Oldbury is a town in Sandwell, West Midlands in England. It is a part of the Black Country, and the administrative centre of the borough of Sandwell. The town's name stems from the Old English 'Ealdenbyrig', which conveys that Oldbury was old even in early English times over 1000 years ago. Eald is Old English for 'old', and Byrig is the plural of 'burh' in Old English, with a burh being a stronghold or fortified town. According to the 2011 Census, the town has a permanent population of around 13606 people. Oldbury was part of the ancient parish of Halesowen, a separated part of Shropshire surrounded by Worcestershire and Staffordshire, till the Counties (Detached Parts) Act 1844, when it was combined back into Worcestershire after an absence of nine-hundred years. It ended up being an Urban District in 1894, acquiring Municipal Borough status in 1935. In this time, Oldbury council constructed several thousand houses, flats and bungalows for some 40 years until its disbandment, the 1000th of which was completed in 1933 at Wallace Road near the border with Rowley Regis. Ever since the 1980s, the town has seen ongoing development, primarily the creation of more retail possibilities. This includes Oldbury Green Retail Park, set on the town's ring road, which was developed in the middle of the 1990s. This, alongside the development of the Merry Hill Shopping Centre discovered about six miles away during the 2nd half of the 1980s, has added to a decline in the functioning of nearby West Bromwich town centre as a retail centre for citizens. For all of your home developments, make sure to identify respected specialists in Oldbury to make certain of quality.