This has been nagging at me for a while actually. I'm not a Dogman researcher specifically but I've been cross-referencing old OS maps with reported sighting coordinates and the clustering around disused lines is hard to ignore. Railway cuttings, old embankments, that sort of thing. They create these long undisturbed corridors through the landscape don't they, away from roads and development.
My thinking is its less about the railways themselves and more about what grew back once the lines closed. Dense vegetation, minimal human foot traffic for decades. Could explain why the Lincolnshire cases tend to cluster around the old Great Northern routes.
Has anyone tried overlaying sighting maps with railway closure dates from the Beeching cuts? Would be interesting to see if reports increased in those areas after the 60s when things went overgrown. I'd do it myself but my GIS skills are basically nonexistent. Anyone here more capable with that sort of mapping software?