Truck traffic recovery continues to strengthen at US-Canada toll crossings

The first half of the year saw 3.38m trucks at the eleven toll crossings between the US and Canada v 2.88m in the first half of 2009 (21009H1), a 17.4% rise.  Those are average daily traffic of 18.5k 2010H1 v 15.8k 2009H1.

The Detroit area crossings saw the biggest rise. Ambassador Bridge truck traffic is 2010H1 was 1.35m v 1.07m 2009H1, an average daily 7.37k v 5.87k, a 26% rise half year on half year. (But this 7.37k is still well below 2006H1, which was 9.9k average daily truck traffic.)

Blue Water Bridge is doing daily 4.03k v 3.4k a 19% increase. (2006H1 saw Blue Water truck traffic 4.7k daily average.)

June by itself this year showed an even larger advance on June last year. At the Ambassador Bridge truck traffic averaged 8.1k/day June 2010 v 5.8k June 2009, a 40% advance.

Blue Water Bridge ran 4.5k trucks/day this June v 3.7k last June, 22% up.

Niagara R crossings up far less

The Niagara River crossings are up but by far lesser amounts in their truck traffic.

Peace Bridge truck traffic 2010H1 was average daily 3.3k v 3k for 2009H1, a 12% rise.  June itself was 3.7k, an 18% advance on June 2009's 3.1k.

Lewiston-Queenston the other New York to Ontario bridge has been running about 1.9k trucks/day just 4% up on 2009H1. In  June the number was around 2k/day, up 6% on last June.

The contrast of strong Michigan truck recovery versus much weaker New York truck traffic is supportive of the notion that the recovery of auto manufacturing centered in Michigan and Ontario is the main driver of the truck numbers.

Cars good June but little sign of recovery

Total car traffic in June was up nicely at the eleven crossings running 80k/day v around 70k last June, a 14% rise. But previous months of 2010 over the same month a year earlier were a mix of declines and advances. For the first six months of 2010 average car traffic was 70.5k/day a tiny 1.2% increase on 2009H1's 69.6k average daily.

Bus traffic is down, both the month and the half year.

The data is collected by the Public Border Operators Association, a cooperative of the toll crossing operators.

Here is the spreadsheet they produce:

http://www.tollroadsnews.com/sites/default/files/PBOA201006.xls

TOLLROADSnews 2010-07-12