From Capital New York comes the news that the Automobiles section that runs in every Sunday issue of the New York Times was just killed in a memo, and will cease publication after the first of the year.
No word on what this means for Autos Editor and all-around wonderful human being James Cobb or the rest of their excellent staff, according to Joe Pompeo at CapNY. They will keep their online section, which makes sense.
Here's the memo:
Dear Colleagues,
As I said in a previous note, we are reviewing sections of The Times as part of our effort to cut costs in the newsroom. So I regret to announce that as of the first of the year we will no longer publish a stand-alone autos section.
We will continue covering the automobile industry, of course, as evidenced by our sensational investigative reporting on the ignition switch problems in General Motors cars. And we will run consumer stories in the Business section, including regular coverage on Fridays. The Driven videos will continue online.
But despite sensational work over the years by Jim Cobb and his crew, the masthead and I concluded there is no longer an economic reason for a separate section.
Jim was there 20 years ago when the Sunday section was launched, and he has made The Times proud ever since. In the day, the insatiable demand among print advertisers had the coverage spread across several days, including Sunday. Now we'll consolidate our print efforts on Friday, while remaining nimble on the web.
There will be opportunities in the coming weeks to single out the great work of Jim, Norman Mayersohn, Jim Schembari, Robert Peele and the many contributors, but let me start here by saying how grateful I am for two decades of imagination and dedication in making our Sunday section the best read in the business.
— Dean
It's worth mentioning they already killed their blog. Either way, our best to everyone involved.