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Impacts of Policy-Induced Freight Modal Shifts (2019)

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194 pages | 8.5 x 11 | PAPERBACK

ISBN 978-0-309-48090-1 | DOI 10.17226/25660

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GET THIS BOOK Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Jack Faucett Associates, Inc.; National
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Impacts of Policy-Induced Freight Modal Shifts

CHAPTER 6

Data Preparation

This chapter explains the data preparation process that preceded the estimation of freight
mode choice models using the 2012 CFS confidential microdata. The estimation of shipment-
level freight mode choice models required data regarding the shipment characteristics, e.g.,
shipment size and commodity type; the shipper attributes, e.g., establishment size and indus-
try; and the model attributes of all modes to be analyzed, e.g., transit times and freight rates. A
major challenge was that CFS data do not include some of the data required to estimate freight
mode choice models. These data are (1) shippers’ characteristics, such as location, industry
sector, and employment and (2) attributes of the modes to be analyzed (truck and rail), such as
distance, transit time, cost, number of transfers, and drayage distance. As a result, the research
team had to use other datasets with data on shippers’ characteristics and modal attributes to
complement the CFS data. The datasets used were the LBD, the confidential version of the
Waybill sample, HERE data, and rail network data from the FRA. It should be noted that
because the CFS has only a minuscule number of observations for water and air freight modes,
these modes could not be included in the freight mode choice estimation process.
Table 18 shows the data assembled for the freight mode choice analysis, the datasets from
which the respective variables were derived, and the sources of the data.
In summary, the shipment data are obtained from 2012 confidential CFS microdata; the
shippers’ attribute data are obtained from the 2012 LBD data from the Center for Economic
Studies; the rail attribute data are derived from the 2012 Waybill data and rail network data
from FRA; and the truck attribute data are derived based on HERE data. To obtain modal
attributes (costs and transit times) for each shipment in the CFS microdata, statistical inference
techniques were used based on the HERE and Waybill datasets. The sources of the data, relevant
variables, challenges, and limitations are explained in latter sections.

Shipment Data: 2012 CFS Microdata

The CFS is a database obtained from a shipper-based survey conducted every 5 years as part of
the Economic Census. The survey is conducted as a partnership between the U.S. Census Bureau
and the BTS and is the primary source of data on freight shipments at the national and state level
(BTS and U.S. Census Bureau 2015). For each shipment, the CFS includes shipment ID; Federal
Information Processing Standard Publication 6-4 (FIPS) state code for shipment origin and
destination state; metropolitan area; CFS area; quarter of the year; commodity types as desig-
nated by SCTG; mode of transportation; shipment value in dollars; shipment weight in pounds;
great circle distance (GCD) in miles; routed distance in miles (for the mode used to send the
shipment); hazardous material code; weighting factors; and binary variables indicating whether
the shipment is an export, and, if so, export country and whether it is temperature controlled or

77  

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Impacts of Policy-Induced Freight Modal Shifts

78   Impacts of Policy-Induced Freight Modal Shifts

Table 18.   Summary of datasets.

Establish- Modal Data

Shipment Data
ment Data Rail Truck

Temperature controlled
Greater circle distance

Number of employees
Mode(s) of transport

Commodity (SCTG)
Data Items

Destination in U.S.
Export destination

Industry (NAICS)
Hazardous cargo

Generalized cost

Generalized cost
Export mode
Shipment ID

Weight in lb

Location

Payroll
Value

Time

Time
Date

Cost

Cost
Network Data

CFS+Waybill
Waybill, Rail

Speed/Truck
Confidential

CFS+HERE
Confidential
Dataset

HERE

Data
Confidential Commodity Flow Survey Longitudinal
(CFS) Micro-data Business Database
(LBD)

NAVTEQ
Center for Surface
Source

(processed by
Census Bureau Economic Studies Transportation
Caliper
(CES) Board (STB)
Corporation)
NAICS = North American Industry Classification System

not. It is worth mentioning that the Public Use Microdata Sample (PUMS) released by the BTS
with information on about 4.5 million shipments from the 2012 CFS (U.S. Census Bureau 2017),
although generally useful, cannot be used to estimate freight mode choice models because it
does not contain information about the shipper, particularly its location.

