It lies close to The Belfry Golf Club, Middleton Lakes RSPB reserve and Kingsbury Water Park, just a few hundred metres from the M42 link to Tamworth and Birmingham.

[1] The land used for Bodymoor Heath was purchased sometime during the 1970s from a local farmer by then-Chairman Doug Ellis, to replace the previous training facility in Trinity Road, Aston.

However, by the late 1990s the facilities had started to look dated, prompting then-Villa manager John Gregory to criticise Ellis, stating that he believed he was "stuck in a time warp",[2] citing the Chairman's reluctance to invest further in the training ground as something of considerable concern.

Planning permission had been a significant problem for the club's intention to modernise the training facilities, and it wasn't until November 2005 that Aston Villa announced an £8 million redevelopment of Bodymoor Heath.

In 2018, contractors O'Brien were appointed to oversee the relocation of significant parts of Bodymoor Heath, particularly the Academy, where the line would directly cut into, in order to compensate for the land lost.

[10] In April 2018, Aston Villa announced that Bodymoor Heath was to be renamed the "Recon Training Complex",[11] after a group owned by the club's sole owner at the time, Tony Xia.