Sheffield City Centre - The Future

[hackey lad]

2 hours ago, ECCOnoob said:

It is not so simple of simply declaring they were  not up to spec.  Times change. What was required, accepted and commonplace in the 1960s and 70s is very different to what is required now.

 

When the legacy mega office blocks such as Telephone House, Pennine house and The Griffin building were first built they were probably state-of-the-art. However that was a time when everyone had their own little cubicle, the women did the filing and the men sat in their executive offices. It was a time when operations such as telephone switchboard, mail room and payroll required entire floors of a building. Now those operations can be dealt with by one or two persons sat at a desk with laptop. 

 

I remember my first job in a law firm with a  switchboard that was a 4 person job and had its own dedicated room.  Now a few decades later, our firm doesn't even have have a switchboard as everyone uses VOIP and a mobile.  Same with outdated things such as  filing rooms, the telex room, the typing pools, works canteens etc..

 

Add on the drive towards agile, remote, hot desking and other advances in the way we all work and it's not hard to realised why legacy buildings simply become unfit for purpose over natural time.   It's not a design flaw.

 

In 40 years time when I hope I'll be long long retired, chances are our current state-of-the-art office blocks will be seen as old fashioned, run down and not fit for the modern workplace. 

 

It's always evolving.  Cities have to evolve with it, and harsh fact is, its often far cheaper to either repurpose a building or knock down completely and build again rather than try to force a business to adapt their operations and spend double the money refurbishing a existing building to suit their needs.  That's before we get onto the minefield of now banned materials, health and safety laws, disability access laws which were not in existence when the original buildings were built.

Im not on about  the 60s 70s , Im on about the last ten years . How many of these offices are used at capacity ?

[ECCOnoob]

4 minutes ago, hackey lad said:

Im not on about  the 60s 70s , Im on about the last ten years . How many of these offices are used at capacity ?

I don't know, you tell me.

 

In fact, I can't think off the top of my head of a city office building empty which has been built in the last 10 years.

Edited February 23, 2022 by ECCOnoob

[hackey lad]

1 minute ago, ECCOnoob said:

I don't know, you tell me.

 

In fact, I can't think off the top of my head of a city office building empty which has been built in the last 10 years.

I never said empty 

[ECCOnoob]

7 minutes ago, hackey lad said:

I never said empty 

Well, even if they are partially full it still raises the same problems. Companies come and go all the time and every single one has unique needs.

 

If a pre-existing office building is up to modern standards - great , but what if it only has two floors available when a company requires four..... they are simply not going to take it.  If a current property roster has nothing suitable across the board then obviously a company will choose to build or convert their own.

 

As I said earlier, the way the working world  dramatically changes. It evolves all the time.  You can't force companies to adapt their operations to fit into pre-existing structures all the time. Even less so if the bottom line ultimately costs more.

Edited February 23, 2022 by ECCOnoob

[hackey lad]

So why allow the buildings to be built , just hoping they will be occupied ?

[Anna B]

55 minutes ago, ECCOnoob said:

Well, even if they are partially full it still raises the same problems. Companies come and go all the time and every single one has unique needs.

 

If a pre-existing office building is up to modern standards - great , but what if it only has two floors available when a company requires four..... they are simply not going to take it.  If a current property roster has nothing suitable across the board then obviously a company will choose to build or convert their own.

 

As I said earlier, the way the working world  dramatically changes. It evolves all the time.  You can't force companies to adapt their operations to fit into pre-existing structures all the time. Even less so if the bottom line ultimately costs more.

Send Kirsty Allsop round with a hammer and a bloody big mallet. She'll soon sort out a few dividing walls and partitions. No problem

[ECCOnoob]

52 minutes ago, Anna B said:

Send Kirsty Allsop round with a hammer and a bloody big mallet. She'll soon sort out a few dividing walls and partitions. No problem

??

[Bargepole23]

8 hours ago, Anna B said:

Send Kirsty Allsop round with a hammer and a bloody big mallet. She'll soon sort out a few dividing walls and partitions. No problem

Any update on the asbestos removal costs?

9 hours ago, hackey lad said:

So why allow the buildings to be built , just hoping they will be occupied ?

Because that will hopefully attract new business. If the offices are available, then it's much easier for business to move in than building a new office, wouldn't you think.

 

Because the organisations speculatively building them know what the market wants and can see an opportunity for a profit.

[Anna B]

"Build it, and they will come..."

 

    Except not in Sheffield...

 

[Planner1]

13 hours ago, hackey lad said:

So why allow the buildings to be built , just hoping they will be occupied ?

Who do you think could control that? The council and government can’t.

 

The council has planning powers that relate to the type, size and quality of a development, but if a speculative investor wants to build something that complies with the planning requirements, so they can sell it for a profit later, there’s nothing the council can do about that.