Shropshire

Shropshire is a county of western England, on the border with Wales and for statistical purposes classed as part of the West Midlands. Forming a part of the historic Welsh Marches region, it borders Cheshire to the north, Staffordshire to the east, Worcestershire and Herefordshire to the south, bordering the Welsh counties of Radnorshire to the south west, Montgommeryshire to the west and Denbighshire to the north west. It is largely agricultural. The county town is the historic town of Shrewsbury. The largest town by urban area in Shropshire is Telford, a new town, just south of which lies Ironbridge, named for the world's first cast-iron bridge over the River Severn built in 1779, which partly confirmed Shropshire as one of the birthplaces of the Industrial Revolution. Other notable towns include Bridgnorth, Ludlow, Oswestry and Whitchurch.

Transport

The county has only one motorway: the M54, which links Telford to Wolverhampton in Staffordshire and, via the M6 motorway, to Birmingham and the south of England. The A49 road forms a rural, north-south road across the county linkingv via Shrewsbury, Whitchurch in the north of the county to Warrington in Lancashire, and Ludlow in the south to Hereford and Leominster. Another major road in Shropshire is the A5 which, broadly following the Roman London-Holyhead road Walting Street, links Shropshire with North Wales and also serves traffic to Chester and Liverpool.