When Did The City Centre Lose Its Soul?

[Kidorry]

I agree, it can be seen almost everywhere after the weekend. 

Edited April 6, 2023 by Kidorry

[HeHasRisen]

2 minutes ago, Kidorry said:

I agree, it can be seen almost everywhere after the weekend. 

The irony being that minutes earlier anyone doing this will have been in a venue that had a functioning toilet 

[Kidorry]

I agree again, but not in a public one. 

[Jack Grey]

22 minutes ago, Kidorry said:

Some people were very happy to be able to go and telephone someone from a phone box, which is virtually impossible now, due to people in offices, thinking everyone has a mobile phone and a computer. 

Id rather visit a village with Ebola than go into a phone box

 

Used only by drug dealers and homeless people who need to defecate 

 

Im surprised they havent removed them all years ago

Edited April 6, 2023 by Jack Grey

[Annie Bynnol]

7 hours ago, Organgrinder said:

The city centre is no more lived in than it ever was and as for vibrant, you need to check what vibrant means.

Vibrant is exactly what this city used to be with it's pavements thronged with shoppers, workers and people enjoying time out.

Now , it's deserted and pavements 2 feet wide would be adequate for the amount of pedestrians.

If you go in the new market, there ae less people in than there were around just 2 or 3 stalls in the old market.

The only thing I would agree with is that it the buildings used to be dirty and polluted.  That's because hundreds of thousands were working and producing goods to sell around the globe.

Due to that work, they had money to spend in shops, markets, theatres, pubs, clubs and cinemas and Sheffield was a prosperous city.  Now, we beg for scraps from the government.

When are the jobs going to come to sustain this 22nd century city?  When are ordinary people going to have some free facilities such as we had in the past.

When are we going to have a city centre free of beggars, rough sleepers, druggies and alcho's>  When are we going to see beat bobbies again?

Do you think that cleaner buildings on their own, make a city and your idea of vibrant absolutely amazes me.

Who are these people who we will see more of every day?  Do you mean rough sleepers etc.  I'm quite sure you don't mean workers.

As a former keep fit enthusiast, i have been walking and cycling the streets of Sheffield for years and they have never been so empty.  Photos to prove it.

 

       The national census, ward and constituency data on population disproves your view on city centre population. You obviously were not in Sheffield in the evenings and Sundays in the 80's and 90's when at times not one commercial cinema existed,  or a supermarket was open in the centre in the evening. Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings were so bad with drunks that it became a no go area.

       Sheffield(specifically and nationally)has been dealt several body over the last 50 years but still people come here because they want to. 

 

       

 

[ECCOnoob]

39 minutes ago, Kidorry said:

I do agree with some of the things you have said, but, are you also seeing it as a vibrant and prosperous city because it is to your taste? Because to me you could be describing the city through rose tinted glasses as you are accusing other people. I think that some of the things you said about the damage that was caused during the second world war is going a bit too far. I was around then and I can assure you and any other person on here that people were very glad to have the city restored, and go to work in the dirty factories .Some people were very happy to be able to go and telephone someone from a phone box, which is virtually impossible now, due to people in offices, thinking everyone has a mobile phone and a computer. Plus in this evolving city, do the planners ever need to go to a toilet, because I think they would find it very difficult to find a public one. Not so many years ago this city had one of the best transport systems in Britain, until  our council was told by a certain P.M. to privatise the public transport. That is your idea of a better city, but, not mine. 

Do you think that if there was an alternative back in those days to work they'd be so enthusiastic. Do you think if you give those people a choice between the dirty manual factory or a modern semi automated industrial surrounding or even ability to work from a comfy office or their own  living rooms, they wouldn't have took it?

 

As for telephone boxes and public toilets, let's not forget here that the computer age has been mainstream for over a quarter of a century. The early mass market mobile phones were commonplace by the mid 1990s. So if people are still insisting on using telephone boxes and never bothered to progress with society over 25 years later, that's their choice and their own problem.  You are deluded to think that any authority would keep a completely outdated and unnecessary piece of ageing infrastructure in situ just to appease a tiny minority.  In fact, if you bother to look, there still are abilities to make calls from on street kiosks. They are even free calls. The difference is they are from modern sleek touch screen terminals rather than a ye olde red phone box.

 

As for public toilets, most people have facilities inside their own house these days. There is no need for vast amounts of public communal facilities operated by a local authority - which in the past couple of decades were seen as nothing more than run down seedy crack dens that people avoided like a plague.  For those of legitimate purposes there are an abundance of facilities in any restaurant, cafe, bar, office building, theatre, gallery, cinema, hotel, council building, bus station, library, train station and both of our main department stores. There are even several specific locations which advertise that their toilet access is open to all without purchases or other restrictions. 

 

The worsening of public transport following privatisation is up for debate in my opinion, however, if you keep up with current affairs, you'd be aware the next generation of supertram operation will be back in public hands and both our local politicians and regional mayor are  pushing for the same to apply to bus services. Something which I'm sure you would consider an improvement.....right?  

 

There's not some ageist thing. It's just certain people burying in the sand. Not willing to move on from what 'they' perceive as the better days.  Certain people who, for some bizarre reason,    take pride in not moving with the times and clinging onto their backwards thinking and constant put down of anything new or different.

Edited April 6, 2023 by ECCOnoob

[PRESLEY]

1 hour ago, HeHasRisen said:

Lets not start the public toilet thing again, there are countless places to go for a piddle in the city.

Yeh! Because the city centre has become like a toilet.  

[HeHasRisen]

22 minutes ago, PRESLEY said:

Yeh! Because the city centre has become like a toilet.  

Kidorry made that joke already, mate.

[PRESLEY]

1 minute ago, HeHasRisen said:

Kidorry made that joke already, mate.

It wasn't a joke, its true MATE. 

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Annie Bynnol said:

       The national census, ward and constituency data on population disproves your view on city centre population. You obviously were not in Sheffield in the evenings and Sundays in the 80's and 90's when at times not one commercial cinema existed,  or a supermarket was open in the centre in the evening. Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings were so bad with drunks that it became a no go area.

       Sheffield(specifically and nationally)has been dealt several body over the last 50 years but still people come here because they want to. 

 

       

 

I agree that I was not in the city centre in the 80'ss and 90's and that is why I am not referring to the 80's and 90's when I post.

The city centre was choc a bloc in the 50's 60's and 70's when I was working and entertaining in the city centre. No drunks problem where I was.

If you are discussing drunks too, you need to follow my tack and blame the police and council for not keeping law and order as they used to.

We used to go out and have fun without disorder in those days and that is exactly why I say that the city centre has gone down the plughole.

 

Also, there were definitely more people living in town from the 1920's to the 1950's than there are now until slum clearance knocked down the houses.

 

 

 

Edited April 6, 2023 by Organgrinder