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35-457: Washwood Heath is a ward in Birmingham , within the formal district of Hodge Hill , roughly two miles north-east of Birmingham city centre, England. Washwood Heath covers the areas of Birmingham that lie between Nechells , Bordesley Green , Stechford and Hodge Hill . Saltley on the south-western side and Ward End on the north-eastern side of Washwood Heath are the two areas that cover

70-693: A ku (or 区 in Japanese writing ) is an administrative unit of one of the larger cities, closely equivalent to the divisions or wards of a London Borough or a New York Borough. In Vietnam , a phường is an administrative subunit of an inner city district, or quận . Wards and electoral divisions of Nepal are political divisions which are grouped into Gaunpalika ( Rural council ) and Municipality . A rural municipality or municipality has minimum of five and maximum of 33 divisions. Plant Oxford Plant Oxford located in Cowley , southeast Oxford , England ,

105-588: A district or municipality , used in local government elections. In the United States, wards are usually subdivided into precincts for polling purposes. In Wisconsin, a 'ward' is what in most other states would be a precinct In some cities of India , such as Mumbai and Delhi , a ward is an administrative unit of the city region; a city area is divided into Zones, which in turn contain numerous wards. The smallest administrative unit of Gram Panchayats in India

140-580: A huge industrial centre, it attracted workers during the Great Depression looking for work. This resulted in the need for new housing, including from the 1920s Florence Park , built mainly by private landlords . Like many contemporary industrialists of the time, Morris wanted to provide for the whole life of its workers, and so developed the Morris Motors Athletic & Social Club on Crescent Road, which still exists today. Approached in 1935 by

175-475: A major Irish community. The area is served by Washwood Heath Academy . For the younger population, there is a children's centre. The ward is represented on Birmingham City Council by three councillors: Mariam Khan, Ansar Ali Khan and Mohammed Idrees, all Labour . Project Champion was a project to install a £3m network of 169 Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras to monitor vehicles entering and leaving Washwood Heath and Sparkbrook . Its implementation

210-654: A result of the purchase, car manufacturing was completely moved from the Adderley Park site, which became Morris Commercials , to the Ward End Works. Engines for the Morris Minor were also produced at the factory during the 1930s alongside the Wolseley production line. When World War II broke out in 1939 the factory became the production base for tanks and military vehicles as well as mines. In 1941, it also began to produce

245-454: Is a BMW car assembly facility where Mini cars are built. The plant forms the Mini production triangle along with Plant Hams Hall where engines are manufactured and Plant Swindon where body pressings and sub-assemblies are built. The original Morris Motors site at Cowley had three manufacturing plants, separated by the eastern Oxford Ring Road and B480 road. The present site of Plant Oxford

280-490: Is also known as a ward. In Bangladesh wards are subdivisions of a city or town which administrates under City Corporations and municipalities ( pourashova ) In East Africa, the word ward used in English is translated into Swahili/Kiswahili as Kata. In the case of a municipal amalgamation , the former cities and towns that make up the new metropolis may be referred to as wards. In Monaco , wards are informal divisions of

315-604: The Air Ministry about the factory's ability to change to aircraft industry production, additional capacity was built into the factory through the shadow factory plan from 1937. During World War II , the factory produced the de Havilland Tiger Moth training aeroplane. Also developed on site was the No 1 Metal and Produce Recovery Depot run by the Civilian Repair Organisation , to handle crashed or damaged aircraft, and even

350-564: The Great Western Railway opened Morris Cowley railway station to serve the thousands of workers commuting to the factory. In 1933, they built a railway goods yard beside the Wycombe Railway to bring supplies into the factory, and take completed vehicles away. This railway yard still exists today and serves the current vehicle-manufacturing plant, though the railway to High Wycombe has long been lifted. As Cowley expanded into

385-664: The Horsa glider . By the end of the war, £500,000 worth of damage had been inflicted on the plant by the Luftwaffe in raids in 1941 and 1942. In 1939 a new factory for the Morris Motors Pressing Branch was constructed on the Common Lane side of the Ward End Works. This was renamed Nuffield Metal Products in 1945. Production of Wolseley cars recommenced on 4 September 1945. In 1948 the works began to encounter new problems and it

