Truck tonnage increased 1.1% in October after declining 1.1% in September as U.S. freight sector continues to improve “slowly and inconsistently,” according to a report from the American Trucking Associations (ATA).
The numbers came from ATA’s advanced seasonally adjusted (SA) For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index, which showed that the index equaled 115.2 (2015=100) in October compared with 113.9 in September. Compared with October 2022, the SA index fell 2.1%, which was the eighth straight year-over-year decrease. In September, the index was down 4.1% from a year earlier.
“After hitting a floor in April, tonnage has slowly and inconsistently improved, but remains 3% below its recent peak in September 2022,” ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello said in a release. “Despite the monthly gain, truck freight remains soft as it continues to contract on a year-over-year basis. It is important to remember that our for-hire truck freight index, which includes both truckload and LTL freight, is dominated by contract freight with minimal amounts of spot market loads. The traditional spot market remains much weaker than contract tonnage.”
