Scenic Railriders Opens For Its First Full Season: Watch

CONCORD, NH — If you are looking for something completely different to do with your family this summer while not traveling far from home, Gary LeBlanc, the owner of Scenic Railriders on Sewalls Falls Road in Concord, has just the thing for you: Riding a rail bike along on abandoned train track.

Scenic Railriders opened for business late last year, after many years of conceptualizing, building rail bikes, and navigating permits and permissions. The concept came to LeBlanc after looking for a business to start before he retired — his day job is in IT. He saw the idea of rail bike trails in different locations around the country and believed it would be a cool concept. Currently, there are 18 rail rider trails around the country being operated by five companies (he was No. 11, he said, and the only one in New Hampshire).

"I thought to myself, 'This is something that I would really enjoy doing,'" LeBlanc said. "And it's something fun that people can enjoy and it's unique … there's not a lot of competition out there."

Since LeBlanc had a shop in his garage to build the bikes, that would be no problem. Finding an abandoned rail, though, was. Most abandoned rails have been converted into walking and bike paths, a trend that began in the mid-1960s. LeBlanc spent about 18 months attempting to create the business on an abandoned MBTA track in Peabody, Massachusetts, where he lives, but was unsuccessful. After getting a number of approvals, the MBTA's real estate department changed hands, he said, and told him access to the rail would need to put it out to bid. LeBlanc threw up his hands at that point after officials decided not to put it out to bid.

But LeBlanc kept searching and lucked out — finding a section of rail in the northeastern part of Concord, owned by Pan Am, and signed a multi-year lease (the Merrimack River Greenway Trail group is also hoping to convert the section of track as part of its bike and walking path running from the Pembroke line to the Northern Rail Trail in Boscawen).

LeBlanc though couldn't just open up the business. There were city permits, a requirement for an engineered parking lot, at a certain grade and pressure for the gravel to be set as well as other requirements that cost him about $35,000 more than he had planned on spending.

"The whole process was a lot harder than I thought," LeBanc said. "My pocket is a lot lighter … but it is what it is."

After clearing brush and debris from the track, he opened for business in late July.

Business was slow, at first, but that allowed him build more bikes. And, by the end of the season, the last six weeks were booked solid, LeBlanc said.

The rail bikes come in two- and four-seaters that can be connected, too, for larger families. They have mandatory seatbelts and baskets for personal items — so they do not fall out of pockets while pedaling.

The company has 12 bikes and LeBlanc hopes to build a bunch more before the end of the season — enough to have 42 riders on each tour. The bikes take about fives days to build because all the parts are made by hand, based on LeBlanc's own design.

The tours run about two hours and the route is 6.4 miles long. It starts on Sewalls Falls Road and runs south to Second Street where riders take a quick break while the bikes are turned around by staffers. The tour then travels back to Sewalls Falls Road, crosses the street, again, by staffers, and continues north to the Hannah Duston Historic Site. A quick break again while the bikes are turned around and riders travel south again to Sewalls Falls Road back to the starting point.

Each tour group is sent out with 400 feet of space between them. The tours are not meant to be races but leisurely in nature, he said. There is also a weight limit of 300 lbs. per rider.

In the age of COVID-19, LeBlanc has implemented safety protections for guests and employees including pre-tour health questions and screenings, and sanitization of the bikes and surfaces, as well as social distancing.

The bookings for this year have been coming in pretty strong, he said, and the company is fully staffed with employees (last year, the labor market was a bit tight). Tours run three per day on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, with five tours on Saturday and Sunday.

And what does the future hope for Scenic Railriders … another stab at a Massachusetts trail or maybe rail bikes through the White Mountains? LeBlanc is not sure.

"I'm hoping this year goes real well," he said. "Depending on how this year and the next year goes, maybe I'll think about doing another location. After that … I don't know … I really need to get my feet back under me."

For more information or to book a tour, visit the company's website here.

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