BOONE, Iowa—Rail Explorers, featuring pedal powered railbikes, has named Heather Abel as General Manager, Western Region. In this role, Abel will oversee all the division operations across the Western Region of Rail Explorers including Boone-IA, Las Vegas-NV and coming in 2023 Amador-CA. In her new role Abel will lead staff development, training, tour operations, marketing, sales, and community relations.
Abel brings extensive experience to her new position. For the past two years she was the Division Manager for Rail Explorers Las Vegas. Under her leadership sales and community engagement in the Las Vegas division grew significantly.
“Heather brings extensive experience in leadership, customer service, sales and communications to her new position,” said Mary Joy Lu, CEO Rail Explorers. “Along with several years of experience with our company, Heather’s ability to motivate her team is a key component of the continued success of Rail Explorers,” added Lu.
Rail Explorers are the founders of the railbike industry in the USA and pioneered this unique and exciting way to experience the magic of the railroad. Their heavy duty, commercial grade railbikes are the only all steel framed railbikes in America. Rail Explorers are the industry leader in safety and customer service.
About Rail ExplorersThe inspiration to start Rail Explorers originally came from a scene in a Korean soap opera. Back in September of 2012, Mary Joy Lu (who started Rail Explorers with her husband Alex Catchpoole) was watching one of her favorite K-Dramas and became intrigued when she saw a strange contraption being pedaled along the railroad tracks. Mary Joy was so excited by this extraordinary looking rail bike that within 10 days she was on a plane to South Korea to meet with the designer and manufacturer of the vehicles. Mary Joy, Alex, and other Rail Explorers employees traveled back to Korea in 2015 to learn more about the unique business. Rail Explorers was then able to bring a fleet of explorers to the USA. This was the first time these rail bikes had been seen anywhere in the world outside of South Korea.
Rail Explorers operations began on July 3, 2015, in New York’s Adirondacks and the response was extraordinary. Since that day more than 350,000 people have enjoyed Rail Explorers in the Adirondacks, Delaware, Rhode Island, Las Vegas, Boone, Iowa, New York’s Catskill Mountains and Cooperstown, NY.
Heather Abel, General Manager, Western Region
(contributed press release, Rail Explorers)
