That bias is correct, at least outside of the North East corridor. Amtrak owns most of the track in the North East Corridor which incidentally is the only place

That bias is correct, at least outside of the North East corridor. Amtrak owns most of the track in the North East Corridor which incidentally is the only place it is profitable. Outside of this corridor the tracks are mostly owned by 5 railroads [1]. Passenger rail is supposed to have priority as Amtrak was the entity created in order to relieve railroads from being required to provide passenger service. This however is an area of a lot of friction. For a recent example of this mess see" https://www.washingtonpost.com/transportation/2022/07/06/amtrak-expansion-freight-rails/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/transportation/2022/07/06/amt... [1] https://soundingmaps.com/the-largest-railroads-in-us/ https://soundingmaps.com/the-largest-railroads-in-us/