Up, up and up go rail freight shipments

Rail freight loadings continue to show improvement, reports the AAR in releasing carloading data for the week ending Oct. 16.

Total U.S. carloadings increased by more than 10 percent over the same week in 2009.

Intermodal loadings were up by more than 15 percent over the comparable week in 2009.

Fourteen of the 19 carload commodity groups increased from the comparable week in 2009.

For the first 41 weeks of 2010, U.S. railroads carloadings are up more than 7 percent over the first 41 weeks in 2009; and intermodal loadings are up almost 15 percent.