> And those are on twinned, dedicated passenger tracks where you never have to wait on a siding for a freight train to go by in the other direction
In Europe passengers trains have priority over freight trains of which there are very little anyway. Freight mostly goes by road while trains are mostly used to transport passengers. It is very different from how the network is used in North America.
That's not entirely true - rail freight in Europe is widely used, but usually uses different lines ( e.g. the old Paris-Lille line is used exclusively for freight, while the new high speed one is for passenger trains only), and yes, it has lower priority when its shared.
However, according to statistics i found, rail freight in the EU is at 17% for 2019[0], while in the US it's at 9%[1] for 2017.
In Europe passengers trains have priority over freight trains of which there are very little anyway. Freight mostly goes by road while trains are mostly used to transport passengers. It is very different from how the network is used in North America.