AI Analysis: Railway carloadings statistics, by total tonnage transported, monthly

Executive Summary

Canadian railway carloading statistics from 1999 to 2026 reveal a steady 31.6% growth in total monthly tonnage, rising from approximately 23.5 million to 30.9 million tonnes, driven primarily by bulk non-intermodal commodities alongside an increasingly important intermodal segment. The dataset — spanning 325 months, 47,775 records, and 75 unique components — is heavily right-skewed, with a mean of 596,845 tonnes nearly 37 times larger than the median of 16,296 tonnes, reflecting the dominance of a few high-volume commodity categories. Notably, the data shows remarkable long-term stability, with no statistical outliers detected across the entire 27-year period.

Key Findings

• Total monthly railway tonnage grew by 31.6% over the study period, from ~23.5 million tonnes in 1999 to ~30.9 million tonnes in 2026, reflecting sustained growth in Canadian freight demand.
• The dataset is heavily right-skewed, with a mean of 596,845 tonnes versus a median of just 16,296 tonnes, indicating that a small number of high-volume commodity categories dominate overall rail freight volumes.
• Container-on-flat-car and Total intermodal traffic loaded are nearly perfectly correlated (r=0.998), confirming that containerized freight moves in near lockstep with overall intermodal rail activity.
• Non-intermodal bulk commodities — including grain, coal, and potash — account for the largest share of total railway tonnage, while intermodal traffic has grown as an increasingly significant and distinct freight segment.
• An unexpected negative correlation (r=-0.899) exists between Animal/vegetable fats and oils and Newsprint, suggesting opposing seasonal or economic cycles driving these two commodity types.
• Zero statistical outliers were detected across 325 months of data using a z-score threshold of ±2.5, with a standard deviation of ~3.4 million tonnes around a mean of ~27.6 million tonnes, indicating exceptional long-term consistency in Canadian rail freight volumes.
• Individual monthly values range from 0 to over 34.8 million tonnes across 75 components, with 50% of all records concentrated between just 2,078 and 216,124 tonnes, highlighting the extreme disparity between niche and dominant commodity categories.