Does anyone know ANYWHERE where i can find out about the sheffield student games!!!??????? ie a website!!!!!!!!

I keep getting reminded about the World Student Games with every Council Tax payment I make.

Why not do a search over the net? Here is a pointer:

"Biggest Waste of Tax Payers' Money In Living History"

Try that, I'd be surprised if Ask Jeeves couldn't take you straight there.....,

The council said that future business people who took part in the stupid, sorry, student games would be likely to locate or trade with Sheffield. Is there any proof thst this has happened?

E ven before the Games began the Wise Fathers of Sheffield City Council were throwing money away by the bucketful.
As far as I remember the bidding for the Games took place in Belgrade and there was only one bidder. Guess who ? The other cities had all pulled out,probably realising that the whole caboodle could bankrupt them for years.
This obviously put Sheffield in a position of power.However,according to what I read at the time,our negotiating team accepted all the conditions of the contract presented to them,without even a whimper.They actually put on an expensive presentation even when they knew they were the only candidate left !
This was just a foretaste of things to come.It must be a wonderful feeling to really splash out when you're spending other people's money.

well thanks for your extermely helpful responses.......

actually they are helpful im doing some geography coursework about how sporting events affect different communities and im gathering that from your feedback it wasnt in a very helpful way!!!!! which is great to compare!!!! but bad for you.

It was such a waste of money wasn't it.

We're lumbered with an arena no one uses, two big sports facilites no one goes near and a stadium that brought other sports developments to Sheffield and transformed a run down crappy area of the city into something that looks terrible and no one goes near.

I agree - what a complete waste :loopy:

As you can tell sheffstud, there are some bad memories of the World Student Games. The financing of them was badly managed, but there were some good things to come out of them:
The Hallam FM Arena
Don Valley stadium
Ponds Forge
Hillsborough Leisure Centre

were all built for the Games, and we wouldn't have had them without it. It is also unlikely that other sporting facilities such as the Ice Arena would have followed.

During the Games themselves there was a really good Festival, including a fantastic street festival with entertainers from all over the world.

So, not all bad news.

Maybe I should tag a ;) on my last post for those who fail to see the sarcasm in it :thumbsup:

Originally posted by rinty
It was such a waste of money wasn't it.

We're lumbered with an arena no one uses, two big sports facilites no one goes near and a stadium that brought other sports developments to Sheffield and transformed a run down crappy area of the city into something that looks terrible and no one goes near.

I agree - what a complete waste :loopy:

The arena gets used, granted. But it's been some years since Don Valley Stadium held an athletics meeting of any importance. I went to a Grand prix meeting years ago, probably about six to eight years ago and it was great. But then the body running the thing lost the right to stage the event. I'm sure it hasn't been staged since.

Regarding the other sports facilities that you state the WSG helped bring to Sheffield, it's too early to comment. I did read that the skating centre's attendances had been poor, but let's wait a couple more years before deciding. Still, I have my doubts.

Meadowhall brought a lot of investment to this neck of the woods, not the fact that there's a running circuit nearby. Meadowhall led to the improving of the roads around Attercliffe and its success has had a knock-on effect in the surrounding regions.

But Meadowhall would be a success wouldn't it, as it was a private development, not one reliant on the ridiculous premise of a council eager to win a pointless and expensive event that other councils of the country wouldn't touch with a barge pole.

Enjoy your swim, enjoy your skating. Enjoy your concerts.

You might as well. You'll still be paying for the privilege by the time you're a grandfather.....,

well thanks for your views they have been helpful.

the Games clearly brought positives and negatives. its a catch22 really isnt it.... you got your arenas and facilities and maybe a few happy memories, but are still gona be in debt for aaaaaaages as a result.

hopefuly my new found info will be of use!!!!!

The main reason the athletics stopped happening was the people of Sheffield couldn't be bothered to go and watch it. The stadium is used every week.

I don't mind paying for facilites - I don't like money being thrown away either but the games weren't the total disater many people make them out to be because these facilities would never have been built otherwise.

I think the Grand Prix meeting ended up going (back) to Crystal Palace. That in itself, is probably a political decision, or if not, then the usual 'let's have it in the south' that we've regretably come to expect from the government, Tory or Labour.

