DOT Freight Transportation Index Rises 0.1%
The Department of Transportation’s freight transportation services index rose 0.1% in November from a year earlier, the 11th straight year-over-year gain.
The freight TSI fell 0.3% from October to a reading of 98.5, DOT’s Bureau of Trade Statistics said Wednesday in its monthly report.
The index remains the lowest level for a November since 2001, when it was at 97.6.
March 2010 was the first month since July 2008 in which the index exceeded its year-ago level and it has done so every month since then, DOT said.
The November index is 5.4% higher than its recent low of 93.5 of May 2009, when it was at the lowest level since June 1997. November’s reading is 12.7% off the index’s historic peak reading of 112.9, set in May 2006.
The TSI, which uses 2000 as a base-year reading of 100, is a seasonally adjusted monthly index measuring the output of services provided by the for-hire transportation industries, including railroad, air, truck, inland waterways, pipeline and local transit.
