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WASHINGTON — Shipments carried by U.S. railroads fell 16.4 percent last month compared with a year earlier, a major industry trade group reported Thursday.
The Association of American Railroads said freight carried during August totaled 1.1 million carloads. The group noted that while August was yet another month with declining carloads, the percentage drop was the lowest since February.
The autos and auto parts commodity group saw carloads jump 40 percent to 44,272 carloads from July, probably because of Cash for Clunkers, the group said. But intermodal traffic, which is driven more by consumers, dropped 16.7 percent from a year ago, the group said. It said the average weekly intermodal count was 196,066, the highest since January.
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