Shipments of truck trailers during August totaled 23,652, according to the Truck Trailer Manufacturers Association, as the pace remained slower than the record year of 1998, when 344,007 shipments were reported.
The August total was a 23% drop from the 30,731 shipped in 1998. For the first eight months of the 1999, trailer shipments totaled 186,945, which was 16% below the figure for the same period in 1998.
Shipment figures from the Bureau of Census, rather than sales figures, are reported by TTMA to gauge trailer manufacturing activity. The bureau’s preliminary figures usually are revised downward by about 15%.
While overall figures for trailers lagged behind 1998, shipments of containers and container chassis were up 2.1% through August, from 13,632 to 13,922. For the month, container shipments dropped to 1,805 from 1,898 in August 1998.
For the full story, see the Oct. 25 print edition of Transport Topics. .
