The PAL interchanges with Burlington Northern Santa Fe (BNSF) and Canadian National (CN), formerly Illinois Central Railroad, in Paducah.

In Louisville, the line interchanges with the Indiana Rail Road (INRD), CSX Transportation (CSXT) and Norfolk Southern (NS).

The line today carries over 200,000 carloads of traffic on a CTC-controlled mainline with welded rail and even a section of multiple main track nearly 20 miles (32 km) long between Paducah and just east of Calvert City.

It has 270 route-miles of track, of which 233 miles (375 km) are its mainline running between its namesake towns of Paducah and Louisville, as well as branch lines to Mayfield, Kevil, and Elizabethtown.

The railroad serves "many chemical plants and other manufacturing companies, several coal mines, numerous clay and stone quarries, lumber and propane distributors, farm [including a few large grain elevators] and mine equipment suppliers, warehouses, transloads, bulk terminals, riverports, and one military base."