"If it made sense to build a passenger railroad in NM, private industry would have already proposed and financed it."
Same goes for automobile roads?
The problems with railroads is that they get taxed to death, then the unions f their corpses (lawyers skim everything). Otherwise they would be a great form of transportation.
Most certainly!
The path between Philadelphia, New York and Boston was well worn even before the start of the nation. Improvements to segments of that trails that connected to form this pathway were financed by private developers who charged a toll. In order for horse carriages to gain access to the trail, the toll collector would lower a "pike" by turning a handle. Thus the origin of the word "turnpike" for modern, limited access highways.
Bridges were the same. There is still a privately owned toll bridge between New Jersey and Pennsylvania operating for over 100 years (http://www.dingmansbridge.com/)
Now, big government financed networks of interconnecting, cross-continent roadways certainly made it easier to for point to point transportation and shipping to take place. Most people would have opted for point to point travel if they could have but the glory days of the train were before the affordably priced auto.
I say all this as a daily commuter on New Jersey Transit!