Economic Implications of Innovative Visual Guidance System for Crane Cabins

This paper proposes innovation through implementation of a real-time computer-aided visual guidance system (VGS) which prevents crane accidents, caused by crane operator’s obstructed view, which can be the cause of collisions between load and obstacles and/or intrusions in the workspace. Proposed VGS allows predicting whether a dangerous event is going to occur and promptly alerts the crane-operator in order to let her/him taking corrective actions during the execution of crane-assisted shifting duties. VGS is equipped with interface which is designed to be simple in terms of the number of commands and easy to use in order to reduce the operators’ stress. Analyses of the economic feasibility of VGS application through cost-benefit framework follows. The payback period of invested funds for the purchase and installation of VGS is 1.5 years and installing and usage of VGS represents a very low risk investment.