Rail moved second-most freight by weight in 2012, BTS survey shows

About 11.7 billion tons of goods valued at more than $13.6 trillion were shipped in the United States by various transportation modes in 2012, according to preliminary data contained in a Commodity Flow Survey (CFS) released yesterday by the U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) and the U.S. Census Bureau.

Freight transportation figures show trucks moved about 8 billion tons of manufactured goods, refined petroleum products, chemicals and raw materials last year valued at $10 trillion. The shipments represent more than 70 percent of total cargo both by value and weight.

Rail was the second most-used mode by weight, carrying 1.8 billion tons of freight, or a 16 percent share. But by value, rail moved cargo worth $455 billion, or only 3 percent of total value, according to the CFS.

Based on ton-miles — which is derived by multiplying a cargo's weight by the distance shipped — rail accounted for 44.5 percent and trucking, 38.1 percent of the freight transported in 2012.

"When an individual mode's portion of multiple mode shipments is broken out and allocated to a single mode, the ton-miles generated by rail rise to 51 percent of the total," BTS officials said in a press release.

Intermodal shipments were second to trucking in cargo value at $1.8 trillion, or more than 13 percent of total value. Multiple modes carried 347 million tons of freight, accounting for 3 percent of total weight.