Railway carloadings, May 2012 (preliminary data)

PDF version

Previous release

Canadian railways carried 26.0 million tonnes of freight in May, down 0.9% from May 2011. The drop was solely the result of decreases in domestic freight shipments, as international cargo loadings rose.

On the domestic front, freight loadings, composed of non-intermodal traffic (i.e., carried in bulk or loaded in box cars) and intermodal traffic (i.e., containers and trailers on flat cars), fell 3.5% to 22.5 million tonnes over the same 12-month period.

Non-intermodal cargo loadings declined 4.2% to 20.1 million tonnes. The decrease was the result of reduced traffic in more than half of the commodity classifications carried by the railways. The commodity groups with the largest declines in tonnage were wheat, coal and potash.

In contrast, several commodity groups registered increases. Loadings of fuel oils and crude petroleum increased the most, followed by sand, gravel and crushed stone, and iron ores and concentrates.

Intermodal freight loadings grew 2.3% to 2.4 million tonnes. The increase occurred solely on the strength of containerized cargo shipments, as trailers loaded onto flat cars declined.

Internationally, total rail traffic received from the United States advanced 20.3% to 3.5 million tonnes. The increase was driven by both non-intermodal and intermodal traffic.

Geographically, 57.3% of the freight traffic originating in Canada was in the Western Division of Canada, with the remainder loaded in the Eastern Division. For statistical purposes, cargo loadings from Thunder Bay, Ontario, to the Pacific Coast are classified to the Western Division while loadings from Armstrong, Ontario, to the Atlantic Coast are classified to the Eastern Division.