Triple 14 — Friday, September 11, 2026

TL;DR — the day in rail + freight.

• Week 35 (ending Sept. 5) U.S. rail traffic totaled 533,545 carloads and intermodal units, up 13.8% year over year — 234,397 carloads (+8.9%) and 299,148 intermodal units (+18.0%) [1][2].
• That headline is flattered by a soft 2025 base. Sequentially, week 35 was down about 9,700 units (-1.8%) from week 34's 543,212 [1][3]. Plan off the year-to-date trend (+3.6% combined), not the weekly YoY print [1][2][4].
• Coal was the only one of ten carload groups to decline (-3,547 to 58,037); metallic ores/metals, grain and chemicals led the gains [1][2] — a mix shift that pulls equipment toward bulk and manifest lanes.
• Service: one minor CSX derailment at Danville, W.Va., Monday morning closed two grade crossings for most of the day; local road impact, no mainline outage [6].
• No fetched sourcing this cycle on intermodal spot/contract rates, port dwell or chassis, or STB/demurrage/tariff action. Those sections are marked, not filled.

Market snapshot — rail + intermodal rates, volumes, capacity.

Volumes are the only verifiable read today. AAR's week 35 report, released Sept. 9, put total U.S. traffic at 533,545 carloads and intermodal units for the week ending Sept. 5, up 13.8% year over year, with carloads at 234,397 (+8.9%) and intermodal at 299,148 containers and trailers (+18.0%) [1][2]. Nine of ten carload commodity groups posted gains, led by metallic ores and metals (+4,859 to 23,122), grain (+4,373 to 22,509) and chemicals (+3,848 to 33,653). Coal was the sole decliner, off 3,547 to 58,037 [1][2].

Read the YoY figure with care. Against week 34 — 543,212 units, 240,021 carloads, 303,191 intermodal — week 35 was down roughly 9,700 units sequentially, or -1.8%, with carloads -2.3% and intermodal -1.3% (arithmetic on [1] and [3]). The jump in the YoY comparison, from +4.1% in week 34 [3] to +13.8% in week 35 [1], is far larger than anything that happened in the actual volumes, which points to a weak 2025 Labor Day-week base rather than a demand surge. AAR's published commentary in these sources does not address the base effect, so treat +13.8% as a calendar artifact until it does.

For contract and capacity planning, use the year-to-date series: through 35 weeks, U.S. carloads are 7,986,328 (+2.8%) and intermodal 9,904,325 (+4.2%), for 17,890,653 combined (+3.6%) [1][2][4]. Cross-border, Canadian carloads ran 94,927 (+10.4%) with intermodal 72,202 (+8.9%); Mexican carloads were 12,108 (-7.4%) with intermodal 14,729 (+10.1%) [1][2]. The coal-down/everything-else-up pattern is not new — an AAR readout covering week 30 flagged that headline growth understated industrial strength once coal was excluded [5].

No rate data in the fetched sources this cycle: no intermodal spot or contract benchmarks, no fuel surcharge movement, no truckload comparison for conversion math. Do not price off the volume print alone.

Service advisories — Class 1 disruptions: weather, derailments, labor, maintenance windows.

One concrete event. A minor CSX derailment was reported at about 3:30 a.m. Monday, Sept. 7, in Danville, West Virginia, closing the Fourth Street and Third Street grade crossings for most of that day while crews rerailed equipment; road traffic was routed to the bypass and U.S. 119 [6]. This was a crossing-level incident, not a mainline outage, and the source shows no network impact.

Weather to watch in the same footprint: concurrent coverage flagged flash-flood and severe-storm warnings with 4–8 inches of overnight rain across parts of eastern Ohio and northern West Virginia, including Gallia, Mason and Jackson counties [6] — CSX Appalachian coal and chemical territory. The source does not date those bulletins precisely against Sept. 7, and no railroad has confirmed embargoes, detours or slow orders.

No labor actions, no planned maintenance windows, and no published service advisories from BNSF, UP, NS, CSX, CN or CPKC appear in the fetched sources.

Port congestion — major ports (LA/LB, NY/NJ, Savannah, Houston): dwell, backups, chassis.

No material development in the fetched sources this cycle.

Regulatory — STB rulings, demurrage rules, tariffs, policy.

No material development in the fetched sources this cycle. One unconfirmed lead: Progressive Railroading's trending index carries an item on RailPulse addressing demurrage disputes [4], but only the headline was retrievable — pull and read the full piece before briefing customers on it.

Signals worth watching — what to track next.

1. Week 36 normalization. AAR's next weekly report lands Wednesday, Sept. 16. Watch whether the YoY comparison falls back toward the low-single-digit YTD trend once the Labor Day base distortion clears [1][4].
2. Coal's isolation. Whether coal stays the only soft carload group (-3,547 YoY in week 35) or a second group turns negative — the first real signal of broader industrial softening [1][2].
3. Appalachian weather escalation. Whether the eastern Ohio / northern West Virginia flooding produces a published CSX service advisory, embargo or slow order rather than isolated crossing closures [6].
4. STB weekly service data. Velocity, terminal dwell and cars online post Thursdays and are the better predictor of missed rail bookings than volume; the current source set contains no STB filing, so next Thursday's release is the priority pull.
5. RailPulse demurrage item. Confirm the substance before it reaches shipper conversations [4].

Sources

1. AAR Reports Weekly Rail Traffic for the Week Ending September 5, 2026 — Railpace Newsmagazine, Sept. 9, 2026 — https://railpace.com/aar-reports-weekly-rail-traffic-for-the-week-ending-september-5-2026/
2. U.S. Rail Traffic Up 13.8% in Week Ending September 5, 2026 — IndexBox, Sept. 9, 2026 — https://www.indexbox.io/blog/us-rail-traffic-up-138-in-week-ending-september-5-2026/
3. AAR reports rail traffic for the week ending August 29, 2026 — American Journal of Transportation, Sept. 2, 2026 — https://www.ajot.com/news/aar-reports-rail-traffic-for-the-week-ending-august-29-2026
4. US freight railroads logged increased traffic in week 35 — Progressive Railroading, Sept. 10, 2026 — https://www.progressiverailroading.com/intermodal/news/US-freight-railroads-logged-increased-traffic-in-week-35--77719
5. Rail Traffic UP: Is the Industrial Economy Robust? [AAR Data] — FreightWaves via Yahoo Finance, Aug. 5–6, 2026 — https://finance.yahoo.com/economy/articles/rail-traffic-industrial-economy-robust-011958088.html
6. Minor train derailment in Danville closes two railroad crossings Monday — WCHS, Sept. 7, 2026 — https://wchstv.com/news/local/minor-train-derailment-in-danville-closes-two-railroad-crossings-monday