Unfortunately, TRAINS magazine has continued a constant decline over the last 5+ years. I don't think it has anything to do with the people that actually work on the magazine but instead it is a reflection of print media in general these days: you either put out a premium product that people continue to see value in, or you continue to decline into irrelevance. Cost cutting is not the way to go to survive. For me, Railfan and Railroad has just totally changed things ever since White River got involved. It is filled with quality photography with excellent reproduction. You can really tell how much has been invested in putting out a quality product each month. Conversely, TRAINS is printed on recycled paper and is darn near 40% advertisements these days anyway. I won't be renewing when my subscription comes up and I would predict that within 5 years, the printed publication will be pulled altogether.

My apologies for the digression from the original post, but I think any lack of quality one finds in TRAINS' products these days is mostly a function of cost cutting by the parent company - the irony of it all of course is that's exactly what the big Class Is are doing as well...

PS - Signor's maps are hands down the best maps there are. Would be real cool to see a book solely of his maps. I'd buy two copies for sure!