Final Report
Model Deployment of a Regional,
Multi-Modal 511 Traveler Information System
Multi-Modal 511 Traveler Information System
8.0 Cost Analysis
This section presents the costs associated with the Model Deployment and compares them to the costs associated with the pre-enhanced 511 system. Costs are categorized by Model Deployment phase (design and development; implementation; and operation) and by type, i.e., implementation and operations costs are broken down into their major subcomponents (hardware and software, phone charges, etc.). All costs reported for the "Model Deployment" or "post-enhancement" period are for the period approximately 2003 – 2004. Costs for the pre-enhancement period are for the period approximately 1998 – 1999.
8.1 Model Deployment Costs
Table 2-1 in Section 2.2.1 presented the complete list of the Model Deployment enhancements. For budgeting purposes, ADOT organized most of those enhancements into ten individual "projects." Since this is the way ADOT tracked costs, and is the format of the cost data provided by them to the evaluation, this cost analysis presents the individual enhancement costs using this same ten-project categorization. In many cases the relationship between the project and a specific enhancement is obvious. For example, the segment weather enhancement was fully contained within the "segment weather information" project. In some cases, however, a number of enhancements are addressed within a single "project." For example, the ADOT portion of many of the new data enhancements consisted solely of revisions to the HCRS database and the IVR menu system and were carried out in those two "projects." Table 8-1 presents the relationship between the ten ADOT Model Deployment projects and the enhancements as they have been categorized for evaluation.
Table 8-2 presents the total costs of the Model Deployment, organized by deployment phase (design and development, etc.) and by Model Deployment activity. Note that the "Total" column reflects the total costs of the Model Deployment, including operations and maintenance (O & M) costs for the 12-month post-enhancement evaluation period (the total capital costs for the pre- and post-enhanced versions of the 511 system—that is, all costs excluding O & M—are presented in Table 8-4.) The Model Deployment activities include the ten ADOT Model Deployment projects as well as ADOT staff costs and telecommunications costs. ADOT did not formally track their staff costs and, therefore, the figures in Table 8-2 represent approximations. ADOT did not formally track costs by phase either, and as noted in Section 2.2.1, the Model Deployment design, implementation and operations phases overlapped somewhat. Therefore, the breakdown of costs by phase (developed by the evaluation team with ADOT input) should also be viewed as approximate.
Table 8-2 indicates that the total cost of the ten Model Deployment "projects"—which is what ADOT formally defines as the "Model Deployment" per se—was about $1.477 million. That includes obligated, but not yet expended, budget associated with the enhancements that are still being implemented. The total cost exceeded the funding available for the entire Model Deployment by about 4% ($52,000). Several of the enhancements were significantly more costly than anticipated. The most significant cost over-runs were associated with the VRAS enhancements (61%), program management support (37%), and the travel time trial (8%).
| ADOT 511 "Project" | Enhancement |
|---|---|
| HCRS Enhancement | Tucson and Phoenix Local Street Data Transit Major Service Disruptions Phoenix and Tucson Airport Info Grand Canyon Info Downtown Phoenix Special Events and Parking Sharing Data with Other States (Utah) Regional Roadway "Quick Reports" Roadway Segment-Based Reporting Roadway Info Accessible Via Roadway Name |
| VRAS Enhancement | Voice Recognition Improved System Performance Monitoring |
| Operations Enhancement | Data Quality Enhancements |
| Segment Weather Information Enhancement | Segment Weather Info |
| Travel Time Trial | Phoenix Arterial Street Travel Times |
| Bus Arrival Time Trial | Phoenix BRT Estimated Arrival Times |
| Marketing Research | Marketing |
| Premium Service Research | Premium Service Partnership |
| Evaluation Support | Local (University of Arizona) evaluation |
| Program Management Support | 511 program support consultant (prepared Program Management Plan, System Requirements Definition, etc.) |
The total federal funding for the Model Deployment funding totaled $1.140 million. This means that ADOT and their 511 partners expended about $337,000 of their own funding for the ten Model Deployment projects and an additional $228,000 of their own funds on other 511 enhancement activities, including their own staff time, which they do not formally consider a Model Deployment cost.
