The overnight train takes about 191⁄2 hours to complete its 934-mile (1,503 km) route, making major stops in Champaign–Urbana, Carbondale, Memphis, and Jackson as well as in other small towns.

The City of New Orleans was first initiated by the Illinois Central Railroad in 1947 as the daytime complement to the Panama Limited, a night train dating back to 1911.

In 1981 Amtrak revived the City of New Orleans name for the train, still on an overnight schedule, on the heels of the popular song of the same name by Steve Goodman.

Additional corridor service on the northern segment of the route is provided by the Illini and Saluki between Chicago and Carbondale, Illinois.

The 921-mile (1,482 km) route, which the City of New Orleans covered in 15 hours 55 minutes, was the longest daytime schedule in the United States.

[7] When Amtrak assumed operation of U.S. passenger train service on May 1, 1971, it dropped the Panama Limited in favor of retaining the City of New Orleans on the traditional daytime schedule.

Real dining service[vague] returned; by the early 1990s an Amfleet dinette had doubled with the lounge car.

[19] Because of damage in Mississippi and Louisiana due to Hurricane Katrina, Amtrak was forced in late August 2005 to truncate the City of New Orleans at Memphis, Tennessee.

[25][26] In 2016, Amtrak released a study on bringing passenger rail to the Gulf Coast that recommended extending the City of New Orleans to Orlando, Florida along trackage once traversed by the Sunset Limited but unserved since Hurricane Katrina.

[27] The Chicago Region Environmental and Transportation Efficiency Program (CREATE) is in the preliminary design phase for the Grand Crossing Project.

Many other artists, notably Willie Nelson, Johnny Cash, John Denver (with slightly different lyrics), Judy Collins, and Jerry Reed have also recorded it.