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Will Sheffield Ever catch up with Leeds/Manchester?

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I also love Sheffield for all sorts of reasons, but feel it is falling further and further behind Leeds, a city of similar size.

 

Sheffield doesn't really promote itself properly, and seems singularly lacking in a big idea. It's planning department takes so long to grant permissions that it constantly misses the zeitgeist. The idea that it tries to promote itself as the 'City of Sport' would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

 

Leeds on the other hand has managed to attract prestigious Arts companies like Northern Ballet and Opera North, and is now hoping to become 'City of Culture' in 2016

 

Shopping is also an issue. While just about adequate, it is nothing to write home about, and lacks any stores of note, nor does it encourage small quirky individual, destination shops, although it is working hard to improve the city centre - but what's the point if there's nothing to come into town for?

 

Rather than going on jaunts to Cannes, it might like to study how other, more successful councils operate, and take a leaf out of their book.

 

If this great 'Northern Hub' mega city (made up of 3 or 4 smaller cities,) ever gets going, Sheffield had better pull its finger out and get in there, or it will be sidelined for good.

Edited by Anna B

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Yes unless we can conjure up another million or so living within a ten mile radius.

 

Being forward thinking doesn't rely on greater numbers.

 

Networked and super fast: welcome to Bristol, the UK’s smartest city

 

Forget Silicon Roundabout; Bristol is fast gaining a reputation as the UK’s most technologically smart urban environment, a place that is trying to understand how the cities of the future can exploit the vast realms of data they will collect when even the most humdrum devices, from electricity meters to car number plate recognition systems, are wired together in what is commonly referred to as “the internet of things.” The buzz around Bristol – the only major English city outside London to make a positive net contribution to the national economy and which boasts the largest silicon chip industry outside Silicon Valley – is palpable.

 

A report released last week found that Bristol had the strongest creative industries sector of any large urban area in the UK, excluding London.

 

“There’s not really anything like it anywhere else,” Meineck said of the city’s technological spirit. “Maybe there are small pockets across London, but in Bristol it seems like the whole city is networked.”

 

It helps that the city’s independent mayor, George Ferguson, is a technology evangelist. “I believe that the best cities are the ones that embrace change and are prepared to look for new solutions to the great urban challenges, such as climate change, mobility, energy supply and caring for our growing older population,” he said. “Of course, in trying new things we shall sometimes make mistakes, but by working closely with business, with academia and, of course, with citizens, we can learn together in our live urban lab.”

 

So far most of the projects backed by the city council have been small-scale pilots involving smart meters. However, from next spring an old cable television network – which the council bought for small change nearly a decade ago and which, thanks to the addition of new superfast fibre, can support colossal data speeds of terabits per second – will turn the city into a giant test bed.

 

LINK

 

“I believe that the best cities are the ones that embrace change".

 

Well that's Sheffield out of the running then.

 

 

Population of Bristol: 428,100

Population of Sheffield: 551,800

 

(Both figures dated 2011).

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Leeds on the other hand has managed to attract prestigious Arts companies like Northern Ballet and Opera North, and is now hoping to become 'City of Culture' in 2016

 

Sheffield Theatres named best outside London

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-20892038

 

Rather than going on jaunts to Cannes, it might like to study how other, more successful councils operate, and take a leaf out of their book.

 

Sheffield is sharing a stand with Leeds there alongside other cities. I guess we should just not bother ?

http://www.thestar.co.uk/news/business/business-news/cannes-do-attitude-as-sheffield-city-region-heads-to-property-fair-1-7100438

 

As for the rest of the thread, can't we just have a naysayers megathread on Sheffield and all the tosh similar to what is posted in this thread be put in there ? Surely, If you don't like it here, why don't you just leave ? :wave:

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As an outsider Sheffield to me is a very parochial town which doesn't embrace changes and is crippled by its past. It hasn't moved with the times and terrible planning decisions along with over-zealous bent parking wardens has only drove businesses away to real cities like Leeds.

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As an outsider Sheffield to me is a very parochial town which doesn't embrace changes and is crippled by its past. It hasn't moved with the times and terrible planning decisions along with over-zealous bent parking wardens has only drove businesses away to real cities like Leeds.

 

The grass is always greener in Leeds too, try asking the good folk of Leeds how good their City is, the YEP did.

http://www.yorkshireeveningpost.co.uk/news/latest-news/top-stories/yep-survey-how-you-would-tackle-problems-facing-leeds-1-6916632

I suspect if the Star asked the people of sheffield, the comments would be the same.

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I think that the Sheffield Bid result today will be very interesting. Leeds have voted yes for it already.

 

http://www.sheffieldbid.com

 

This sounds very good. But isn't it what the councill should be doing?

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This sounds very good. But isn't it what the councill should be doing?

 

If it's a good idea, it's fairly safe to say the council probably aren't involved :hihi::hihi::hihi::hihi::hihi:

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As an outsider Sheffield to me is a very parochial town which doesn't embrace changes and is crippled by its past. It hasn't moved with the times and terrible planning decisions along with over-zealous bent parking wardens has only drove businesses away to real cities like Leeds.

 

This type of unsubstantiated claim makes the rest of your post not worth reading. Either complain to the authorities with proof or pay your fine with good grace.

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So why should Sheffield try and compete with other nearby cities? I couldn't give a toss what Manchester or Leeds do

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It cannot compete as long as SCC are in charge. They are still stuck in the 1970s "SSRSY" era. Still singing the internationale and the red flag flying here etc.

 

Just found this quote from the Guardian which sums it up pretty well:

In the 1980s Liverpool / Meseyside and Sheffield / South Yorkshire councils adopted a policy of "resistance" to the Tory government.

 

Leeds and Manchester councils, despite also being Labour, were mich more pragmatic. The results are still plain to see - Manchester and Leeds have become successful cities, still run by Labour, while Liverpool and Sheffield now struggle economically. People got sufficiently fed up with Labour's inability to deliver economically (or even run the places properly) that Labour got kicked out of both cities in the late 90s and mid 00s, which didn't happen in Leeds or Manchester where people were happier with moderate and sensible Labour councils.

 

Sheffield council in particular is viewed by the populace as either incompetent or corrupt. The current Labour council has returned to the bad old ways of making bad decisions in order to make political points (knocking down Don Valley Stadium, refusing to grit roads in the west of the city, etc) and there's a sodding great area of the city centre that is shut down awaiting construction of a new shopping area that will never happen (meanwhile Leeds and even Liverpool constructed new shopping areas in their City centres in the same time frame).

 

Blunkett's legacy is not a good one.

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Population of Bristol: 428,100

Population of Sheffield: 551,800

 

(Both figures dated 2011).

 

http://www.bristol.gov.uk/page/council-and-democracy/councillors

 

Labour 31

Liberal Democrat 16

Conservative 15

Green 6

UK Independence Party (UK I P) 1

Independents for Bristol 1

 

https://www.sheffield.gov.uk/your-city-council/roles-who/councillors.html

 

Labour, 59

Liberal Democrats, 18

Green, 4

UKIP, 3

 

I think so those figures explain exactly why Sheffield council has so little ambition. Vote Labour and not just any old Labour, Sheffield Labour. A special brand of governance.

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