Volkswagen have celebrated the 60th anniversary of Bulli and Transporter production in their Hanover plant earlier this week by organizing an exhibit with the Hanover Museum between March 9 and June 26.
Production of the Bulli began on March 8, 1956 and has thus been an central, iconic part of the ;ocal community, since 9.5 million examples have passed through the Lower Saxony factory’s gates.
Although production of the Volkswagen T1 Transporter had begun six years earlier in the main Wolfsburg factory, the company decided a dedicated assembly line was required after reaching 100,000 examples in just four years. Wolfsburg could only manage an output of 80 per day, much less than the 330 daily production needed to reach demand. The employee count has grown from 4,000 at the time of inception to over 14,500 today.
Milestones for the plant include the introduction of the T2 in 1967, T3 in 1979, T4 in 1990 and the T5 in 2003.
An electric van concept, the Budd-e was shown earlier this year at the Consumer Electronics show, and points to an electrified future for Volkswagen’s van and people mover range.
By Mitchell Jones
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