April truck tonnage readings trend down, reports ATA

Amid what it called a “choppy” freight market, the American Trucking Associations (ATA) reported today that April truck tonnage saw declines.

The April reading of the ATA’s advanced Seasonally Adjusted (SA) For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index came in at 113.0 (2015=100), off 0.3% from March’s 113.3 reading. And it posted a 0.1% annual gain, with annual readings posting gains for the past four months, while posting the smallest increase over that time. When it posted its third consecutive annual gain in March, ATA said that marked the first three-month stretch of annual gains since late 2022 and into early 2023.

The ATA’s not seasonally adjusted (SA) For-Hire Truck Tonnage Index, which represents the change in tonnage actually hauled by fleets before any seasonal adjustment and the metric ATA says fleets should benchmark their levels with, came in at 112.0 in April, down from March’s 114.6 reading.

“After surging 2.8% in February, and hitting the highest level since late May 2024, tonnage fell a combined 1.8% in March and April,” said ATA Chief Economist Bob Costello. “Unfortunately, a recovery that was expected this year hasn’t transpired as the industry deals with a freight market in flux from tariffs and softening economic indicators.”