truck, railroad and port news from april / not a pretty picture...

i think this cartoon sums it up......... :-)

dieser cartoon fasst das ganze recht gut zusammen..... :-)

ALEXANDRIA, Va. — The American Trucking Associations’ advanced seasonally adjusted For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index decreased 2.2 percent in April, after posting a 1.2 percent jump in March.

On a seasonally adjusted basis, the tonnage index declined to 112.1 (2000 = 100) in April from 114.6 the previous month. After March’s year-over-year increase, which was the first since June 2006, April’s tonnage was 2.7 percent below the same month in 2006......

Trucking serves as a barometer of the U.S. economy because it represents nearly 70 percent of tonnage carried by all modes of domestic freight transportation, including manufactured and retail goods.

Trucks hauled 10.7 billion tons of freight in 2005. Motor carriers collected $623 billion , or 84.3 percent of total revenue earned by all transport modes.......

ATA represents more than 37,000 members covering every type of motor carrier in the United States.

Railroads Feel Profit Pinch as U.S. Automakers Trim Production http://tinyurl.com/3yprxa

hat tip to Russ Winter http://tinyurl.com/37zrsf

April’s container data from the Port of Los Angeles is in, and is consistent with other “reports from the field”. 368,683 loaded containers came in, versus 370,171 in April last year, which is down 0.4%