TransCore’s Canadian Freight Index that reflects spot market freight shipments both within Canada and cross border remained steady with an increase of 1% from July. Year-over-year load volumes, however, were down 13% from August 2011. Cross-border volume accounted for 71% of overall loads while intra-Canada freight made up 25% of the total load volumes.
Equipment availability increased 3% month-over-month and 13% year-over-year. Available capacity has continued to increase from the beginning of the year with August volumes sitting at the highest levels year-to-date. August equipment volumes were down only 3% from the peak posting levels of August 2007.
While an increase was seen in both equipment and load postings, the equipment-to-loads ratio for August widened to the largest variance in 2012, depicting a larger increase in available capacity.
Regional Breakdowns are as follows:
Top destinations for loads imported into Canada were: Ontario (54%), Western (25%), Quebec (20%), and Atlantic (1%).
Top regions for import equipment into Canada were: Ontario (52%), Western (24%), Quebec (21%), and Atlantic (3%).
Regions of origins of loads within Canada were: Western (43%), Ontario (27%), Quebec (22%), and Atlantic (8%).
The top states of origin for loads destined to Canada in order of most loads were Ohio, Pennsylvania, Illinois, California and Indiana. Texas dropped off from the top 5 to 9th place for the first time in months.
The top destinations for freight originating in Canada were New York, Texas, Pennsylvania, California, and Florida.