Week 17 of 2017 shows same week total rail traffic (from same week one year ago) improved according to the Association of American Railroads (AAR) traffic data. The economically intuitive sectors again declined.

Analyst Opinion of the Rail Data

We review this data set to understand the economy. If coal and grain are removed from the analysis, rail over the last 6 months been declining around 5% – but this week declined 1.4 % (meaning that the predicitive economic elements declined year-over-year). Also consider rail movements are below 2015 levels – even though they are above 2016 levels.

The following graph compares the rail economically intuitive sectors vs. total movements:

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 [including coal and grain] 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 +5.2 % unchanged decelerating 13 week rolling average +5.0 % decelerating accelerating 52 week rolling average -1.3 % accelerating accelerating

A summary of the data from the AAR: