The article you linked makes no mention of maintenance and infrastructure emissions. There's just a single table that seems to be based on fuel emissions at the time of travel.

I cannot look everything up. Soooooo … trust me bro.

It's also specific to existing rail infrastructure, which is fine, but for the purposes of argument and comparison, it would be ideal to compare the most efficient bus/roadway system with the most efficient rail system. Zero-emissions trains exist, yet somehow just maintaining the rail line would completely offset that according to your argument?

There also exist zero emission cars. So this argument doesn’t work so well. We are talking about real life applications. And that’s why it is absolutely reasonable to compare existing infrastructure. Germany has invested heavily into both, automobile infrastructure and Railroad infrastructure. So the comparison seems to be alright.

Asphalt is an oil product, yes, but it still needs to be processed and turned into asphalt. That also emits pollution. So does transporting it to the destination, and all the other environmental factors with building up a road surface.

And so does steel and concrete.

You can't just hand wave that away "because we already made a ton of it". That's not how sustainability works. We're explicitly trying to reduce our reliance on oil.

I can hand wave this off completely fine, since it would be technically possible to frac bitumen into synthesis gas as well. So asphalt is still bound carbon. And that’s alright that way.

You also seem to be ignoring that rail lasts orders of magnitude longer than asphalt, and don't constantly have to be patched and repaired for pot holes.

This is wrong. They need to be ground down regularity, they need to be replaced regularity due to material fatigue, railroads need intense care - freed from plants regularity, much more frequent in fact than asphalt, due to its open structure. In Addition to rails, there is need for electrical wiring above the train. This wiring is also needed to replace regularity due to material fatigue, constant rubbing of the metals onto each other. Then we also have further infrastructure for people, so called train stations. Especially larger train stations must be heated in winter with immense amounts of gas and train stations made of glass in summer are in desperate need of cooling. You just have to take a look at the prices for a ride. If it compares financially, then it most likely compares in emissions as well.

Steel is also one of the most recycled materials on the planet. (Nearly 70% of all steel here in the US is recycled). Melting down old cars or whatever into new rail tracks uses significantly less energy than refining new metal.

While this is correct, it is still very inefficient to melt down steel and then clean it up to recreate the requested alloys. Asphalt on the other hand can be recycled much easier. It is in fact a thermoplastic material. It needs much lower melting temperatures and is not dependant on reductive agents.