The Freight Transportation Services Index rose 2.4 percent in January from its December level, matching its largest monthly increase in the last two years, the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Bureau of Transportation Statistics reported today, March 12.
The January increase was the third rise in the last four months. At 111.5, the Freight TSI is down 1.5 percent from its peak of 113.1 achieved in November 2005, but up 3.2 percent in the four months since its recent low of 108.0 in September 2007. The freight index had its largest climb to start the year since the January 1993 increase of 4.2 percent.
The January Freight TSI was 2.7 percent higher than the January 2007 level and remains 0.3 percent below the January 2006 level and 1.3 percent lower than the January 2005 level. However, the freight index has increased 7.9 percent in five years and 13.5 percent in 10 years.
The Freight TSI measures the month-to-month changes in the output of services provided by the for-hire freight transportation industries, including trucking, rail, inland waterways, pipelines and air freight. The baseline year for the index, which includes historic data from 1990 to the present, is 2000.
