This year has been a strong one for intermodal volumes.

On November 8, the Intermodal Association of North America released the latest reading of its Intermodal Volume Index, a measure of North American intermodal freight activity.

The October 2026 estimate of 105.1 is a predicted 0.3% decline from September but a 5.5% increase from the year prior, underlining the strength of this year’s intermodal volumes.

"We are expecting October to look remarkably similar to September, extending the peak season demand into the first part of Q4," said Andrew Sibold, director of economics, in a statement.

"A word of caution: with strong domestic share shifting from trucking and imports rebounding, there is the potential for capacity to tighten, which would dampen the actual results," Sibold added.

Against a 2017–19 baseline set to 100, IANA gauges what is happening right now — before the official monthly figures are published. It works by translating a high-frequency freight activity onto the same scale as the published index, giving shippers, carriers and analysts an early snapshot of current-month demand. The result is a real-time picture of the intermodal freight economy.