For-hire tonnage ticked up in January

Feb. 24, 2015

ATA says forhire carriers hauled 13 more freight in January despite winter39s icy wrath Photo courtesy of VDOT — ATA says for-hire carriers hauled 1.3% more freight in January despite winter's icy wrath. Photo courtesy of VDOT.

Freight volumes kept rising for motor carriers last month, according to the American Trucking Associations (ATA), as its for-hire truck tonnage index increased 1.2% in January – which follows a revised gain of 0.1% in December of last year

For all of 2014, ATA said for-hire tonnage increased up 3.7%, slightly better than the 3.4% the trade group originally reported last month.

That follows a 5.5% gain in ATA’s index for 2013, the association added; noting that trucking hauled 9.7 billion tons of freight in 2013, with motor carriers collecting $681.7 billion or 81.2% of total revenue earned by all transport modes.

“Last year was slightly better for truck tonnage than we originally thought and I am expecting that momentum to continue in 2015,” noted Bob Costello, ATA’s chief economist, in a statement.

He added that for-hire tonnage has actually soared 6.7% over the last 10 months after “bottoming out” in March 2014.