Rail vehicle with human and/or electric power

A method for operating a plurality of pedal powered railway vehicles upon a railway, including the steps of:

• providing a convoy of multiple similar pedal powered railway vehicles upon rails of a railway, each vehicle including four wheels provided in pairs joined by axles and spaced apart by a distance similar to the rails, and with at least one seat and at least one set of pedals adjacent to the seat and with a drive extending from the pedals to at least one wheel of the vehicle for driving of the wheel, at least indirectly, through cranking of the pedals;
• orienting the vehicles in a common direction;
• having separate riders of separate strength levels on the vehicles pedal their vehicles to cause movement of the vehicles in a common direction to a common destination;
• configuring the vehicles to include electric motors configured to drive the vehicles in addition to pedal powered drive;
• powering the vehicles at least partially with the electric motors to keep the convoy of pedal powered vehicles closer together than they would be if the multiple vehicles were powered by different individuals pedaling alone;
• wherein said providing step includes a hitch mounted to the frame on a rear portion of the vehicle, and wherein a linkage is flexibly and removably coupled to the hitch at a distal portion of the linkage, the linkage having a proximal portion coupled to a frame of a trailer, the trailer frame having at least one trailer axle rotatably supported relative to the frame, with the at least one trailer axle including railway wheels at ends of the trailer axle, the wheels spaced a similar distance apart as the rails upon which the vehicle is configured to roll;
• wherein said providing step includes the electric motor of at least one of the vehicles in the convoy configured to supply electric power to at least one wheel of the vehicle when at least one set of pedals is cranked, such that pedaling action by a user automatically causes at least some electric motor assist power to be supplied to the vehicle, in addition to power supplied by the user by pedaling action;
• wherein the vehicle includes a throttle control coupled to the electric motor, the throttle control manually adjustable by a user adjacent to one of the seats, with manual adjustment of the throttle adjusting electric power delivered from the electric motor to the vehicle, such that a user can adjust an amount of electric power supplied to the vehicle, such as for control of speed of the vehicle;
• wherein the electric motor assist power is always supplied to the vehicle when the at least one set of pedals is cranked in addition to the electric power supplied to the vehicle responsive to the throttle control manually adjustable by the user;
• and
• wherein the electric motor has at least two power settings including a first setting that is lower than a second power setting, the vehicle including a power setting control which is manually adjustable between the at least two power settings, the at least two power settings differing in an amount of power delivered from the electric motor to the at least one wheel when the at least one set of pedals is cranked, with the second setting causing more power to be delivered from the electric motor to the at least one wheel than the first power setting.