Plaxton President

Plaxton President
Arriva North West Plaxton President bodied Dennis Trident 2 in July 2010
Interior of Arriva North West's Plaxton President
Overview
Manufacturer	Plaxton/TransBus/Alexander Dennis
Assembly	Wigan, England
Body and chassis
Doors	1 or 2
Floor type	Low floor
Chassis	Dennis Trident 2 Volvo B7TL DAF DB250
Powertrain
Engine	Cummins C-series/ISCe (Dennis Trident 2) Volvo D7C (Volvo B7TL) DAF (DAF DB250)
Transmission	Voith/ZF
Dimensions
Length	9.9 to 11.5 metres
Width	2.55 metres
Height	4.2 to 4.4 metres
Chronology
Predecessor	Northern Counties Palatine

The Plaxton President was a low floor double-decker bus body built at Northern Counties plant in Wigan, England and branded as a Plaxton product for its main production run. It was unveiled in 1997 and built between 1999 and 2005. When it became part of TransBus International, the body was sold under the TransBus name; strangely never got branded as the Alexander Dennis President after ADL bought Transbus. The President was built on the Dennis/TransBus Trident, the DAF DB250 and the Volvo B7TL chassis. It can be built as either a closed top bus or an open-top bus.

The body was designed to compete with the Alexander ALX400 body, and had neat rectangular front headlights below a large front windscreen. From the side, it can be easily recognised by the different depths of windows on the lower deck; however, this is less apparent with newer bonded-glazed models. Seating varied according to the chassis and specification. TfL models were typically built with 41 seats upstairs, and 23 downstairs, with a centre exit door. Early TfL versions also had the staircase moved to the centre of the bus, although this was later changed to the standard position of just behind the driver.

Outside London the Presidents are less common, however some operators have built up substantial numbers of them.

Lothian Buses were the largest operator of Presidents outside London with approximately 200 purchased from June 1999 to June 2004. Apart from seven examples on Volvo B7TL chassis Lothian's examples are all Dennis Tridents including some high capacity 11m examples. Since 2010 Lothian began withdrawing their earliest model Presidents from frontline service. Some have received an open top conversion for Lothian's sightseeing subsidiaries and others have been sold on for further service with various other bus operators. National Express West Midlands, formerly Travel West Midlands, are the second largest operator of Presidents outside London with 102 examples new from Autumn 1999 to Summer 2000 all of which have Volvo B7TL chassis and were internally refurbished in 2007-08.