A restored double-decker bus with an open-air deck will start plying across New Town taking residents as well as visitors on a guided tour of prominent places.

The bus, retrofitted with a modern engine and spares, is undergoing test runs in the township, said an official of Hidco, which has launched the project in collaboration with the tourism department.

“The bus will start from Kolkata Gate and travel past major attractions of New Town such as the Rabindra Tirtha complex, the new Coffee House, Eco Park, Mother's Wax Museum and Eco Urban Village,” the official said.

The passengers will be taken on short guided tours of all the places where the bus will stop.

“The bus will have a guide…. Snacks will be served on board,” said the official of Hidco, the agency that looks after civic amenities of the township.

A double-decker bus now plies in New Town ferrying passengers from Eco Park to Eco Urban Village but it doesn’t have a guide on board and also does not stop for the passengers to visit the prominent places in the township.

Hidco chairman Debashis Sen said: “We thought of having the bus (double-decker bus with an open-air deck) here as a lot of happening tourist spots have come up in New Town.”

The British government had in 1926 introduced double-decker buses.

In Calcutta, they were labelled slowcoach monstrosities belching black fumes and withdrawn from the streets. But in London, they enjoy the right of way, for traffic and tourism.

Double-decker buses once plied along all main thoroughfares in the city and also to Howrah. The buses were phased out in the mid-1990s when they ran into maintenance issues.