The Optare Visionaire (introduced in 2006 as the East Lancs Visionaire, and branded the Darwen Visionaire between 2007 and 2008) is an open top

double-decker bus A double-decker bus or double-deck bus is a bus that has two storeys or decks. They are used for mass transport in the United Kingdom, the United States, New Zealand, Europe, Asia and also in cities such as Sydney; the best-known example is the ...

body built by

Optare Switch Mobility (originally called Optare) is an English bus manufacturer based in Sherburn-in-Elmet, North Yorkshire. It is a subsidiary of Indian company Ashok Leyland. The company would be responsible for the EV operations of the group with ...

. It is in terms of engineering an open top Olympus (itself a double-decker variant of the Esteem) in all but name. The Optare Visionaire was also built for tri-axle

chassis.

History

The first orders were made in November 2006 by

Arriva Arriva plc is a British multinational public transport company headquartered in Sunderland, England.The Original Tour Tootbus London, formerly The Original Tour is a London bus tour operator using open-top double-decker buses. It also holds the franchise to run City Sightseeing's London tour. Based in Wandsworth, it is a subsidiary of RATP Dev. History T ...

for a £1.6 million order for ten, built on

Volvo The Volvo Group ( sv, Volvokoncernen; legally Aktiebolaget Volvo, shortened to AB Volvo, stylized as VOLVO) is a Swedish multinational manufacturing corporation headquartered in Gothenburg. While its core activity is the production, distributio ...

's B9TL

Euro IV The European emission standards are vehicle emission standards for pollution from the use of new land surface vehicles sold in the European Union and EEA member states and the UK, and ships in EU waters. The standards are defined in a seri ...

chassis. These all entered service and were the only order for the ''East Lancs'' Visionaire.

Acquisition by Darwen

After

East Lancs East Lancashire Coachbuilders Limited was a manufacturer of bus bodies and carriages founded in 1934 in Blackburn, Lancashire, England. The company went into administration for a short while in August 2007, before being bought by Darwen Group ...

went into administration in 2007, the business was bought by the

Darwen Group The Darwen Group was a bus manufacturer located in Blackburn, Lancashire, England. The company originated from the purchase of East Lancashire Coachbuilders who went into administration in August 2007. After a series of developments, in June 20 ...

, and the East Lancs Visionaire was renamed the Darwen Visionaire. During this time, an order was received for a number of Visionaires.Omnibus blog - "Managing growth is sometimes far more difficult than managing decline…"
Accessed 1 September 2008 An open top

single-decker bus A single-decker bus or single-decker is a bus that has a single deck for passengers. Normally the use of the term ''single-decker'' refers to a standard two- axled rigid bus, in direct contrast to the use of the term double-decker bus, which ...

, the Panaire, was also offered at the time and none were built.

Reverse takeover by Optare

Since the order for the Darwen Visionaires,

performed a

reverse takeover A reverse takeover (RTO), reverse merger, or reverse IPO is the acquisition of a public company by a private company so that the private company can bypass the lengthy and complex process of going public. Sometimes, conversely, the public compan ...

with

. Ten Optare Visionaires entered service on

Big Bus Tours Big Bus Tours (formerly ''Les Cars Rouges'' and ''The Big Bus Company''), is the largest operator of open top bus sightseeing tours founded in May 2011 after "Les Cars Rouges" and the "Big Bus Company" merged. The company operates in 23 citie ...

London tour. These were ordered in the

Darwen Darwen is a market town and civil parish in the Blackburn with Darwen borough in Lancashire, England. The residents of the town are known as "Darreners". The A666 road passes through Darwen towards Blackburn to the north, Bolton to the sout ...

period, but have been built under the new Optare name. Therefore, no Visionaires were built under the Darwen name, despite orders being taken.

Wilts & Dorset Wilts & DorsetCompanies House extract company no 1671355
Wi ...

received 9 Visionaires for use on the Purbeck Breezer services linking

Swanage Swanage () is a coastal town and civil parish in the south east of Dorset, England. It is at the eastern end of the Isle of Purbeck and one of its two towns, approximately south of Poole and east of Dorchester. In the 2011 census the civil ...

with Wareham,

Poole Poole () is a large coastal town and seaport in Dorset, on the south coast of England. The town is east of Dorchester and adjoins Bournemouth to the east. Since 1 April 2019, the local authority is Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Counc ...

and

Bournemouth Bournemouth () is a coastal resort town in the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council area of Dorset, England. At the 2011 census, the town had a population of 183,491, making it the largest town in Dorset. It is situated on the Southern ...

References

{{Optare timeline, state=collapsed

Visionaire The VisionAire VA-10 Vantage is a prototype single-engined light business-jet (or "very light jet") designed and developed by the American company VisionAire Jets Corporation. Originally planned for production in the late 1990s, the original Visio ...

Vehicles introduced in 2006 Open-top buses Low-floor buses Double-decker buses Tri-axle buses

History

Acquisition by Darwen

Reverse takeover by Optare

See also

References