SPOTTING a bus driver accelerating down the street with both hands off the wheel should no longer be cause for alarm under plans to introduce Britain’s first self-steering bus.

The streets of Cambridge are to be the test ground for a system that will allow thousands of miles of new bus lanes to be installed on roads that are too narrow for ordinary buses.

The self-steering bus, which uses a camera mounted at the top of the windscreen to follow lines painted on the road, does not deviate more than a few millimetres from its course.

This allows the bus lane to be 1.5m (5ft) narrower than those used by driver-steered buses. Cyclists and pedestrians in city centres will be able pass close to the self-steering bus without fearing that the driver will suddenly veer off course.

The bus will also guide itself to within 4cm of the kerb at bus stops, allowing level boarding for disabled passengers and people with pushchairs.

The camera can look up to 100m ahead, recognising the parallel lines of dashes and sending a signal to a box on the steering mechanism. The steering wheel vibrates as soon as the system detects the lines, informing the driver that it is safe to remove his hands.

However, the driver continues to control acceleration and braking and can override the device at any time to steer the bus around obstacles. An alarm sounds if the optical guidance system cannot find the lines.

The system was developed by Siemens, the German technology company, and has already been introduced in Rouen in France and will soon be used on buses in Bologna in Italy. Both cities, like Cambridge, have networks of ancient streets that cannot comfortably accommodate conventional buses.

Stagecoach, the bus and train operator, is conducting trials in Britain in the summer and plans to fit the system on 22 buses in Cambridge by the end of the year.

Several cities, including Manchester, Leeds, Liverpool and Portsmouth, are being forced to reconsider their plans for relieving congestion after the Government rejected their proposals for tram lines.

While a single tram line costs up to £400 million, buses can be fitted with optical guidance for £25,000 each plus a few thousand pounds for painting lines on the road.

Les Warneford, Stagecoach’s managing director of buses, said that the interior of the self-steering buses would also be upgraded to help to overcome the negative image of bus travel among car users. Leather seats and TV screens will be installed and longer distance services will offer a wireless broadband internet connection.

Mr Warneford said that the system’s only shortcoming was its inability to follow the lines when they were covered by snow or spillages. In those circumstances, the driver would revert to hand-steering.

Cambridge is also introducing the world’s longest guided busway on a disused 12-mile railway line between the city and St Ives.

The rail lines will be replaced with concrete channels. Buses fitted with small guidewheels will drive along the channels at up to 60mph.

The two systems are expected eventually to be integrated, with the optical guidance system taking over at the end of the busway.

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