Of the total cost of the Model Deployment (about $1.705 million), about 24% ($406,508) was spent on design and development. About 59% ($1,005,752) was spent on implementation. The remaining 17% ($292,578) was spent to operate the system during the 1-year Model Deployment operational period. As indicated in Table 8-2, the cost to operate the system in future years is expected to be about 28% (~$83,000) lower. Most of the cost reduction results from the elimination of consultant program support, which amounted to approximately $75,000 during the one-year operational period.
| 511 Cost Components | Model Deployment Costs | Operations (Estimated Annual Cost for Future Years) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Design and Development | Implementation | Operation (One-Year Model Deployment Operational Period) |
Total | ||
| ADOT Staff | |||||
| Project Manager | $4,059 | $12,341 | $4,100 | $20,500 | $2,600 |
| IT Manager | $3,089 | $10,951 | $4,680 | $18,720 | $3,900 |
| IT Staff | $515 | $1,435 | $390 | $2,340 | $78 |
| Public Information Officer | $1,716 | $6,084 | $2,600 | $10,400 | $2,080 |
| Subtotal | $9,379 | $30,811 | $11,770 | $51,960 | $8,658 |
| 511 Enhancements (ADOT "Projects") | |||||
| HCRS Enhancement | $39,300 | $181,072 | $11,250 | $231,622 | $7,500 |
| VRAS Enhancement | $219,676 | $340,660 | $18,714 | $579,049 | $17,600 |
| Operations Enhancement | $7,377 | $66,389 | $0 | $73,765 | |
| Segment Weather Information Enhancement | $9,552 | Postponed | $9,552 | ||
| Travel Time Trial | $18,058 | $162,523 | Still in Testing | $180,581 | |
| Bus Arrival Time Trial | Postponed | ||||
| Marketing | $17,210 | $42,137 | $59,347 | ||
| Premium Service Research | Cancelled | ||||
| Evaluation Support | $25,000 | $25,000 | $50,000 | ||
| Program Management Support | $60,957 | $157,160 | $74,809 | $292,926 | |
| Subtotal | $397,129 | $974,940 | $104,773 | $1,476,842 | $25,100 |
| Other Operations Costs | |||||
| Phone Charges (toll free, call transfers, etc.) | $139,577 | $139,577 | $139,577 | ||
| T-1 Line Rental (4 T-1's, totaling 96 lines) | $36,458 | $36,458 | $36,458 | ||
| Subtotal | $ — | $ — | $176,035 | $176,035 | $176,035 |
| Total | $406,508 | $1,005,752 | $292,578 | $1,704,837 | $209,793 |
Most of the Model Deployment costs were associated with ADOT's consultants. The total cost for the ten projects, all of which utilized consultants, was about $1.477 million, representing about 87% of the total costs to enhance the 511 system. ADOT staff costs account for about 3% ($51,960) of total costs. Various phone charges account for the remaining 10% ($176,035) of total costs.
The marketing costs shown in Table 8-2 do not reflect the costs to deploy 50 static roadside 511 signs at various locations throughout Arizona. Those signs have not yet been deployed. ADOT estimates that the cost to produce and deploy the signs will be approximately $50,000.
ADOT's estimate of the break-down of their Model Deployment staff hours is shown in Table 8-3. During the design and development phase, ADOT estimates that they devoted a total of about 19 staff hours per week to the project. This effort was spread fairly evenly across the 511 project manager, the IT manager, IT staff, and the Public Information Officer. Much of this time was spent in meetings, including meetings with the consultants performing the various enhancements. During the 1-year operations period, a time when design and implementation activities were continuing, ADOT estimates that they spent about the same number of staff hours (16) per week. Expectedly, during the operations phase, a smaller proportion of time was spent in meetings. As indicated in the two columns at the far right of Table 8-3, ADOT estimates that significantly less staff will be required for ongoing operation of the 511 system, about 7 staff hours per week.
