Sheffield shops: Sheffield City Council offering to pay people £35,000 to open a business on Fargate

The authority has launched a scheme offering grants to independent businesses who want to transform empty shops and underused spaces in and around Fargate.

Don’t miss a single thing when it comes to news across Sheffield and South Yorkshire, sign up for our free daily newsletter on everything in God’s Own Country

The authority is using government money to ‘reinvent the area as a thriving social hub’. It says it has £250,000 to spend, equal to seven grants of the £35,000 maximum.

It must be spent on ‘agreed fit-out’ costs and is paid after items have been purchased, on proof of payment. The deadline to apply is August 14.

Fargate is having a £33m revamp set to complete by February. In recent years it has suffered a string of shop closures and shifted towards food and drink, leisure and cultural uses, although M&S still occupies its biggest shop.

The grant area includes Chapel Walk where the council is spending £1.24m on public art, lighting and shop front revamps in a bid to revive the once popular pedestrian route.