Rail Freight Pushes to Five-Month High

Major U.S. railroads enjoyed the highest bulk carloadings in five months during the week ending Aug. 15, propelled by 2009 peak volume in scrap and metal ores needed in early stages of manufacturing, and the strongest rail shipments of finished vehicles since early spring.

The Class I railroads and a few regional rail lines that report their U.S. traffic to the Association of American Railroads originated 276,488 railcar loads in the latest week, the most since March 14. That was up from 274,633 cars a week earlier.

Their hauls of intermodal containers and trailers slumped to 193,488 boxes from 195,014 in the Aug. 7 week, but that latest volume number was close to recent peaks that have seen rail hauls of truck boxes at their highest pace since January.

Beneath the carload total, large carriers hauled 11,194 railcars carrying automobiles, other motor vehicles or other large finished equipment units, up from about 8,000 or fewer that was the weekly norm as recently as July.

Recent weeks have seen some auto plants return to production after prolonged shutdowns to retool and clear inventory, and as General Motors and Chrysler sorted out their systems through rapid bankruptcies. The industry also got a big push starting in late July from the federal “cash for clunkers” stimulus program, which gives big vouchers for new car purchases when old models are traded in.

In line with some recovery in auto manufacturing and from factories, railcar loadings of scrap materials -- mostly metals bound for recycling – hit a 2009 high at 8,398, along with metal ores at 4,627.

Chemical tank car loads of 27,537 were near recent highs that were the strongest since February, and grain volume of 20,791 hopper cars was also one of the highest numbers since last winter.

AAR said traffic overall showed only “incremental gains,” noting that carloads in the latest week were down 17.1 percent from the same point in 2008 while intermodal was down 18.4 percent.

Carloads, though, are now consistently running better than the full 2009 numbers, which showed an 18.9 percent year-over-year drop in the first 32 weeks.

Intermodal last week trailed its year-to-date 17.2 percent decline. This is the time of year when ocean-borne import containers usually flood West Coast docks in a peak shipping season buildup, but this year ships are being laid up and ports are complaining of lost business to other routes as well as the drop in total ocean shipping.

Contact John D. Boyd at jboyd@joc.com.