Rail Week Ending 31 October 2015: Monthly Data Now Contracting 4.3% Year-over-Year

Week 43 of 2015 shows same week total rail traffic (from same week one year ago) and monthly total rail traffic (from same month one year ago) declined according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR) traffic data. Intermodal traffic contracted year-over-year, which accounts for approximately half of movements. and weekly railcar counts continued in contraction. October 2015 is down 4.3% over October 2014.

This analysis is looking for clues in the rail data to show the direction of economic activity – and is not necessarily looking for clues of profitability of the railroads. The weekly data is fairly noisy, and the best way to view it is to look at the rolling averages (carloads and intermodal combined).

  Percent current rolling average is larger than the rolling average of one year ago Current quantities accelerating or decelerating Current rolling average accelerating or decelerating compared to the rolling average one year ago 4 week rolling average -4.0 % decelerating decelerating 13 week rolling average -2.2 % decelerating decelerating 52 week rolling average +0.1 % decelerating decelerating

A summary of the data from the AAR: