Record intermodal paces U.S. freight gains

U.S. freight rail traffic for the week ending Sept. 20, 2014 kept rising from levels of a year ago, the Association of American Railroads reported Thursday, Sept. 25. As per the previous week, this most recent week's intermodal volume set a record high for U.S. railroads, breaking the previous record of the week before, AAR said.

U.S. freight carload traffic rose 5% for the week, measured against the comparable week in 2013. U.S. intermodal volume kept rolling as well, up 6.4% compared with last year. Total U.S. weekly rail traffic was up 5.7%.

The advance was broad-based. Nine of 10 of the carload commodity groups AAR tracks on a weekly basis posted increases compared with the same week in 2013, including petroleum and petroleum products, up 26.8%, grain, up 23.2%, and nonmetallic minerals, up 10.8%.

Canadian freight carload traffic fares less well, down 0.2% for the week ending Sept. 20, though Canadian intermodal rose 7%. Mexican freight carload traffic gained 4.8% over a year ago, and Mexican intermodal also rose, up 2.6%.

Combined North American freight carload traffic for the first 38 weeks of 2014 on 13 reporting U.S., Canadian, and Mexican railroads was up 3% measured against the comparable period in 2013. Combined North American intermodal volume was up 5.9% compared with last year.