Local Plumbers

Sheffield South Yorkshire

Approximate Population: 530,300

As World War II loomed the steel factories of Sheffield were set to work making weapons and ammunition for the war.   As a result, once war was declared, the city became a target for bombing raids, the heaviest of which occurred over the nights of 12 December and 15 December 1940 (now known as the Sheffield Blitz).  More than 660 lives were lost and numerous buildings were destroyed.

In the 1950s and 1960s, many of the slums were demolished and replaced with housing schemes such as the Park Hill flats.   Large parts of the city centre were also cleared to make way for a new system of roads.  Increased automation and competition from abroad resulted in the closure of many steel mills.   The 1980s saw the worst of this run-down of Sheffield’s industries (along with those of many other areas in the UK).   The 1984/5 miners’ strike affected the coal mining areas to the east and north east of Sheffield, though it is unlikely to have had a major impact upon Sheffield’s economy.   The building of the Meadowhall shopping centre on the site of a former steelworks in 1990 was a mixed blessing, creating much needed jobs but speeding the decline of the city centre.   Attempts to regenerate the city were kick-started when the city hosted the 1991 World Student Games, WSG, which saw the construction of new sporting facilities such as the Sheffield Arena, Don Valley Stadium and the Ponds Forge complex.

The city is now changing rapidly as new projects aim to regenerate some of the more run-down parts of the city. One such project, the Heart of the City Project, has seen a number of public works in the city centre: the Peace Gardens were renovated in 1998, the Millennium Galleries opened in April 2001, the Winter Gardens were opened on 22 May 2003, and a public space to link these two areas, the Millennium Square, was opened in May 2006. Further developments included the remodelling of Sheaf Square in front of the recently refurbished railway station. The new square contains The Cutting Edge a sculpture designed by Si Applied Ltd made of Sheffield steel.

Local Plumbers Sheffield South Yorkshire

Local Plumbers

Milton Keynes Buckinghamshire

Approximate Population: 184,506

The flood plains of the Great Ouse and of its tributaries (the Ouzel and some brooks) have been protected as linear parks that run right through Milton Keynes.  The Grand Union Canal is another green route (and demonstrates the level geography of the town - there is just one minor lock in its entire 10 mile route through from Fenny Stratford to the “Iron Trunk” Aqueduct over the Ouse at Wolverton.

The Milton Keynes redway system of cycleways and footpaths uses these and other routes.   The Park system was designed by landscape architect Peter Youngman, who also developed landscape precepts for the whole town: groups of grid squares were to be planted with different selections of trees and shrubs in order to give them distinct identities.   However the landscaping of parks and of the grid roads was evolved under the leadership of Neil Higson, who from 1977 took over as Chief Landscape Architect and made the original grand but not entirely practical landscape plan more subtle.

A policy of creating “settings, strings, beads” for landscape features was introduced: ’settings’ for historic villages and landscape features, ’strings’ of landscape to make the linear parks hang together and ‘beads’ of public space where residents might linger.   Higson also made the landscaping of the Grid Roads, one of the glories of Milton Keynes, more subtle, with ‘windows’ cut into the roadside planting so that motorists travelling through had a sense of the major town they were in; early critics had said of Milton Keynes ‘there is no there there’, as the town could not be seen by the motorist just passing through.   Now that the trees and shrubs have matured, the skill and lavish scale of the Grid Road planting makes a dramatic and welcome change from the monotony of many British towns.

Local Plumbers

Milton Keynes Buckinghamshire