Bus vannin is to trial making passenger announcements on some of its double deckers on the 3 and 3A services between Ramsey and Douglas.

Voice announcements are complemented by a rolling LED text of the bus’s next stop location to help all passengers to travel with more convenience and independence.

It is hoped the announcements will enhance the service for visually impaired and hard of hearing passengers and for all passengers during foggy or dark conditions.

Phil Gawne MHK, Minister for Infrastructure, explained: ‘This technology is fitted on our double deckers and enables the Public Transport Division to introduce improvements that will enable us to comply with forthcoming requirements under the Equality legislation for disabled passengers. We need to assist less able passengers while not irritating regular passengers and we hope we have got that balance right.’

Alf Lloyd, Head of Operations at bus vannin said: ‘We will undertake a four week trial of the bus announce system, commencing on Monday 19 October 2015, to gauge all our passengers’ reaction to it. We would like feedback and comments from passengers as we will be looking to roll out the system permanently, initially on double deckers on main routes to the north, south and west of the island and potentially on all buses in the longer term.’

Feedback on the announce system can be given by phoning 662525 or emailing publictransport@gov.im.