Regeneration…but what lies beneath? Plus our appearance on BBC Radio!

I understand in a broad sense that Sheffield has moved from being a city of heavy industry to a city of education and the arts.  This however, raises new questions; particularly around what sustainable, long-term jobs are being done by Sheffield residents.

The two universities would provide a lot of academic and general jobs, and certainly they raise a lot of revenue.  Yet, the heart of a university would seem to be the students, and the ones here will ultimately tranisiton to jobs.  But what jobs?  Many of the students seem to be from other parts of England, and will go on to work in other places.  Hopefully, some of the more enterprising students will start businesses and projects in Sheffield.  

One does wonder what are the key industries of employment, for the long-term residents here.  I’m informed that it is mainly services work; a resident interviewed by my work group indicated that relatively few corporations set up offices in Sheffield.  This resident and others with whom I’ve spoken raised a common theme: wondering about the future.

This brings me in a tangential way to the Castle Market situation.  Our Council guest informed us that the site is not commercially viable right now, but I’m a bit sceptical of this logic: after all, the council is not renting or mortgaging the site…it’s essentially city property.  I believe the Council is just keen to draw larger rents overall and in the process, break up a powerful site of working-class/lower class solidarity and camaraderie.   The teens and other characters who hang out there at the moment will be displaced. 

I might be seeing this a bit romantically, but to me it’s pretty romantic to think that castle ruins under the ground will be more profitable.  This could actually be characterised as a victory for a minority; what you might call a ‘museum class’; at the expense of a whole bunch of people who are busily earning a living.  This is not the logic on which this city became great.  Certain tiger economies in other parts of the world would be laughing all the way to their bank, if they heard about this.

Still, the good news is that many of the current, Castle Market traders appear to be set to move across to the new site.  So hopefully the new rents, which will invariably be higher, will be achievable for a lot of the traders.

Gosh, this has been a relatively critical blog entry.  This is a really exciting stage in the trip, as I’m seeing past the initial concept of regeneration and asking, is the current situation sustainable?


Also, we featured on BBC Radio Sheffield! Cecilia, Jack and I were on Toby Foster’s breakfast show, at 7.30 on Friday morning. The recording can be accessed through this page, for the next 5 days or so.

Go to 00.36 in the recording.

 

- Linda Hadley (Bachelor of Arts, majoring in Sociology and English)