I thought that the crowds were better than expected, although I suppose it can't have been cheap if you took your family along. I enjoyed going. It's a shame we can't get that meeting back.

Whatever, I do agree that the area has improved drastically since the WSG and it's been good seeing some big names in pop music at the Arena. I've seen Blur (superb), Oasis (terrible), S Club 7 (better than I imagined) and Paul McCartney (as good as ever). I don't think we would have seen their like at the City Hall.

But the fact that there's a huge debt left to pay still leaves a lot of Sheffield people with a bad taste in their mouth. (That is, when considering where else that money could have been spent: housing, health, education etc, etc. But, we are always told that that budget could not have been used for these things, blah di blah..)

Politics eh?

Originally posted by clogginchris
As you can tell sheffstud, there are some bad memories of the World Student Games. The financing of them was badly managed, but there were some good things to come out of them:
The Hallam FM Arena
Don Valley stadium
Ponds Forge
Hillsborough Leisure Centre

were all built for the Games, and we wouldn't have had them without it. It is also unlikely that other sporting facilities such as the Ice Arena would have followed.

During the Games themselves there was a really good Festival, including a fantastic street festival with entertainers from all over the world.

So, not all bad news.

Also do not forget that the Lyceum was restored for the cultural element of the games.
The Tennis centre at Graves
Don Valley Grass Bowl
Concord's all weather pitches
Hyde Park flats were rebuilt and some demolished.If only they had done the same to Park Hill before they got their listed status.
Tudor Square repaved.

So,not all bad news.

and wasn't the cack works of modern art to do with that as well?

Hardly the jewel in the crown was it? I mean who had ever heard of the World Student Games. :rolleyes:

Originally posted by clogginchris
The financing of them was badly managed, but there were some good things to come out of them:

Hillsborough Leisure Centre


Peniston Road never used to flood until HLC was built though ;-)

The council said that the World Student Games would 'put Sheffield on the map'. OK, so where was it the time before Sheffield, and the time after Sheffield? Those places might be on the map somewhere - but where?

When there was the push to get the games here, the WSG committee heard that Sheffield were daft enough to want it. They didn't wait until the end of the decison period - they decided there and then to give us the honour - before we woke up to what it meant.

During the build up to the games they had the advice of an expert (J. Mont.......) and they tended to ignore him when he gave them the 'wrong' answers - they wanted it their own way. One example, for instance, there were thousands of tickets unsold, yet people still wanting them. A massive sales failure.

The design of the Arena was taken away from the town hall and became the subject of a design competition - won by American designers I hear.

Despite all that, we do now have some rare facilities - but I hope they learn to use them properly and make them a success. Current views are 'mixed' it seems.

Originally posted by nuf_said
The council said that the World Student Games would 'put Sheffield on the map'. OK, so where was it the time before Sheffield, and the time after Sheffield? Wasn't Sheffield the first to host the games??

Scraped this off the bbc website:

Sport

Sheffield has lots to offer sports fans. Football is a controversial subject, since the city is the home of both Sheffield United and Sheffield Wednesday5. Another team which might be of interest to football fans is Sheffield FC, the oldest club in the world, founded in 1857. Also worth mentioning is the Don Valley stadium, an international athletics stadium originally built as the venue for the World Student Games. It now acts as the British Olympic Association's training headquarters. Within Sheffield there is also Ponds Forge Leisure Centre (containing an Olympic-sized swimming pool), which has hosted both National and International events.

So how pointless is Don Valley?

I'm not sure that most people will find our facilities pointless.
What sticks in most people's throats is the millstone of debt around council tax payers' necks.
The council pretended that central government would pick up the tab despite being told in no uncertain terms that this would not be the case.

Look also at the new Institute of Sport. It is underwritten by Sheffield Council i.e. if it loses money, we have to bail it out. Part of the business plan to justify its self sufficiency included income from hosting athletic and other sports events.

Hang on? Our existing stadium has a shortfall and cannot get enough events to host. So events hosted at the new institute will contribute to losses at the existing stadium.

Slightly similar position with the new Ice Centre. In this case it needs numbers of users at a level that would suggest that the privately owned ice rink on Queens Road would start to struggle. Staff from the council rink were actually leafletting at Queens Road to poach users away.

I'm sorry, but in the current financial climate, it all ammounts to grandstanding by politicians at our expense.

