Oldbury is a town in Sandwell, West Midlands in England. It is a section of the Black Country, and the administrative centre of the borough of Sandwell. The town's name stems from the Old English 'Ealdenbyrig', which signifies 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 fortification or fortified town. According to the 2011 Census, the town has a permanent population of around 13606 people. Oldbury belonged to the ancient parish of Halesowen, a detached part of Shropshire surrounded by Worcestershire and Staffordshire, until the Counties (Detached Parts) Act 1844, when it was involved back into Worcestershire after an absence of nine-hundred years. It ended up being an Urban District in 1894, earning Municipal Borough status in 1935. In this time, Oldbury council constructed several thousand homes, flats and bungalows for some 40 years until its disbandment, the 1000th of which was finished in 1933 at Wallace Road near the border with Rowley Regis. Since the 1980s, the town has actually seen sustained development, mainly the creation of more retail options. This includes Oldbury Green Retail Park, set on the town's ring road, which was built in the middle of the 1990s. This, together with the advancement of the Merry Hill Shopping Centre discovered around 6 miles away during the 2nd half of the 1980s, has actually added to a decline in the functioning of neighboring West Bromwich town centre as a retail centre for locals. For all your home improvements, be sure to find trusted specialists in Oldbury to make certain of quality.