Trucking news and briefs for Wednesday, April 19, 2023:
ATA's seasonally-adjusted For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index in March saw the biggest monthly decline since the beginning of the pandemic.ATA
ATA’s advanced seasonally adjusted index equaled 111.6 (2015=100) in March compared with 118 in February.
“After increasing a total of 2.6% during the three previous months, March’s sequential decline was the largest monthly drop since April 2020 during the start of the pandemic,” said ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello. “Falling home construction, decreasing factory output and soft retail sales all hurt contract freight tonnage – which dominates ATA’s tonnage index – during the month. Despite the largest year-over-year drop since October 2020, contract freight remains more robust than the spot market, which continues to see prolonged weakness.”
Compared with March 2022, the SA index decreased 5%, which was the first year-over-year decrease since August 2021. In February, the index was up 1.9% from a year earlier. During the first quarter, tonnage was 0.6% below the same three-month period in 2022.
The not seasonally adjusted index, which represents the change in tonnage actually hauled by the fleets before any seasonal adjustment, equaled 117.2 in March, 9.3% above the February level (107.2).
Navistar is recalling nearly 45,000 trucks and buses due to a wiring issue related to the heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning (HVAC) system, according to National Highway Traffic Safety Administration documents.