Establishment Data: 2012 LBD

The LBD covers all non-farm sectors listed in the Standard Statistical Establishment List,
also known as the Business Register. The LBD has been collected and maintained by the Center
for Economic Studies at the Census Bureau every year since 1976. The LBD contains informa-
tion from the Standard Statistical Establishment List, Economic Censuses, and surveys. The
longitudinal nature of the LBD allows the study of an establishment or firm over a period of
time, including the year of entry and exit. Since LBD also contains confidential data—such as
age of the firm, employment, and payroll—obtaining access to LBD microdata requires a spe-
cial sworn status (Jarmin and Miranda 2002, U.S. Census Bureau 2015). The LBD provides the
shippers’ attributes, mainly industry sector in North American Industry Classification System,
employment, location, and payroll. CFS and LBD are merged to form a dataset composed of
shipment and shipper attributes.

Modal Data
This section presents the various modal data used in the preparation of the freight mode
choice dataset.

Truck Data
To obtain the distances and transit times by truck for each shipment in the CFS data, the
research team obtained the HERE data, which were generously provided by the Caliper corpora-
tion. The HERE data contain layers with distances and transit times for the entire U.S. highway
and street network, along with additional geographic information such as ZIP codes, census

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Impacts of Policy-Induced Freight Modal Shifts

Data Preparation   79  

tracts, counties, cities, and states (HERE 2018). The final maps from the HERE data were pro-
cessed by the Caliper corporation and provided to the research team in GIS format. The team
post-processed the HERE data to obtain distances and transit times between all ZIP codes in the
entire United States. Truck distances and transit times were calculated assuming each shipment
by truck follows the shortest path from origin ZIP code to destination ZIP code. The output
included origin ZIP code, destination ZIP code, truck transit time (minutes), and truck dis-
tance (miles). Truck rates were calculated based on an updated version of the model presented
in Holguín-Veras and Brom (2008), which estimates truck direct cost in dollars for a shipment
as a function of the distance and time traveled. The finalized truck distances, transit times, and
costs were merged with the CFS-LBD dataset by matching the ZIP-ZIP origin-destination pairs
between the CFS-LBD data and the transit time and distance matrices.

Rail Data
Thanks to the assistance of the FRA, the research team secured access to the confidential
2012 Waybill Sample, a stratified sample of carload waybills collected by the Surface Transporta-
tion Board. This database contains information on commodity type in Standard Transportation
Commodity Code (STCC) codes, shipment size, types of car used, origin-destination informa-
tion ranging from country and state up to ZIP code, Freight Station Accounting Codes, number
of cars, revenue, shipment rate, variable rates, distance (routed, shortest path), and number of
transfers. In addition, the team secured FRA rail network data, which contain geocoded infor-
mation about rail nodes, rail stations (Freight Station Accounting Codes), and link distances.
The network contains information on privately owned freight rail lines in the actual freight
network at county and city levels; rail lines are presented with labels that include information
on the primary owner of each particular freight rail line. The network data were updated in
2010. The research team used these data to produce rail distances between all ZIP codes (nearly
40,000) in the United States, assuming rail takes only the shortest paths and a drayage by road
to the closest rail station. Transit times were estimated for various commodities assuming an
average waiting time of 24 hours for each transfer. These rates, distances, and transit times by
rail between all ZIP codes in the United States were incorporated into the freight mode choice
modeling process. Since the commodity types are defined differently by CFS (using SCTG), and
Waybill (using STCC), a conversion matrix between SCTG and STCC was used to obtain the rail
distances, transit times, and rates for each shipment in the CFS data.

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