This short article provides a brief overview of Rail carload volumes (SA/NSA). Contact crt@ftrintel.com with additional questions.
The rail volumes shown in the FTR Shippers Update report tie historically to the Association of American Railroads Weekly Railroad Traffic report. The non-seasonally adjusted figures represent the raw outputs, while the seasonally adjusted figures account for the normal seasonal cyclicality that occurs across business lines by applying a seasonal factor to the result. To get monthly carload figures, the AAR’s weekly figures are summed up and partial weeks are accounted for to generate a monthly figure for each commodity group. The forecast element of the carload figures is an intelligent assessment of the future trajectory of the AAR carload volume figures driven by FTR’s proprietary FreightCast model and then verified and adjusted as needed by the FTR team of experts.