Definition of "penurious"

As the Swindon, Marlborough & Andover, conceived in 1872 and opened between the first two places in 1881 and to Andover and the L.S.W.R. in 1883, it was one of many small, ambitious and penurious Victorian lines, deeply concerned in the skulduggery characteristic of inter-railway dealings of that age and vexed by the G.W.R.

1961 October, “Talking of Trains: Last of the M.S.W.J.R”, in Trains Illustrated, page 585