Bus tracking capability was added to the Metro Online Web site as part of the Seattle Metropolitan Model Deployment Initiative at a cost of $333,000.

From the Seattle MMDI Evaluation Report: Appendix A.1 King County BusView Web Applet

Made Public Date
11/07/2003
Identifier
2003-SC00026
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Summary Information

BusView is a component of Metro Online, a King County, Washington transit website that shows real-time bus location on a map for selected bus routes. Bus location data is provided by the King County Metro Transit AVL system. The website allows riders to track bus progress at their home or office computer and helps riders determine whether their bus will arrive on time.

The website was developed by the University of Washington at a cost of just over $333,000. Annual O&M costs are $175,552. The following table gives a breakdown of the project costs. Roughly 25% of the capital cost and 25% of the O&M cost were shared with other Seattle Smart Trek MMDI projects.

 
 
Equipment Description
Capital Cost (1998)
O&M Cost (1998)
University of Washington - Total Equipment Purchases (Proposed Budget)
$ 8,500
 
University of Washington - Total Supplies & Materials (Proposed Budget)
$ 2,300
 
UW University of Washington - Development Labor
$ 221,016
 
King County Engineering & Management Support
$ 16,000
 
Operations Labor (1 UW FTE's)
 
$ 131,250
14% Share of 3 Pentium Workstations & Associated Equipment
$ 3,393
 
14% Share of Labor (including indirect costs and benefits)
$ 78,324
 
14% Share of Other Direct Costs
$ 3,585
 
14% Share of Hardware & Supplies (replaced every 2 years)
 
$ 1,696
14% Share of Fiber Link & Other Contractual Services  
 
$ 2,428
14% Share of Operations Labor (3 UW FTEs)
 
$ 40,178
Total
$ 333,118
$ 175,552


The cost estimate included 14% of the ITS Information backbone costs since the system was designed to interface or exchange information with the ITS Backbone.

System Cost Subsystem