CSX freight also causes delays between Chicago and New Orleans. When I was delayed, the conductor claimed that CSX was in violation of either state law (IL) or the rail-sharing contract they have. I forget which.
I've heard a conductor on the Lakeshore line out of Chicago vent similarly. It was something like, the contracts with CSX specify a dollar amount based on the on-time percentage Amtrak achieves, which Amtrak thought would guarantee priority, but it turns out that CSX would rather leave money on the table than give Amtrak the least bit of priority.
I honestly suspect CSX actively hates Amtrak at some level of management. You've got these passenger trains running fixed schedules 3-5 times a week and you can't run them on time? I can't believe that is an accident.
