OSLO, June 25 (Xinhua) -- Self-propelled buses with zero emissions are soon to be reality in Norway's capital city Oslo, newspaper Aftenposten reported Sunday.
The buses are to be tested from March next year by Ruter AS, a public transportation authority for Oslo and the neighboring county of Akershus, and the Agency for Urban Environment.
A prototype of such buses was on Norway's tour earlier this year, Aftenposten reported.
They are to be initially tested within the area of Oslo or Akershus as a pilot project and the goal is to get a fleet of 10 to 20 self-propelled buses in operation.
The authorities want to learn how such a service works in practice and it might thus be necessary to test the service at various locations in the city.
Ruter has submitted the application to the Norwegian Environment Agency in order to get the support of the project and in it described how they pictured the project to work.
The description includes a fleet of 10 to 20 buses running around a limited area. If a passenger wants a bus, he or she can order it through the Ruters phone application and then wait for five to ten minutes before they can get onboard.
According to Ruter, passengers are to decide where the bus would take them and on the way to the chosen destination, the bus can pick up other passengers.
It may also be necessary to test the buses with fixed routes, where the buses stop at regular places, they wrote.
According to Aftenposten the trial will start in March next year and end in January 2019.
A legislative amendment has been sent by the Ministry of Transport, which will open for companies and municipalities to apply for a license to test self-propelled vehicles.
The plan is to use regular transportation ticket when using the self-propelled buses.
"Our goal is that the service should be an integral part of the transport network and available in the same way as the today's offer. Then it will be natural to use the regular tickets, but this has not been concluded yet," said Endre Angelvik, director of Mobility Services in Ruter.
The project will cost somewhat more than 22 million kroner (236,184 U.S. dollars) and the Environmen Agency will support it with 7.4 million kroner.
If the project becomes a success, it can lead to building homes in areas that until now have been thought to be too far away from the collective transport hub, Aftenposten wrote.
