Martyn's Blog

On Wednesday 20th March, I took the train from Burton on Trent up to Sheffield in South Yorkshire for a day out in the city, and a quick trip over to the Meadowhall Shopping Centre, which has its own railway station and Supertram stop.

The train had to take the long way around to Sheffield from Burton, diverging at Chesterfield and travelling past Woodhouse and Darnall to get to Sheffield. I later found out that this was because of the work to upgrade the Hope Valley Line, particularly the station at Dore & Totley, which now has an extra platform (it is on the list of places for me to visit soon).

Sheffield station was first opened in 1870 by the Midland Railway, and was named Pond Street. It replaced the Midland Railway’s old station, Sheffield Wicker. Wicker opened in 1838 and closed to passengers in 1870, becoming a goods station until it was closed in 1965. The present station entrance was built in 1905 as part of an extension to the station. The station leads on to Sheaf Square, a public open area created during a redevelopment of the station in 2006. There are two water features, the most prominent being the wall of water which borders the walkway up to the main road.

My first visit was to the Millennium Gallery, an art gallery with several exhibition rooms. The gallery houses the Ruskin Collection, containing items collected by Victorian scholar John Ruskin, which he hoped would inspire the workforce of South Yorkshire. The other permanent exhibition is the Metalwork Collection, containing hundreds of examples of locally-made cutlery and other items.

The Millennium Gallery leads straight into the Winter Garden. Opened by the late Queen Elizabeth II in 2003, the garden is home to many plants and flowers, which are regularly changed throughout the year. There are also a few sculptures and statues, as well as a cafe. Snooker fans will recognise the place, as it is where the BBC Sport coverage of the World Championships at the nearby Crucible Theatre is broadcast from.

I left the Winter Garden and walked to another garden, the Peace Gardens. The gardens were laid out in 1938 as St Paul’s Gardens, but were quickly nicknamed “Peace Gardens” by the locals, after the 1938 Munich Agreement. On 6th August 1985, forty years to the day after the bombing of Hiroshima by the USA, the gardens were officially renamed to the Peace Gardens in the presence of three survivors of the bombing.

The gardens were remodelled in 1997 with the cascading water features and the central fountain added. The cascades represent both the rivers of Sheffield and the flow of molten steel, an integral part of the city’s heritage as the centre of steel production in the United Kingdom.

Around the back of the nearby Town Hall is a green police box. Installed in 1929, it is the last remaining example of a police box in the city, one of over 120. It is now used as a tourist information point, having been used as a telephone box for the police, and also for detaining miscreants until they could be taken to the police station.

I had a wander to the City Hall, having almost got lost in amongst some roadworks which were taking place in the area. The City Hall was originally designed in 1920, but not completed until 1932 because of the poor economic situation in the 1920s. It is a concert venue which has played host to the likes of violinist Yehudi Menuhin, Elton John, Kylie Minogue and a group from Liverpool called The Beatles.

A short walk from the city hall took me to Sheffield Cathedral. The building dates back to the 13th century, although it has been heavily modified since then. Conveniently, it was built close to Cathedral tram stop on the Sheffield Supertram network.

The cathedral has suffered two major fires in recent years, the first in 1979 and more recently in 2020, when it was targeted in an arson attack. A local charity which operated from the cathedral and provided food for the homeless, Cathedral Archer Project, was badly affected by the fire.

I headed back to the railway station to catch a train to Meadowhall station, serving the massive Meadowhall shopping centre between Sheffield and Rotherham. Trains to Meadowhall are incredibly frequent from Sheffield, every five to ten minutes during the day.

The Meadowhall Shopping Centre was opened in September 1990 on the site of an old steelworks. It has over 280 stores, and a huge food court. I had actually been to Meadowhall once before, just before Christmas 1998, but I got there by bus that time.

Meadowhall Interchange is a combined railway, tram and bus stop which was opened at the same time as the shopping centre in September 1990. The railway station has four platforms, a staffed ticket office and a waiting room. It has a direct link through a bridge into the shopping centre.

I had a wander around part of the shopping centre, and then returned back to the station to catch a train back to Sheffield. I then needed to catch a train from Sheffield to Derby, which was running six minutes late. Unfortunately, I had a six minute wait at Derby for a train back to Burton. I got off the train from Sheffield just in time to see my train home depart. Luckily, I only had half an hour to wait to get back home.

That’s it for this post, thanks for reading.