![]() ![]() The maps in the Guide, contributed by the individual railroads, were comprehensive but to some extent fictitious. The Guide seemed a waste of time when Amtrak’s latest system timetable was always handy, although even that document is now conspicuously missing in action. I can’t remember the last time I consulted a contemporary version of the Guide, which upon Amtrak’s arrival in 1971 became a thin version of its old self, filled exclusively with Amtrak and commuter timetables. (Don’t confuse the defunct passenger guide with PocketList’s freight-only Official Railway Guide, which it still publishes). PocketList is owned by the $4 billion British-based information conglomerate IHS Markit, known in other markets for Jane’s Information Group and Carfax. My attempts to reach anyone at PocketList to officially confirm the Guide’s demise were unsuccessful, which probably says something about how irrelevant the passenger version had become. Last July, publisher PocketList decided to pull the plug. “Would I be interested in writing a tribute to the passenger edition of the Official Guide?” I said “of course,” but to tell you the truth, I didn’t even know it still existed.Īctually, it doesn’t. ![]() Old issues of the Official Guide of the Railways are filled with invaluable information, but their pulp paper makes them vulnerable to the ravages of time.A recent email from my friend and colleague Dan Cupper, editor of the venerable R&LHS journal Railroad History, took me by surprise. ![]()
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