Beijing, Aug 26 (IANS) Beijing will start trial operations next year of an eco-friendly 'straddling bus' that can carry 1,400 passengers and allow other vehicles to pass under it, a move that can reduce traffic in the overcrowded Chinese capital.

The capital government has approved its assessment report and started manufacturing the bus and a 9-km route along the West Sixth Ring Road in Mentougou district, where the trial operation is planned to start in July, the Shanghai Daily said citing a Beijing Times report Thursday.

The bus's manufacturer, China South Locomotive and Rolling Stock Corporation, said it would take three months to finish making a sample bus, which is four metres high and looks like an elevated train bestriding a road, allowing vehicles lower than two metres to go through it under the passenger level.

If the trial operation proves successful, a total of 189 km of route will be built, connecting Mentougou with the capital's airport, said Song Youzhou, the inventor of the bus with Shenzhen Hashi Future Parking Equipment Co.

The bus can run at a speed up to 60 km per hour, faster than most ordinary buses in Beijing, and carry 1,200 to 1,400 passengers at a time without creating any road congestion. At that rate, the bus could reduce up to 30 percent of the overcrowded city's traffic jams.

The cost of building one km of bus line would be $7.3 million, which is only 10 percent the cost of a subway line. Besides, it would take less time to build the lines.

The bus will run on solar energy gathered from its rooftop and electricity through connection to the city's power grid, making it eco-friendly.