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420-680: The Ward End area of Washwood Heath. The Ward End Works covered an area of 65 acres (26 ha) upon completion. A distinctive feature was the Bromford House administrative block, with its 400 ft (122 m) façade fronting onto Drews Lane. The factory was an assembly plant and before the outbreak of hostilities produced a light car called the Stellite . During its first four years, the factory also produced munitions fuses and shell cases for soldiers fighting in mainland Europe during World War I . When

455-595: The 12th century. The word was much later applied to divisions of other cities and towns in England and Wales and Ireland . In parts of northern England , a ward was an administrative subdivision of a county , very similar to a hundred in other parts of England. In Australia , Canada , New Zealand , South Africa , Sri Lanka , the United Kingdom , and the United States , wards are an electoral district , within

490-572: The 1970s and 1980s, the Cowley Assembly Plant (the former Morris Motors factory) faced a high level of industrial action, a problem which successive management teams struggled to resolve. Much rationalisation took place at the plant in the early 1980s, as BL restructured its manufacturing operations in the light of the Ryder Report. Production of the Austin Maxi ended in 1981 to make way for

525-647: The Honda-based Triumph Acclaim , whilst production of the Princess range was axed in 1981 to allow the arrival of production of the Rover SD1 following the closure of the car production lines at Solihull, which was retained solely for the production of Land Rover vehicles. Future large Rovers would therefore be built at Cowley until the BMW sell-off in 2000. The Morris marque was abandoned in 1984, when production of

560-684: The Longbridge-built Morris Ital finished; it had been transferred there from Cowley in September 1982, two years after its launch. The transfer of the Ital from Cowley was to make way for the Austin Maestro and Montego , which were launched in March 1983 and April 1984 respectively, continued in production until December 1994, though production was gradually cut back after 1989 following the launch of

595-561: The company's headquarters. The works have since been demolished. The former Metro-Cammell and Leyland DAF Vans sites are to be redeveloped as the Washwood Heath depot for High Speed 2 . Ward (politics) The word "ward", for an electoral subdivision, appears to have originated in the Wards of the City of London , where gatherings for each ward known as "wardmotes" have taken place since

630-682: The company, in return for joint-development of the new Rover 600 and 800 , both produced at Cowley. The 800 Series had been launched in mid 1986 and facelifted at the start of 1992; a year before the launch of the 600 Series. Despite 1989 seeing a then record of more than 2.3 million new cars being sold in the United Kingdom, falling demand for the 800 Series resulted in 1,800 job cuts at Cowley being announced in October of that year. On 31 January 1994, BAe announced sale of its 80% majority share of Rover Group to BMW . On 21 February, Honda announced it

665-502: The country, grouped into quartiers. In the Republic of Ireland , urban divisions were called wards and rural ones were called district electoral divisions . Both were renamed as electoral divisions in 1996. The electoral districts for Irish local authorities are local electoral areas . These are generally defined as combinations of electoral divisions, and in urban areas were formally described as combination of wards. In Japan ,

700-456: The entire ward, though some parts near Nechells and Hodge Hill do not come under either of these and are simply headed under "Washwood Heath". One of the area's major employers was the railway works owned by Metropolitan-Cammell (later Alstom ), but it closed in 2005. In the 2020s, Washwood Heath railway depot is to be constructed as part of the High Speed 2 project - to service and maintain

735-529: The former Oxford Military College in Cowley. Moving his company into the new site, from 1914 onwards Morris pioneered Henry Ford -style mass production in the UK, by building what became affectionately known as "the old tin shed." In 1925, Morris opened his own printing division, Morris Oxford Press, later Nuffield Press , taking up some of the original military college buildings. To facilitate more efficient production,

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770-475: The former Morris Motors site were placed into a redevelopment project called the Oxford Business Park, which now houses offices of numerous companies including: European headquarters of Harley-Davidson Motorcycles ; the global headquarters of international aid charity Oxfam ; Wiley-Blackwell ; Royal Mail ; HM Revenue and Customs ; and a large David Lloyd fitness centre . Plant Oxford now produces

805-404: The high speed trains. According to the 2001 Population Census , there were 27,822 people living in the ward with a population density of 5,335 people per km compared with 3,649 people per km for Birmingham. The area is 5.2 km. Washwood Heath is an ethnically diverse community with 57% (15,863) of the ward's population being of an ethnic minority compared with 29.6% for Birmingham. It had been

