Oxley, Wolverhampton

Name and origins

The place name Oxley has its origins in the Old English language. 'Ox' from old English 'Oxa' (for the animal), and 'Ley' from the old English 'lēah' (recorded in the Domesday Book by the Normans as 'Oxelie'), meaning woodland clearing or meadow. The majority of Wolverhampton's place names are old English (Anglo-Saxon) in origin, and at that time, much of the land was covered in woodland. Cannock forest stretched down through Wolverhampton and would have encompassed the Oxley area – so the name means a clearing in the woodland with the presence of oxen.

Up until the 20th century, Oxley was very much a rural area, sitting on the route of the Wolverhampton to Stafford road.

Transport

The boroughs western border is also the location of Autherley Junction, where the Shropshire Union Canal meets the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal, and of Aldersley Junction, where the BCN Main Line meets the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal.

The mainline of the former Shrewsbury and Birmingham Railway (S&BR) transits the area. In 1907, the Great Western Railway developed a railway depot at Oxley, to replace the S&BR shed that had existed at Wolverhampton railway works. A standard two-turntable shed, it housed nearly 100 locomotives, mainly freight types for servicing the co-located major freight yard. After allocation to British Railways London Midland Region in January 1963, they choose to close the dilapidated Wolverhampton (Stafford Road) TMD, and hence moved all locomotives to Oxley from September 1963. The shed closed to steam locomotives from March 1967, redeveloped as a diesel maintenance facility.

In 1972 the stretch of railway between Wolverhampton North Junction and Oxley was electrified on the 25 kV overhead line AC system (using catenary designed for low-speed movements only), the first stretch of the former Great Western network to be thus treated. This enabled electric locomotives to work trains of empty coaching stock - particularly those used on Euston-Wolverhampton InterCity services - between Oxley depot and Wolverhampton railway station. After British Rail Class 390 Pendolino were chosen as the preferred new rolling stock contract by Virgin Trains for their West Coast Main Line services, Alstom redeveloped the site as Oxley TRSMD to maintain the trainsets.

Modern times

The focal point of Oxley is the Three Tuns Parade, a shopping area on the A449 Stafford Road, adjacent to the boundary with Bushbury North. Several shops, takeaways and banks are located here, including the Wing Wah Chinese buffet restaurant (formerly the Three Tuns Pub), a branch of the Nationwide Building Society, Lloyds TSB, a Firkins Bakery and several others. Principal local landmarks are the two towering railway viaducts crossing the Birmingham Canal Navigations Main Line Canal. A recent departure from the Oxley skyline was the blue and yellow chimney of the Goodyear tyre factory. After car tyre production ceased in 2006 the Goodyear plant went into an almost complete shutdown and, as of 2008, has now been partly reduced to rubble as part of a regeneration and housing project with the famous 81-year-old chimney stack demolished on Sunday 29 June 2008. A new housing estate is being constructed here as of summer 2011.

The Church of the Epiphany is the Anglican parish Church on Lymer Road, the building itself dates to the early 1960s. Installed within the Church is a fine example of a Compton Theatre organ originally installed at the Windsor Theatre in Bearwood, Birmingham. The local Polish community has its centre and Catholic Church on Stafford Road, Oxley. The suburb of Pendeford falls within Oxley ward.

Wolverhampton Science Park is situated near Oxley's south border, on the site of the old Gas Works at Gorsebrook. North East Wolverhampton Academy lies in the ward.