Why is Sheffield Disproportionately Insignificant?

[jgharston 11]

I can remember seeing a model of a plan for a new city centre at the City library just after WW2.

Park Square

Church Street

"Chester Street"

Civic Square

 

Sheffield Replanned, SCC, 1945.

[rubydazzler 11]

Telling the truth is not trolling your cities are filthy. Now as usual you can respond with your onslaught of emoticons which at your time of life I just find embarrassing for you.

How many different personas are you registered under now? You can be anyone you like, but you're not being very successful at what you do in any of them.

 

I agree with a lot of what's being said about the demolition of anything that looks 'old' but yet when the council attempted to raze the swathes of substandard LA housing, it came in for a lot of stick. Perhaps if we demolished the worst of the vast council estates and shrank Sheffield to somewhere around the size of Chesterfield we'd all be a lot happier? One thing is for sure, due to our topography, we are never going to have a massive city centre, unless we were to relocate the centre somewhere else entirely like the Don Valley and refocus the cityscape?

 

Perhaps the critics are right, we have the small town mentality coupled with a desire for our home to be acknowledged as being in the first rank, and the schism is driving us all a little loopy? We can't have it both ways.

 

Although, I'm intrigued to know whether there are as many critics in the ranks in other cities such as Leeds and Nottingham? Somehow I doubt it, there seems to be something unique about Sheffield that makes its own children queue up to berate the old place. Or is it due to the over large number of students who stay on here after they finish their courses?

 

Something odd is obviously going on here, but none of us are quite sure what?

[Kerrangaroo 10]

Telling the truth is not trolling your cities are filthy. Now as usual you can respond with your onslaught of emoticons which at your time of life I just find embarrassing for you.

 

I have to say having stayed with friends in Vancouver and to a lesser extent Toronto the thing that did strike me and leave a lasting impression was the cleanliness of the streets, even the seedier quarter of Vancouver was free of litter. I would be rightly proud if we could boast the same here.

[alchresearch 214]

Park Square

Church Street

"Chester Street"

Civic Square

 

Sheffield Replanned, SCC, 1945.

 

They're splendid, thanks for sharing.

[Longcol 602]

 

One reason why Sheffield is insignificant to me is it has no soul. There is an absolute terror of retaining anything old. Tear it down and build something new, its an eyesore? no matter, its new. Massive sections of its history have been removed in the name of progress and as a result we have a city with no sense of identity just a desire to be "modern".

 

So which "massive sections" of history have been lost - where were all these old architectural gems?

[fizzydrink 10]

How many different personas are you registered under now? You can be anyone you like, but you're not being very successful at what you do in any of them.

 

I agree with a lot of what's being said about the demolition of anything that looks 'old' but yet when the council attempted to raze the swathes of substandard LA housing, it came in for a lot of stick. Perhaps if we demolished the worst of the vast council estates and shrank Sheffield to somewhere around the size of Chesterfield we'd all be a lot happier? One thing is for sure, due to our topography, we are never going to have a massive city centre, unless we were to relocate the centre somewhere else entirely like the Don Valley and refocus the cityscape?

 

Perhaps the critics are right, we have the small town mentality coupled with a desire for our home to be acknowledged as being in the first rank, and the schism is driving us all a little loopy? We can't have it both ways.

 

Although, I'm intrigued to know whether there are as many critics in the ranks in other cities such as Leeds and Nottingham? Somehow I doubt it, there seems to be something unique about Sheffield that makes its own children queue up to berate the old place. Or is it due to the over large number of students who stay on here after they finish their courses?

 

Something odd is obviously going on here, but none of us are quite sure what?

 

I have no need to justify myself to you in anyway, contact the help desk if you think i am using a pseudonym. Reading your latest installment you seem quite confused, i will leave you on this one, that i made my point, plus i do not have or want the pack mentality you seem to thrive on when you pop up in posts such as these. YUP by the way is american, it seems to be joining more of the words used on here such as cool-dude-hun etc, where's the sheffield dialect in that. Just make a nice CUPPA and watch britain's got talent.

[rubydazzler 11]

I have no need to justify myself to you in anyway, contact the help desk if you think i am using a pseudonym. Reading your latest installment you seem quite confused, i will leave you on this one, that i made my point, plus i do not have or want the pack mentality you seem to thrive on when you pop up in posts such as these. YUP by the way is american, it seems to be joining more of the words used on here such as cool-dude-hun etc, where's the sheffield dialect in that. Just make a nice CUPPA and watch britain's got talent.

OK ... *sigh* ... Edited May 11, 2012 by rubydazzler

[jake 10]

Under our current Communist master race the capitalists who created the city with their ideas and skills must be erased from our collective memories and replaced with the ideas that started when the city's clock was reset to year zero when Blunkett took over ................................. well, something like that.

 

er.. something like that..

 

Sheffield never had a big middle class in the same way as Leeds or Manchester - due to the nature of its Industries - thats probably got a lot to do with the character & nature of the city

- for both good & bad.

[buck 11]

I have to say having stayed with friends in Vancouver and to a lesser extent Toronto the thing that did strike me and leave a lasting impression was the cleanliness of the streets, even the seedier quarter of Vancouver was free of litter. I would be rightly proud if we could boast the same here.

That whole Northern Pacific coast region is a gem, from Seattle north to Victoria and Vancouver Island BC. I don't think I ever found a bad area of Vancouver, though to be honest, I didn't go looking. My Grandaughter lives in Portland, Oregon to the south of Washington State. Lots of rain though.

[Guest busdriver1]

So which "massive sections" of history have been lost - where were all these old architectural gems?

 

Who said anything about architectural gems? Does every building have to be stunning to be retained?

I have not lived in Sheffield long enough to give an authorative answer to what was there and what has gone, but, I am sure a great many serviceable buildings have been needlessly torn down in the name of progress. Many of these are now to be torn down in pursuit of the same progress. I wonder how long before the eyesore car parks of Arundle gate get torn down? Not long I hope. It is possible to retain the old and incorporate new with it. Look at Docklands in London for a good example of how to do it.

[evildrneil 14]

Sheffield is still a big old village - it could be a lot worse.

 

That's largely it's problem - deeply parochial and backward looking. And not helped by the fact that it sits in a triangle of three much more successful, forward looking cities. If ever a city really wanted to be back in the 1950s it's (large parts of) Sheffield

[natjack 10]

That's largely its problem - deeply parochial and backward looking. And not helped by the fact that it sits in a triangle of three much more successful, forward looking cities. If ever a city really wanted to be back in the 1950s it's (large parts of) Sheffield

I'm not that well up on neighbouring places, which are they?

 

Is the bit about it being backward and parochial really right. I think a lot depends on who you mix with and how much store you set on what people on SF have to say At a guess, I'd agree with jake, there is a big absence of a true middle-class here in Sheffield and consequently there's been a lack of aspiration over the years?

 

Looking back at its history, there was a record of innovation in Sheffield, the first to do a lot of stuff, wholesale demolition of slum housing especially the back-to-backs which places like Leeds and Huddersfield still have swathes of, streets in the sky, Supertram, a lot of 'culture' I'm sure there's more. It seemed a place proud of itself and its achievements. But then about 20-30 years ago it seems it all went pear shaped. The place seems to have been floundering to find itself again ever since and not had much help to do it.