840-524: The name of the car factory to this day. A brief timeline of the plant's history is as follows: By the early 1970s, over 20,000 people worked in Cowley at the vast British Leyland and Pressed Steel Fisher plants. After re-organisation, PSF became part of the reorganised Austin Rover , while parts Unipart was floated off in a management buyout, but still has its global headquarters next to the Morris plant. Throughout

875-513: The new Mini , built by BMW since May 2001. It is the largest industrial employer in Oxfordshire. In February 2009, 850 jobs cuts at the site were announced, resulting in union bosses being pelted with food by angry agency staff who felt that the union had failed to do enough to try and save their jobs. Shortly thereafter, the company was forced to hire more staff to meet production requirements due to an upswing in demand overseas. Group tours of

910-530: The plant are offered and should be booked in advance. In October 2015, a two-episode series Building Cars Live was filmed there to show how a car is built. It was presented by James May , Kate Humble and Ant Anstead . In 2016, Plant Oxford produced 210,973 Minis, which represented an increase of nearly 5% over the previous year's total of 201,207. Production volumes of all Mini models produced at Plant Oxford. Staff numbers shown here include "temporary" staff. These figures exclude production numbers of

945-585: The plant being redesignated the Austin Morris division's Transmission Plant. 4,400 workers were employed on site. When the Adderley Park plant closed in 1972 all vehicle production was moved to the Common Lane works. During the mid-1980s there was a fire at the factory however no other problems surfaced. In 1989 Freight Rover became Leyland-DAF Vans , which then became the LDV Group in 1993. The site covered 85 acres (34 ha), with Bromford House being used as

980-414: The processing of wreckage from enemy Luftwaffe aircraft. Artist Paul Nash was inspired to paint Totes Meer based on sketches he made of the recovery depot. For a detailed history on the post-war management of the factory, refer to the articles on British Motor Corporation , British Leyland , and Rover Group Despite successive company mergers and name changes, "Morris's" is still often used as

1015-643: The rights to build the new Mini and retained the Cowley plant to produce it at. In 2000, BMW broke up the Rover Group, selling MG Rover and its products to the Phoenix consortium for the nominal sum of £10, which included the Longbridge plant . BMW agreed to redevelop the entire Cowley plant site with the Goodman Group, demolishing much of the factory, to create a new factory called Plant Oxford. The residual parts of

1050-509: The successful Longbridge-built Rover 200 and 400 series models. In 1992, Rover sold the entire site to property group Arlington Securities, itself later sold to the Australian property company Macquarie Goodman, now the Goodman Group and most of the old site was demolished. Owner of Rover Group, British Aerospace , agreed a partnership with Honda , with Honda taking a 20% stake in

1085-412: The war was over, Vickers, the owners of Electric & Ordnance Accessories Company Ltd, put the factory under the ownership of another subsidiary Wolseley Motors on 30 September 1919. After the change in ownership, Wolseley replaced the small workshop sheds with a large assembly building. Wolseley began to encounter difficulties in the 1920s and it was saved after being purchased by William Morris . As

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1120-497: Was frozen in June 2010 amid allegations that the police deliberately misled councillors about its purpose, after it was revealed that it was being funded as an anti-terrorism initiative, rather than for 'reassurance and crime prevention'. In 1914 the Electric & Ordnance Accessories Company Ltd ( Vickers, Sons & Maxim ) constructed a large factory between Common Lane and Drews Lane in

1155-548: Was seen to be more efficient for production of new Morrises to be moved to Cowley in Oxford . By the 1950s, production was centred at Cowley and the Ward End Works were used in the productions of Nuffield Group products. Following the formation of the British Motor Corporation in 1952, parts were also made there for Austin-Healey Sprite , and the Wolseley 1500/Riley 1.5 twins. The formation of British Leyland resulted in

1190-407: Was selling its 20% share of Rover Group, resulting in problems in Rover's supply chain which was highly reliant on Honda. BMW invested heavily in Rover, and particularly the Cowley plant, which became the production centre for the new Rover 75 in late 1998. However, when BMW broke up the Rover Group on its sale 18 months later, production of the Rover 75 was switched to Longbridge, while BMW retained

1225-542: Was the car body manufacturing business of the Pressed Steel Company , later known as Pressed Steel Fisher, which was founded in 1926. The north and south car assembly plants were originally Morris Motors plants, later part of British Leyland and latterly the Rover Group . The whole site was reorganised in the 1990s and now only the original Pressed Steel portion of the site remains. In 1912, William Morris bought

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