(Radio Iowa) – The rail traffic coming into Iowa is providing some mixed signals on economic conditions. The D-O-T’s Stuart Anderson says the volume of some items shipped by rail continues to increase. “Increased car loads in motor vehicles and motor vehicle parts, crushed stone, and sand. Both those measures really are viewed as measures of what the overall economy is looking like, so those are positive measures,” Anderson says.

He says those increases can signal the economy is doing okay. “Not not really moving into a recession, but as we know there’s a lot of other measures out there that would tell you we are, so real conflicting messages on the economy overall but at least from the rail perspective where these have been leading indicators they are positive,” he says. Anderson says on the other side, the number of containers with consumer goods coming in has dropped. “Those have been down significantly although starting to show some improvement here in May,” Anderson says. “But still that would be an indicator that things aren’t necessarily so great from a consumer spending perspective.”

Anderson made his comments during a report to the state Transportation Commission today (Tuesday).