Triple 14 — Sunday, September 13, 2026

TL;DR — No port-level data cleared verification this cycle: nothing in the fetched source set carries dwell times, vessel counts, chassis availability, or gate/berth throughput for LA/Long Beach, NY/NJ, Savannah, or Houston, and no labor or weather disruption at those ports is documented in any fetched source. What is confirmed is the inland side: U.S. rail traffic for the week ending September 5, 2026 ran 533,545 carloads and intermodal units, up 13.8% year over year, with intermodal up 18.0% [1][2][3]. Treat that as a demand signal, not a fluidity signal — rail loadings lag terminal conditions by days and carry no port granularity.

Port snapshot — No verified dwell, vessel-backup, chassis, or gate-throughput figures for LA/Long Beach, NY/NJ, Savannah, or Houston in the fetched sources this cycle; no number is reported here rather than carried over from a stale period.

Service advisories — No weather or labor development affecting berth or gate operations at the four named ports appears in any fetched source this cycle. On rail connections, the picture is a surge. The AAR week ending September 5, 2026, reported September 9, put carloads at 234,397 (+8.9% YoY) and intermodal at 299,148 containers and trailers (+18.0% YoY) [1][2][3]. Nine of ten carload commodity groups gained — metallic ores and metals +4,859 to 23,122, grain +4,373 to 22,509, chemicals +3,848 to 33,653 — with coal the lone decliner, down 3,547 to 58,037 [1][2][3]. Year to date through 35 weeks, U.S. volume stands at 17,890,653 units, up 3.6%, intermodal up 4.2% [1][2]. One caveat for anyone pricing off that 13.8%: the week contained the Labor Day holiday in both 2026 and 2025, and none of the sources flags a calendar adjustment, so the figure is unadjusted. For brokers, heavy intermodal loadings are consistent with strong inland pull off the coasts and tightening ramp capacity, but they do not confirm or rule out congestion at any specific terminal.

Regulatory — No port authority ruling, demurrage or detention decision, or tariff action appears in the fetched sources this cycle.

Signals worth watching — The STB's Rail Service Data page is the nearest verified proxy for the inland backups that feed port dwell: Class I carriers file weekly on system average train speed, weekly average terminal dwell, cars online, trains held per day by cause, and loaded and empty cars not moved in 48 hours or more, plus Chicago gateway data covering average daily car counts in Chicago yards and trains held short of Chicago [4]. STB also notes it is collecting data from the Belt Railway of Chicago tied to an August 3, 2026 Board letter [4]; the sources do not explain what prompted the letter, which makes it worth tracking on its own. For the port metrics this brief could not source, collection needs to run against terminal- and agency-level publishers directly: PMSA's LA/LB container dwell reports and the ports' own dashboards for dwell and truck turn times; Marine Exchange of Southern California daily vessel reports and the Sandy Hook and Georgia Ports equivalents for berth and anchorage counts; Pool of Pools, DCLI, and TRAC advisories for chassis street dwell and pool availability; National Hurricane Center advisories for Gulf and South Atlantic gate and berth risk during the September peak; ILA and ILWU notices for labor; and FMC dockets plus port authority tariff filings for regulatory. Next AAR print lands Wednesday and will show whether the post-Labor Day intermodal rate holds.

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 September 05, 2026 — Material Handling Wholesaler, Sept. 9, 2026 — https://www.mhwmag.com/nuts-bolts/aar-reports-rail-traffic-for-the-week-ending-september-05-2026/
4. Rail Service Data — U.S. Surface Transportation Board — https://www.stb.gov/reports-data/rail-service-data/