Industry News

Rail Traffic Reflects Down Economy

October 9, 2009 | 02:30 p.m. CDT

Rail traffic continues to reflect the down economy, with carloads down 17.2 percent the week ended Oct. 3, compared to the same week last year, reports the Association of American Railroads.

All of the 19 carload freight commodity groups were down from the same week last year, with declines ranging from 2.7 percent for chemicals to 53.2 percent for metallic ores. Intermodal traffic of 206,293 trailers or containers on U.S. railroads was down 15.7 percent from the same week last year. Container volume fell 10 percent and trailer volume dropped 37 percent.

Regionally, carloads were down 16.4 percent in the West and 18.3 percent in the East. For the first 39 weeks of 2009, U.S. railroads reported cumulative volume of 10,381,905 carloads, down 18.1 percent from 2008; 7,347,299 trailers or containers, down 16.8 percent, and total volume of an estimated 1.11 trillion ton-miles, down 17.3 percent. Total volume on U.S. railroads for the week ending Oct. 3 was estimated at 29.7 billion ton-miles, off 16.6 percent from the same week last year.

Combined North American rail volume for the first 39 weeks of 2009 on 13 reporting U.S., Canadian and Mexican railroads totaled 13,204,334 carloads, down 18.8 percent from last year, and 9,139,639 trailers and containers, down 16.7 percent from last year.