Merry Hill Shopping Centre inside the centre to replace the old multiplex at the retail park. In 2018, a new 75,000 sq ft flagship Next store opened replacing the Sainsbury's store that closed on 31 December 2016. A bus station has served Merry Hill since its opening, but the current, more substantial bus station was developed in the early 1990s and gives direct connections to towns including Dudley, Halesowen, Stourbridge, Walsall, West Bromwich and Cradley Heath as well as the cities of Birmingham and Wolverhampton. Similarly, the bus services connect the centre to Cradley Heath railway station, for West Midlands Trains services to Birmingham
History of the West Midlands and 1980s, with towns including Bilston, Darlaston, Wednesbury, Tipton and Brierley Hill being hit particularly hard by factory closures. However, new lighter industrial began to develop in some of these areas, with a large retail park developing in the north of Wednesbury during the 1990s and a light industrial estate being built in the south of the town. Brierley Hill became home to the giant Merry Hill Shopping Centre, which developed between 1985 and 1990. Many of the former industrial sites in Tipton, however, have been mostly developed for new housing. Coventry was slower to develop, but by the early