The reason I cant store them as Block& is because that makes a copy of the Block when it is entered,

Raw pointers should be avoided when possible.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by 'makes a copy'. Containers themselves can't store raw references. Possibly you are making a function accepting a ref but then putting them into a container with a non-ref.

In C++11 (which I recommend using unless you have compiler restraints) you can also store references in a container with a std::ref or std::cref. You will need to make sure your compiler is compiling in C++11 mode.

#include <iostream>
#include <map>
#include <functional>
using namespace std; 

class Block {
   public:
      Block(const std::string& name, const int block_id) {
         this->name = name;
         this->block_id = block_id;
      }
   private:
      std::string name;
      int block_id;
};

const Block block_1("Vacuum", 0);

int main(int argc, char* argv[]) {
   std::map<int, std::reference_wrapper<const Block>> array;
   array.insert(std::pair<int, reference_wrapper<const Block>>(0, block_1));
}

Otherwise you could make your own simple ref container:

class BlockRef {
    Block& block;
};

You could also make a more advanced one with templates that's generic for any type.

Boost has them also if you are ok with using a library.

The reason I cant store them as Block& is because that makes a copy of the Block when it is entered,

Raw pointers should be avoided when possible.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by 'makes a copy'. Containers themselves can't store raw references. Possibly you are making a function accepting a ref but then putting them into a container with a non-ref.

In C++11 (which I recommend using unless you have compiler restraints) you can also store references in a container with a std::ref or std::cref. You will need to make sure your compiler is compiling in C++11 mode.

#include <iostream>
#include <map>
#include <functional>
using namespace std; 

class Block {
   public:
      Block(const std::string& name, const int block_id) {
         this->name = name;
         this->block_id = block_id;
      }
   private:
      std::string name;
      int block_id;
};

const Block block_1("Vacuum", 0);

int main(int argc, char* argv[]) {
   std::map<int, std::reference_wrapper<const Block>> array;
   array.insert(std::pair<int, reference_wrapper<const Block>>(0, block_1));
}

Otherwise you could make your own simple ref container:

class BlockRef {
   public:
      BlockRef(const Block& blockref): blockref_(blockref) {}
      operator const Block& () const { return this->blockref_; }
   private:
      const Block& blockref_;
};

You could also make a more advanced one with templates that's generic for any type.

Boost has them also if you are ok with using a library.