Real dollars on real lanes. USDA quotes refrigerated
produce freight every week — the only lane-level rates published free anywhere in
the United States.
Week ending 29 September 2026
Reefer produce, national average$4.32 per mile2.66% on the week ·
29 Sep 2026
Two years
The reefer average over time
Unweighted mean rate per mile across all lanes quoted each week.
Source:
USDA Agricultural Marketing ServiceReefer rate per mile. Refrigerated produce only, and an unweighted mean across whichever lanes were active that week -- so the mix shifts with the growing season. Treat week-to-week moves in the lane table as more meaningful than in this average.
The wider trend
Dry van, flatbed and LTL do not move together
Producer price indices for long-distance truckload, specialized freight and LTL, from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Indexed, not dollars — the axis does not start at zero.
Source:
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics,
Dry van truckload. An index, not a rate. It tracks change from a base period rather than dollars per mile, and it blends contract and spot business, so it moves later and more gently than a spot rate would. NAICS 484121.Flatbed and specialized. The nearest public proxy for flatbed, but it is broader than flatbed alone: NAICS 484230 covers every kind of specialised long-distance hauling except household goods. No free source isolates flatbed by itself.LTL. LTL pricing is set very differently from truckload -- published tariffs, negotiated discounts and accessorials -- so this index is not comparable to the truckload one in level, only in direction. NAICS 484122.