BB&T Capital Markets Transportation Services Conference
Miami, FL - February 15, 2006
Prepared remarks by:
Henry C. Wolf
Vice Chairman and Chief Financial Officer
Norfolk Southern Corporation
Donald W. Seale
Executive Vice President Sales and Marketing
Norfolk Southern Corporation
Good morning. It’s a pleasure to join you. I would like to thank John [Barnes] and the entire BB&T Capital Markets team for inviting us to participate in this new event.
I am joined this morning by Don Seale, our Executive Vice President for Sales and Marketing, and Leanne Marilley, our Director of Investor Relations.
What we would like to do first this morning is have Don Seale provide you with an in depth discussion of our 2005 railway operating revenues and provide a brief outlook for 2006.
Slide Good morning.
It is a pleasure to join you today. As you know, we are coming off of a record performance for 2005. So this morning I will recap some key trends in our business and our outlook for continued market expansion and yield improvement going forward.
Slide Before we look ahead, it’s worthwhile to review where we have been over the past five years compared to industrial production, the other U.S. railroads and the motor carrier industry.
Since 2001, our volume has increased at nearly twice the rate of these comparative metrics. Our units have grown 17% over 2001 levels, led by a 43% gain in Intermodal volume. This compares to 9% overall growth for the other U.S. railroads.
Our growth has also outpaced expansion in manufacturing by nearly a three-to-one ratio. The low tech industrial production index has increased 6% over the recession year of 2001.
And perhaps most importantly, our five year growth trend has exceeded the 9% gain in truck tonnage over this period.
Slide In 2005 we recorded volume of 7.8 million units as w