Mod: Threads merged

haha, i had almost forgotten about them! i was one of the many dancing children at the opening ceremony, i remember practising for hours on end in the boiling hot sun in hillsbrough park drinking that bubblicious bubble gum flavoured pop and being told what to do with a coloured ball over huge microphones by the american dance nutters they had hired!! i remember the phrase "its our year" should have been "its your money" my mum worked as a nurse for injured athelites somewhere near the wicker.

Originally posted by Strix
Wasn't Sheffield the first to host the games??

No, I didn't think it was the first so I Googled and found this list:-

1923 Paris, France
1924 Warsaw, Poland
1927 Rome, Italy
1928 Paris, France
1930 Darmstadt, Germany
1933 Turin, Italy
1935 Budapest, Hungary
1937 Paris, France
1939 Monte Carlo, Monaco
1947 Paris, France
1953 Dortmund, West Germany
1957 Paris, France
1959 Turin, Italy
1961 Sofia, Bulgaria
1963 Porto Allegre, Brazil
1965 Budapest, Hungary
1967 Tokyo, Japan
1970 Turin, Italy
1973 Moscow, Russia
1975 Rome, Italy
1977 Sofia, Bulgaria
1979 Mexico City, Mexico
1981 Bucharest, Romania
1983 Edmonton, Canada
1985 Kobe, Japan
1987 Zagreb, Yugoslavia
1989 Duisburg, Germany
1991 Sheffield, England
1993 Buffalo, USA
1995 Fukuoka, Japan
1997 Sicily, Italy
1999 Palma de Mallorca, Spain
2001 Beijing, China
2003 Daegu, S. Korea


So now I know the places. Did Duisberg Germany or Buffalo USA get on the map because of the games - er no.
And presumably Rome, Paris etc were already on the map.

It's strange. Half the posts on this forum complain that the City never invests in improving itself. And the other half complains that the city spends money. Reconcile that.

At the time the World Student Games was proposed Sheffield was looking for a new identity, a new future. Jobs were being lost in steel, cutlery and engineering and the city was looking for a vehicle to create a new future for itself.

Sheffield invested in new facilities, many of which replaced facilities which would have to be re-built anyway. Call the debt incurred a mortgage on the purchase of the new buildings - just like buying a house. Hillsborough replaced Hillsborough baths (now The Deep), Ponds Forge replaced Sheaf Valley Baths (and another pool - Park?). The Arena attracted acts to Sheffield that would never have come here otherwise - at the time many of the bigger bands would never have come to the City Hall because it was too small, and Sheffield Arena was one of the first of the new breed of Arenas to have been built in the UK.

These new facilities attracted (or were used as an excuse for)other new investment - the refurbishment of the Lyceum, Supertram, the Sheffield Moat House Hotel (now Sheffield Park Hotel??), the Hilton, among others.

Given the uncertain future of the time, the decision to go for the Games as a vehicle for regeneration as a brave one - and one which has attracted income, jobs and investment to the City.

Some mistakes were made in the financing and running of it (and everyone forgets that the Education Department at the Council overspent by some £8,000,000 in the same year of the Games). And some attempts to re-finance the Games were sabotaged from within - the day a new sponsorship and fundraising programme was launched the Liberal Democrats spiked the initiative by publicising some overblown "scandal" on the Games finances, thus ensuring that the new fundraising programme never got off the ground.

None of the critics have come up with an answer - what would you have done to stimulate investment in a city losing its primary industries and jobs?

Answers on a postcard please.

I remember before the Student Games, many Sheffielders including the Sheffield Star were in favour of holding the Games here. As soon as they didn't go as well as had been hoped people started moaning, and the Star started printing articles about how the Council should never have brought the Games to Sheffield. Hindsight is such a wonderful thing, isn't it!

We did have some brilliant and popular venues/facilities built because of hosting the Student Games though.

Originally posted by MrHelicopter
It's strange. Half the posts on this forum complain that the City never invests in improving itself. And the other half complains that the city spends money. Reconcile that.

Some of us don't fit into those two halves, so does that mean I don't exist ;)

Seriously, there is a trend on this board to moan about absolutely everything which I find very worrying. God knows what outsiders looking here must think about us :o

1995 Fukuoka, Japan

I think someone just graffitied that one on the map