020 Monetized Benefit (7% discount rate)	Year 2035 Quantitative benefit	Year 2035 Monetized Benefit (7% discount rate)
Time Savings	364,000 hours	$13,707,000	412,000 hours	$15,638,000
Fuel Savings	245,000 gallons	$735,000	265,000 gallons	$796,000
Safety		$1,244,000		$1,347,000
Emissions Reductions	71,000 tons	$7,058,000	80,000 tons	$7,994,000
Economic Benefits	6,300 turns	$1,966,000	6,800 turns	$2,130,000
Total		$24,710,000		$27,905,000

The following additional considerations and notes apply to the above estimated benefits:

• One work-year is assumed to span 250 analysis days, spread evenly across all 12 months.
• Non-transport-related benefits are not included (e.g., lower fleet size requirements, reduced administrative costs, improved shipment integrity, improved service quality, reduced inventory costs, reduced safety stock costs, additional profit from increased number of orders processed).

COST ANALYSIS

Costs for this deployment of the GoPort Freight ITS Project were estimated using data from:

• Vendor cost estimates for equipment, installation and warranty of individual GoPort Freight ITS projects.
• The Los Angeles Gateway Cities FRATIS Pilot.
• Caltrans District 12 ITS Master Plan.⁹
• TOPS-BC nationwide average costs.¹⁰

The full programmatic costs associated with the GoPort Freight ITS Project is $24,291,369, which includes PS&E; procurement, construction and integration; construction management; and agency costs. The overall estimated annual cost over a 20 year analysis time horizon is approximately $2.32 million for a discount rate of 7%. Cost breakdown per project element is detailed in Table D-2.

BENEFIT-COST SPREADSHEET

The detailed Excel Worksheet that contains the benefit-cost estimated calculations provided above can be provided to FHWA by Alameda CTC upon request.