Alexander Dennis Lives On – But Not Quite in Guildford

Published on: 1 Oct, 2024
Updated on: 1 Oct, 2024

By Andy Goundry

It was a sad day for Guildford and many residents of the area when the Alexander Dennis bus factory at Slyfield produced its last bus chassis in 2020, the victim of Covid and the resulting collapsed bus market.

Despite being one of the oldest, if not the oldest, vehicle manufacturer in Britain after an unrivalled 126 years of production in Guildford, many people expected that to be the end of the Dennis company.

However, it was far from the end of the line, because notwithstanding the uncertain global market conditions, the company’s North American owners, NFI, then made a major investment in installing some of the key company teams and functions, including design, development, and service into an impressive new facility in Farnborough – Trident House.

Models old and new

The name was chosen in memory of their Trident double-deckers, for many years a very familiar sight not just on Britain’s roads but, particularly in three-axle form, in countries around the world including Hong Kong, the USA, Singapore and Mexico. Indeed, Trident 3s – and their successor, the Enviro 500 – play a key part in the transport networks of Hong Kong and other places, because they can carry over 140 passengers.

In April this year, the company, now rebranded as AD, held an open day at Trident House to showcase their facility and demonstrate to both local residents and the wider population that, whilst volume production of vehicles in Guildford may no longer take place, the business is very much alive, and in a good position for the future to capitalise on the ever-growing demand for zero emission public transport.

The Enviro400EV

A key part of the open day was to showcase AD’s latest range of second-generation electric and hydrogen-powered buses, ranging from the sleek Enviro100EV midibus, which can carry up to 40 passengers, to the bigger two-and three-axle double deckers.

And a two-axle Enviro400EV double decker was laid on to give visitors the opportunity to ride on a state-of-the-art electric bus around the roads surrounding Trident House. So popular was this that nearly three times the planned number of trips were carried out, all fully loaded.

Inside Trident House, staff were on hand to demonstrate many aspects of the work carried out there, such as the role played by Computer Aided Design in new product development, the unseen but vital support activity carried out by the Technical Publications team, and the equally important field service role of the AD24 field service engineers.

The Training team were also on hand to explain how they educate their customers staff to ensure that those staff are well-prepared to look after their AD vehicles in service while the test and development team were on duty to explain their role in proving out the new generation of vehicles, to ensure robust and reliable products for their customers.

A vintage Dennis fire engine

While the focus of the day was on the future development of the company, its history was not forgotten. A display of photographs, information boards and other historic material was provided by the Rural Life Living Museum at Tilford, who are developing an ever-increasing collection of documentation and other material spanning the 129-year history of the company from its roots in the centre of Guildford and the vital role of the company’s workforce was recognised with a display of photos of past and present employees.

Dennis cars belonging to John Dennis

The historic theme continued outside, with a number of heritage buses and fire engines on display, including the 1936 Dennis Ace (or “Pig”) which for decades played a key role in the Works Fire Brigade and now enjoys a well-earned semi-retirement at the Rural Life Living Museum.

John Dennis, grandson of one of the founder brothers of the company, was also on hand to show his three Dennis cars dating from the earliest days of the company, as well as his almost unique 1896 Dennis motor tricycle and trailer.

The local bus rally team were also running rides around the location in their fleet of classic Dennis buses.

The Alexander Dennis team

In total, over 2,000 people enjoyed the day, ranging from current and former employees and their families, local residents and customer staff, to bus enthusiasts from literally all over the world.

Needless to say, plans are already being discussed for an even bigger and better event next year.