£450,000 revamp of traffic island starts
A £450,000 project to improve one of the Black Country's busiest traffic islands – being used by 92,000 drivers everyday – will begin tomorrow.
Workers will move on to the Birchley Island in Oldbury as part of the scheme to install new lights, improve parts of the road surface and plant trees and flowers. Meanwhile, the Express & Star can also reveal today that there are plans to rename the notorious island, which has been branded "grotty" and a blight on the borough.
Council bosses are looking to land a sponsorship deal with a local business and then rename the island after the company and invest the money back into Oldbury.
Sandwell's neighbourhoods chief Councillor Mahboob Hussain said representatives from a number of businesses, such as the AA, Sainsbury's, Holiday Inn and Homebase, were due to attend a ceremony to mark the official start of the project at 9am tomorrow.
Councillor Hussain said: "We have been in open discussions with a number of parties and could change the name, for example it could be The AA Island.
"The sponsorship money would then be reinvested back into Oldbury and help develop the roads from the island, we could see the streets lined with hanging baskets or new lights," he added.
The revamp of the island is expected to last for eight to 12 weeks and Councillor Hussain said there would be no disruption to traffic.
He said diggers would soon be moving on site to start tearing up the grass before the island is given new lights, flowers, semi-matured trees, ornamental shrubs and low-maintenance gravel areas.
It is hoped the work will transform people's first impressions of Sandwell.
"At the moment, this is a blight on the borough," Councillor Hussain added. "It is a main gateway into Sandwell, 92,000 drivers use it every day, and it needs to be cleaned up."
Most of the cash to spruce up the island at Junction 2 of the M5 has come from council funds.
