British Atlanteans

The Leyland Atlantean was in production from 1958 until 1986 and around 15,300 buses of the type were manufactured. Over 3,500 were exported and the remainder served with over a hundred different operators in the UK. These ranged from the transport authorities of Glasgow and Liverpool to small independent operators. The progression of this bus, which placed the engine at the rear of the vehicle, went through an exhaustive development programme in the 1950s. The first production models were bodied by Alexander's, Metro-Cammell and Weymanns. In total eighteen different body builders were used by the mixture of operators. Towards the end of the 1960s the bus was substantially re-engineered and was redesignated as the AN68 (with progressive variations), the first of which came off the production line in May 1972 and it proved to be even more reliable than the earlier versions. The last of the type were taken out of service in the 2010s but examples still survive in open-top form and can be seen around the UK.