Bureau of Transportation Statistics releases air traffic data

The U.S. Department of Transportation Bureau of Transportation Statistics (BTS) released airline traffic data for March on Friday.

The BTS found that airline capacity use, the service load factor, fell to 83.5 percent after seeing three consecutive months of growth. The report said that an all-time high was reached in January 2014 when airline capacity reached 84.6 percent after being seasonally adjusted. The highest point capacity has reached in the past year was 84 percent.

The March numbers are falling in line with trends that have been established after the national recession. This indicates that following the economic downturn, passenger and commercial travel increased with regard to load factors.

The BTS said that February 2015 was ranked as having the third highest load factor and this most recent factor ranks eighth among all-time highs. Before seasonal adjustment, March had a load factor of 83.9 percent, which falls between the all-time high for the month that was set in 2013 at 84.3 percent and the unadjusted load factor for March 2014.
   
For domestic travel, load factors were at 85.8 percent with high levels of passengers and revenue passenger-miles. Available seat-miles reached levels equivalent to pre-recession data. International load factors were at 79.5 percent.