In the classic cartoon “Road Runner,” they’re used by Wylie Coyote to attempt – and fail – to catch his crafty bird nemesis.

From the mid-1800s to the early 1900s, they were tools used to transport maintenance workers to train tracks in need of repair.

For Mason Clark, railroad handcars are both a passion and a business. Clark (’19, mechanical engineering), a railroad buff since he was a young boy, developed an interest in handcars specifically when he was around 12.

“It’s a very niche activity,” he says. “There are only a few people in the country that own one.”

Clark, who owns and operates Handcar Tours in Marina (about 15 miles north of Monterey), has more than two dozen handcars – 13 of the manual variety that operate a lot like a rowing machine and 14 of the electric kind that riders pedal. The Santa Clarita resident works a full-time engineering job during the week, and then heads up to Marina on the weekends to provide tourists the opportunity to ride the rails overlooking the Pacific Ocean and through historic parts of the Central Coast. He opened Handcar Tours with his father in July 2021 and tested the concept for about three months. They had about 5,000 riders that summer season, Clark says.

“After that, we kind of reconfigured,” he says. “We looked at what were the next steps we needed to do to make this more permanent.”

Clark spent over a year getting the necessary permits and permissions to operate permanently and re-opened in 2022. They leased a property that includes a portion of unused railroad tracks from the city, cleared out weeds and debris, built and painted a fence to border the land, and constructed a small building that serves as the ticket office.

Since re-opening in 2022, Clark estimates the company has had around 10,000 riders.

Not bad for what started as his college senior project.

The old-fashioned handcar, which Clark built as a teen, features a platform that riders stand on, as well as a pump that makes the handcar go. For his senior engineering project, he built a new car with seats and pumps for four riders – a novel invention of his own.

“It was an improved version of the original car from the 1800s,” he says. “It was very unique at the time.”

After college, he designed and developed the electric rail bike version, which is less physically challenging than the manual handcars.

His original handcars cost approximately $30,000 each to build.

“That wasn’t intentional,” he says. “But when you start building and designing, you might need to change a project while you’re doing it. If you make a mistake in school, you can retake the class. When you’re building a project like these handcars, the punishment is the loss of lots of money. I look back at it and realize it is not the end of the world.”

The mechanical engineering program was challenging but enabled him to grow. “It was a little brutal at times, but that’s to be expected when you do an engineering degree, especially at a program like Cal Poly Pomona,” he says. “Being able to learn on my own and figure things out is something I got out of it. Some of the professors were very industry-minded and that helped.”

A FAMILY AFFAIR

On a recent fall Sunday morning, overcast skies blanketed the tracks in Marina. But that didn’t affect the riders as all tours for that day were sold out. Clark briefs the group on safety and operating the handcars before they take off on six-mile roundtrip tour that goes through the Fort Ord State Park and includes a crest where the ocean can be seen on a clear day.

The business is truly a family affair.

Clark’s mom, Donnalee Clark, helps load the cars on the track and prepares the riders for takeoff. She says she doesn’t consider herself a part of the business. She just does what she can to support it.

His dad, Todd Clark, handles the finances and helps with operations.

Todd describes his son as focused, determined and hardworking, traits that have helped Mason launch a successful small business, even while working a full-time job.

“It’s his dedication,” Todd says. “He’s a go-getter. To take this on like he did is just amazing.”

Mason has always been a self-learner, Todd says, adding that, as a teen, his son was building and selling handcars across the country and internationally to Canada and France.

“That’s what got him into mechanical engineering and how he got to Cal Poly Pomona,” Todd says.

Clark credits Cal Poly Pomona, in part, for giving him the skills necessary to make his handcar dreams a reality.

“I couldn’t do what I have done with the handcars without the knowledge I gained from school,” he says.

The mechanical engineering program was challenging but enabled him to grow. “It was a little brutal at times, but that’s to be expected when you do an engineering degree, especially at a program like Cal Poly Pomona,” he says. “Being able to learn on my own and figure things out is something I got out of it. Some of the professors were very industry-minded and that helped.”

Now, as a business owner, Clark is getting a whole other kind of education.

He is the engineer, marketing specialist, gardener and human resources director. He also serves as a guide on the tours, with the weekends averaging as many as five two-hour group tours a day. Clark also has hosted social media influencers to ride and share their experience, something he wasn’t particularly well-versed in prior to starting his business.

“I never realized how deep I would be in social media,” he says. “I had to learn how it worked.”

In a way, his engineering education at Cal Poly Pomona prepared him to solve problems outside of engineering, too.

“When you have an idea in your head, I like to think that almost everything is possible. You use your engineering skills to figure out how to make it work,” he says.

Building handcars, owning a business and showing people the beauty of California’s Central Coast is fun, but it is work too, he says.

“I came up with the idea thinking it would be a fun venture,” Clark says. “It has been fun, but it has been harder than I ever imagined. There are so many challenges that come with running a business like this.”

Read more and watch video.