For the first time in four months, Camila Peter slept with a roof over her head, though the roof was part of a former tour bus converted into a sleeping corridor.

“;Better than outside,”; Peter, 24, said yesterday at Gateway Park in Kakaako. “;We're safe.”;

Peter and her family are staying at the Evans Bus Project—a name derived from the idea of “;evening angels”;—until she can get a tuberculosis test this week, allowing her to move into a state emergency homeless shelter.

She was part of the first group of homeless to stay in the three-bus shelter that opened Friday in a vacant lot at Forrest Avenue and Ala Moana Boulevard. It is so popular that it will be expanded.

The bus shelter is part of a six-month pilot project by the state agency that owns the land to clean up the parks in Kakaako and reduce the growing homeless population.

The Hawaii Community Development Authority contracted with the community group Hawaii Helping the Hungry Have Hope, which operates the project to bring the converted buses for the park residents to sleep in.

As part of HCDA's cleanup plan, service providers, police and deputy sheriffs walked the park Friday to encourage residents to move into shelters and help keep the park clean.

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Homeless in cars and vans are illegally camping in the parking lot,stealing, and selling drugs.

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Two families, including a 3-month-old boy, three couples and five individuals stayed the first night, said project manager Nadine Yonekura.

The Evans project already has a waiting list, and a fourth tour bus will be converted into a shelter for about three families tomorrow, she said.

The shelter complex has three restrooms, a table for meals and running water. Residents can also shower and do laundry at the Next Step shelter nearby. But the setup is still not complete.

Kapiolani Community College students will visit tomorrow to convert the fourth bus into a shelter, change an air freight container into a computer room for residents, and build a roof for an outdoor area.

Curtis Kropar, with the nonprofit Hawaiian Hope, will provide the computers and Internet access.

Kropar said it's important for the homeless to have Internet access because in a survey of 100 companies, he found one-third of them only take applications online.

And public schools require a large portion of homework to be e-mailed, he said.

Some residents were just happy to have a safe place to sleep. Francis Manuel has been living at Gateway Park for two months after breaking up with his girlfriend and falling behind on rent.

He's been working as a fish cutter at Ham Produce and Seafood for three years, but with only 30 hours a week, he can't afford his own place.

He hoped to stay in the bus long enough to save money for a place and brought a friend from the park to try to get him in, too.

He said the buses are comfortable and “;protect us from the cold.”;

Antonia and Ryan Lagpacan were waiting at Gateway Park yesterday afternoon with their 3-month-old son Cody for the shelter to open, which is about 7:30 p.m.

They said the bus staff was helping them get into a family shelter in Kapolei.

“;They're helping us getting ... back on our feet,”; Antonia Lagpacan said.