| ADOT Staff | Average Staff Hours per Week | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 511 Model Deployment | Post-Model Deployment | |||||||
| Design, Development and Implementation Phase | Refinement and Operation Phase (One Year of Model Deployment Operations) | Hrs. | Activities | |||||
| Mtgs. | Coord., QA & QC | Total | Mtgs. | Coord. | Total | |||
| Project Manager | 4 | 2 | 6 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 1.25 | QA/QC; strategic direction |
| IT Manager | 4 | 2 | 6 | 2 | 4 | 6 | 2.5 | QA/QC coordination w/vendors; reports |
| IT Staff | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | Hardware support (maintenance, security patches, system lock-ups, etc.) | ||
| Public Information Officer | 4 | 1 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 2 | Marketing; reviewing and responding to 511 caller voicemail comments |
| Total | 14 | 5 | 19 | 7 | 9 | 16 | 6.75 | |
8.2 Comparisons to Pre-Enhancement Costs
Table 8-4 compares the Model Deployment costs—the costs to enhance the 511 system—with the costs associated with implementing the original (pre-enhanced) system. Much more was spent in enhancing the system than in implementing the original telephone information system, about 3.5 times as much. This underscores just how significant the Model Deployment enhancements were and how fundamentally they have changed the previous 511 system. A very small percentage, about 4% ($60,069) of the Model Deployment costs were for hardware. The only hardware purchases were for a machine to record the .WAV file digital voice recordings ($5,000) and for the four new IVR servers ($55,070), both of which were part of the "VRAS Enhancement" ADOT project. Software and engineering costs, which are defined here to include ADOT staff costs and all consultant support services costs, were associated with all six of the ADOT Model Deployment "projects" that were not postponed or cancelled. The projects requiring the greatest software and engineering expenditures were the VRAS Enhancement (31% of total software and engineering costs), HCRS Enhancement (20%), Travel Time Trial (18%) and Program Management Support (17%) projects.
| Deployment Cost Component | Pre-Model Deployment 511 System |
Enhanced (Model Deployment) 511 System |
|---|---|---|
| Design & Development | $ 270,000 | $ 406,508 |
| Implementation | $ 85,020 | $ 1,005,752 |
| Hardware | $ 48,370 | $ 60,069 |
| Software & Engineering | $ 36,650 | $ 903,546 |
| Marketing | $ — | $ 42,137 |
| Total | $ 355,020 | $ 1,412,260 |
Table 8-5 compares annual operations costs of the pre- and post-enhanced 511 system. The annual costs to operate the system during the one-year Model Deployment period was $292,578, about twice as much as for the pre-enhanced 511 system. Almost half of that increase is accounted for by the program support consultant. Increased phone charges account for about 24% of the increase in annual costs. As indicated in the far right column of Table 8-5, ADOT estimates that the annual system operations costs will be significantly lower for future years, but still considerably higher than the pre-enhanced costs.
| Annual Operations Cost Component | Pre-Model Deployment 511 System | Model Deployment Year of Operations |
Future Years of Operation |
|---|---|---|---|
| ADOT staff | $270 | $11,770 | $8,658 |
| Consultant support | $9,400 | $104,773 | $25,100 |
| HCRS | $3,000 | $11,250 | $7,500 |
| IVR | $6,400 | $18,714 | $17,600 |
| Program Management | $ — | $74,809 | $ — |
| Phone charges | $102,464 | $139,577 | $139,577 |
| T-1 Line Rental | $27,600 | $36,458 | $36,458 |
| Total | $139,734 | $292,578 | $209,793 |
8.3 Conclusions
- Assuming ongoing enhancements are completed on-budget, the total cost of the Model Deployment (i.e., the cost of the ten "projects", which ADOT views as the entirety of the Model Deployment) is estimated to exceed the original budget by only about 4% ($52,000). Costs were higher than expected in several areas: VRAS enhancements (61%), which included all of the changes to the IVR system (menus, voice recognition) and consultant program management support (37%).
- The cost of the Model Deployment was substantial in relation to the cost to deploy the original system. This underscores the scope and scale of the Model Deployment and how significantly it altered the Arizona 511 system.
- ADOT expended considerable additional funds in support of the 511 enhancements (including the one year of operations), totaling about $565,000. About 60% of these additional funds were for cost over-runs among the ten Model Deployment enhancement projects. About 31% was for various telecommunications charges. The remaining 9% was for ADOT staff time.
- Although extensive consultant support was utilized, considerable time investments on the part of ADOT staff were required, accounting for about 3% ($52,000) of the total Model Deployment costs.
- Operations costs represented about 17% ($292,578) of the total Model Deployment cost. These costs are expected to decrease in the future, as less ADOT staff time and consultant support is required.
- Consistent with the fact that the Model Deployment consisted primarily of user interface and new data enhancements, and built upon an existing 511 system, hardware costs represented a small percentage (4%) of total capital (non-recurring) costs.
