The Lighthouse in Oxford the railway station at Frideswide Square gradually eroded away much of the canal trade. In 1913 William Morris (later Lord Nuffield), without licence, started his own bus service to compete with the city's cumbersome tram network. In 1951, Lord Nuffield further forced change when he acquired the Oxford Canal Basin and proceeded to fill it. Nuffield College and Worcester Street car park now stand where once lay the Basin. This was the death knell of the canal system as a competitive mode of transport in Oxford as technology replaced human labour. An apt example can be found in the reconstruction
Cowley, Oxfordshire the Morris's site was closed down, demolished, and redeveloped as the Oxford Business Park. The car factory is known today as Plant Oxford and is now owned by BMW and has been extensively redeveloped. It remains the largest industrial employer in Oxfordshire employing more than 4,300 people. The plant was set up in 1926 by a consortium including William Morris and the Budd Company of America and was adjacent to the Morris Motors factory. Morris and the Budd Company both pulled out of the consortium and the plant became an independent supplier of bodies and tooling to Morris and other