Brierley Hill in the 1980s to become the Merry Hill Shopping Centre. Brierley Hill was originally in Staffordshire, but is now part of the West Midlands metropolitan county since its creation in 1974. Since 2008, Brierley Hill, including the nearby Waterfront Business Park and Merry Hill Shopping Centre, has been designated as the Strategic Town Centre of the Dudley Borough, with the aim of creating a new town centre for the borough. The name Brierley Hill derives from the Old English words 'brer', meaning the place where the Briar Rose grew; 'leah', meaning a woodland clearing; and 'hill'. Largely a product of
Merry Hill Shopping Centre and The Waterfront car parks. This service utilised two Travel Merry Hill owned MCW Metrobuses. The centre has around 210 stores and over 10,000 free car parking spaces, with a total retail floorspace of 154,002m² (1.593m ft²), making the centre the fifth largest in the United Kingdom, behind the MetroCentre, Bluewater, Trafford Centre and Westfield Stratford City. Merry Hill is home to anchor stores Debenhams, Marks and Spencer, Primark and Asda. Beyond the main shopping centre is a separate retail park which has a number of shops and restaurants and also a cinema. Stores in this area include Next Home,