What next for much-missed market?

Well the demolition men have gone, the fences are erected and the rats and pigeons have moved back.
Castle marketCastle market
Castle market

But what is now happening on the site of the now much-missed Castle Market?

No sign of the Time Team, (supervised by my pal big Ron Clayton), no sign of the great council planners (are they busy at the Moor Market selling tripe?), and definitely no sign of any Castle remains or indeed any sign that there was ever one there in the first place.

So what are the plans?

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There was plenty of publicity when the Council planners where ripping the heart out of Sheffields traditional food, shopping and meeting area, an area that had been used for that purpose for nearly a thousand years.

Maybe a car park! Oh wait a minute, that would be a waste of time, as no one now visits.

Or a nice bit of parkland could be created, along with a wine bar or new sushi eating joint.

That will make the old Market shoppers come rushing back, I can see them now, sitting around supping Pims and scoffing pink salmon sandwiches while reading the Guardian or Daily Worker.

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Now the area has been cleared of all visible street life, we can get an uninterrupted view of the aptly named Victoria Quays, or to proper Sheffielders, who have lived, shopped and worked in the area, the Canal Basin!

A venue that we are told will be reborn now that the scruffy old market has been shifted to the south of the City and we can all take in the vista across the road.

Mind you, thinking back, the basin never died, it was killed off by the same town planners who have decimated the market area, they did this by kicking out all the little businesses, (and mesters), along with a thriving boatyard and the folk who spent many hours just messing about on boats.

So what’s next in the great scheme of things? The Cambridge Street area, another part of old historical Sheffield awaiting another grand plan, the Sheffield Retail Quarter, sounds grand doesn’t it?

But will it once again kill off the spirit and feeling that has been Sheffield’s unique heritage for generations past?

Judd Newton

Burncross