River Pinn

Frays River is a semi-canalised short river in England that branches off the River Colne at Uxbridge Moor and rejoins it at West Drayton. It is believed to be a mainly man-made anabranch north of the confluence with the River Pinn to feed watermills in the Parish of Hillingdon. The river is believed to be named after John Fray who owned Cowley Hall in the fifteenth century. Other names for the river are the Uxbridge and Cowley Mill Stream, the Cowley Stream or the Colham Mill Stream. Two of the three mills in Hillingdon Parish recorded in the Domesday book are believed to have been located on the southern section of the river.

Yiewsley and West Drayton was a local government district in Middlesex, England from 1929 to 1965. Its area became the south-west of the London Borough of Hillingdon.

West Drayton railway station serves West Drayton and Yiewsley, western suburbs of London. It is served by local trains operated by the Elizabeth line. It is 13 miles 71 chains (22.3 km) down the line from London Paddington and is situated between Hayes & Harlington to the east and Iver to the west. The station is managed by Transport for London (TfL).

Yiewsley ( YOOZ-lee) is a large suburban village in the London Borough of Hillingdon, England, 2 miles (3 km) south of Uxbridge, the borough's commercial and administrative centre. Yiewsley was a chapelry in the ancient parish of Hillingdon, Middlesex. The population of the ward was 12,979 at the 2011 Census.

Otter Dock was a branch of the Grand Junction Canal (renamed Grand Union Canal from 1929) in Yiewsley, Middlesex. In March 1818, permission was obtained from the Grand Junction Canal Company by a Mr John Mills for a dock to be built to service Yiewsley's brickmaking industry. Otter Dock would be the longest of nine arms and docks that served Yiewsley's industries. It was opened in 1820 and after several expansions extended 1,200 yards (0.7 of a mile /1.1 km) north from the mainline of the canal. With the inclusion of the arms within Otter dock, its total length was 1845 yards (1.05 miles /1.68 km).Through the rest of the nineteenth century brick-earth was moulded and fired in clamp kilns within Yiewsley's brick-fields with the finished bricks being transported via the Otter Dock and the Grand Junction Canal Paddington Arm to the South Wharf in the Paddington Basin and also to wharves situated along the Regent's Canal and to other locations along the canal and the River Thames. The bricks were then used in the construction of 19th-century London. By the beginning of the 20th century, the brick-fields and the later gravel pits which the Otter Dock served had been worked out. By November 1906 a cofferdam had been placed at its entrance from the Grand Junction Canal mainline. Filling in Otter Dock north of Horton Road began in 1909 and was completed in 1911. On 17 November 1910 work began on planting 70 chestnut and beech trees along the filled-in canal between Colham Road (known as Wharf or Dock Road until May 1904.) and Ernest Road in the southern section of the former Arm. The roads were renamed Colham Avenue in 1938. The wide boulevard of Poplar Avenue was part of the northern section of the Arm. South of Horton road Otter Dock remained through much of the 20th Century and was used in the 1930s as a boat repair facility. A water pumping station of the Rickmansworth & Uxbridge Valley Water Works Co was constructed adjacent to the truncated arm. The dock was also used by the Johnson's wax company and by timber merchant James Davies Ltd.In the late twentieth century the arm was filled in and today the site of the dock and pumping station is the location of the Knowles Close housing estate.

St Catherine's Church or St Catherine of Alexandria Church is a Catholic parish church in West Drayton, Borough of Hillingdon, London. It was built from 1868 to 1869 and designed by Thomas John Willson and Samuel Joseph Nicholl. It is architecturally in the Gothic Revival style and was paid for by the Irish immigrants living in the west Drayton area. It is situated on The Green near the town centre. On 12 May 2016, it was designated a Grade II listed building.

Cowley is a village contiguous with the town of Uxbridge in the London Borough of Hillingdon. A largely suburban village with 16 listed buildings, Cowley is 15.4 miles (24.8 km) west of Charing Cross, bordered to the west by Uxbridge Moor in the Green Belt and the River Colne, forming the border with Buckinghamshire. Cowley was an ancient parish in the historic county of Middlesex.

Cowley Railway Station was a station on the Uxbridge branch of the Great Western Railway in Cowley, London. The station was opened to serve the small settlement of Cowley. It opened in 1904, nearly fifty years after the rest of the line from West Drayton had been constructed. It was the only intermediate station on the line, situated between Uxbridge Vine Street and West Drayton railway station. It closed to passengers on 10 September 1962, along with the remainder of the branch, but freight trains went through to Uxbridge Vine Street until 1964. Only the stretch of the line from West Drayton Station to the Grand Union Canal survived longer. This was for a freight service to the Middlesex Oil and Chemical Works in Yiewsley which stopped in 1979. Cowley station has since been demolished and built over, and today there are only a few signs of its former existence, including a railway bridge and "Station Road". The station had two platforms, a station building on the southbound platform and a small shelter (also pre-1940, a ticket machine) on the other.It was once part of early 20th century plans for a longer rail line from Denham to Staines via Uxbridge and West Drayton but the section linking Uxbridge High Street railway station and a point south of Uxbridge Vine Street was not built.

The Malt Shovel is a Grade II listed public house at Iver Lane, Cowley, London.It was built early 19th century. It is now called The Malt Shovel.

The Crown is a Grade II listed public house at High Street, Cowley, London.It dates from the 16th century.

West Drayton is a suburban town in the London Borough of Hillingdon. It was an ancient parish in the county of Middlesex and from 1929 was part of the Yiewsley and West Drayton Urban District, which became part of Greater London in 1965. The settlement is near the Colne Valley Regional Park and its centre lies 1.9 miles (3 km) north of Heathrow Airport. Traditionally the Parish of West Drayton covers 3.4 square kilometres (1.3 sq mi). In 1901 the population of the civil parish was 984. In the 2011 Census 14,370 people were living in the West Drayton electoral ward. The ward has three councillors in the Hillingdon Borough Council. The vast majority of the housing in West Drayton is mid-20th century.

Brunel University London is a public research university located in the Uxbridge area of London, England. It was founded in 1966 and named after the Victorian engineer and pioneer of the Industrial Revolution, Isambard Kingdom Brunel. In June 1966, Brunel College of Advanced Technology was awarded a royal charter and became Brunel University. The university is often described as a British plate glass university. Brunel is organised into three colleges, a structure adopted in August 2014 which also changed the university's name to Brunel University London. Brunel's three constituent Academic Colleges include the College of Business, Arts and Social Sciences; the College of Engineering, Design and Physical Sciences; and the College of Health, Medicine and Life Sciences. Brunel has over 16,150 students and 2,500 staff, and the annual income of the institution for 2021–22 was £271.3 million, of which £22.4 million was from research grants and contracts, with an expenditure of £311.9 million. The university is ranked as one of the top 400 universities in the world by QS World University Rankings 2022 and the Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2022. The university won the Queen's Anniversary Prize in 2011. Brunel is a member of the Association of Commonwealth Universities, the European University Association, and Universities UK.