Heritage is an important and growing concern

Uncross your fingers, gentle readers, I am still on terra firma and the bluebells, the young, beautiful and educated and their dogs traverse the pathways of the General Cemetery.

I marvel at the Lion Gate, the cool gurgle of the Porterbrook past Frog Walk and the pristine restored Samuel Worth Chapel and the weeping willows.

Down the path to Pear Street and Montague Street and I am reminded of Alida Valli walking down the Cemetery Path at the end of the Third Man.

There are monuments here too but it reminds me of the cities of Germany or Britain after WW2 as the levelled spaces are testimony to the Council ‘Blitz’ in the 1980s on thousands of monuments, and for what gain?

Ease of maintenance?

It even provoked that rare thing, a protest from University Academia.

The damage cannot be hidden unlike rebuilt cities.

On Eccie Road I perceive a hint of tawdriness and the final sadness, the tree that was the last reminder of the old Pomona has gone. Is that why the willows weep?

Perhaps not but it’s why heritage is important and a growing concern in this city even after so many stable doors have been left open.

Ron Clayton

Sheffield, S6