Sheffield Trail

Sheffield is a city built on industry. Famously, it grew around five rivers, which provided water power for dozens of grinding wheels that were used to manufacture knives. Later, in 1742, Benjamin Huntsman invented crucible steel and Sheffield became world-famous. From the 1970s, the market declined; relatively small-scale specialist steel manufacture continues, but other nowadays most of the people of Sheffield work in other industries and the city’s two universities’ are amongst the city’s biggest employers. In the twenty-first century, Sheffield has sought to rebrand not as the Steel City, but as the Outdoor City; with part of the Peak District in its boundaries and numerous parks and woodlands scattered through its suburbs, it is the greenest city in England.

Sheffield Trail Google Map

This is a relatively short walk at only three miles – most of the city and large town walks we shall do in Yorkshire are, to allow more time to explore and visit museums, cathedrals and other attractions for those so inclined. Sheffield Station is not only South Yorkshire’s largest railway station, but also arguably its most impressive. Its large, Grade II-listed main building is made of Derbyshire gritstone and was originally constructed in 1870; the station has been remodelled, extended and generally tweaked over the years, most recently in 2002. It was originally named Pond Street Station, to distinguish it from Sheffield’s other stations, Victoria and Wicker; they are long gone, although talk of Victoria station reopening never goes away for long. It was later, for a time, known as Sheffield Midland, a name that still lingers locally.

Leave the station via the main entrance, pausing for a moment to view the water feature opposite; the placing of this is appropriate, since the station sits on the culverted River Sheaf and a water mill once occupied the space now covered by the station forecourt. From the station main entrance, bear left past the water feature to reach Sheaf Street, cross this via the pelican crossing and continue straight ahead to Paternoster Row. Turn left and follow this as it first becomes Brown Street and then bends right and becomes Furnival Street, passing the Rutland Arms public house on the corner. Turn right along Arundel Street, passing Butcher Works – a former cutlery and tool factory converted for residential and retail use – on the left. Turn past this left along Charles Street, then right along Eyre Lane, passing the Red Lion public house on the corner.

When Eyre Lane ends, turn right and follow Howard Lane until it ends at Arundel Street, then turn left, looking right down Howard Street to see another traditional pub, the Globe. At the end of Arundel Street bear right across Hallam Square to reach Arundel Gate, cross at the pelican crossing, and turn right. Follow Arundel Street until the Lyceum Theatre appears on the left, then turn left into Tudor Square, which boasts the largest concentration of theatres in the United Kingdom outside of London. Walk through the square, passing between the Lyceum Theatre and the Crucible Theatre, the latter not exactly Sheffield’s prettiest building, but famous for hosting the World Snooker Championships every year. The Grade II*-listed Lyceum dates from 1897 and was completely restored from 1988 and 1990. Bear left across Tudor Square to reach Surrey Street. Here, take a detour to the left to visit the Central Library and Graves Art Gallery, opened by the Duchess of York during the 1930s. Otherwise, continue straight ahead through the Winter Gardens, the largest urban greenhouse in Europe, which opened in 2003 and hosts a wide variety of plants from all over the world.

Exit the Winter Gardens in Millennium Square and turn right and walk to Norfolk Street, then turn right again, passing the Peace Gardens followed by the rear of Sheffield Town Hall on the left. At the crossroads with Surrey Street, continue straight ahead, passing between the Sheffield Centre Unitarian Church (known locally as the Upper Chapel) on the left and the Brown Bear (another traditional public house) om the right. At the next crossroads, turn left along Norfolk Row, passing the Catholic Cathedral Church of St. Marie on the right. This is Grade II-listed and was built from 1846 to 1850.

At the end of Norfolk Row, turn left along Fargate and follow this back to Surrey Street (look out for a Grade II-listed green police box at the edge of the road). Continue straight ahead to Sheffield Town Hall.

Sheffield Town hall

This impressive gothic Grade I-listed building is perhaps Sheffield’s finest, and was constructed from 1890 and 1897 to replace the old Town Hall that we will see later on the walk. From the Town Hall, continue straight ahead along Pinstone Street, once again passing the Peace Gardens, this time on the left. The Peace Gardens were laid out in 1934 on the site of a church demolished that same year. The graves in the churchyard remained until the late nineteen-nineties, when the Peace Gardens were revamped and an unsightly nineteen-seventies concrete annexe to the Town Hall known locally (and not affectionately) as “the egg box” was demolished. Just after passing these, turn right along Cross Burgess Street, and at the end of thus turn right again along Cambridge Street, then take the next right turn in front of Leah’s Yard. This Grade II*-listed building dates from the nineteenth century and was originally a small collection of industrial workshops; it has recently been converted into a small shopping centre.

Continue to the end of the road, where Pound’s Park can be seen directly ahead, and turn right along Carver Street, passing the Church of St. Matthew on the right. At the next crossroads, turn right along Division Street, passing the former Sheffield Water Works Company building on the left. Built in 1867, it retains the Sheffield Water Works Company name, but not its function, having been converted into a popular public house. On reaching Barker’s Pool, look for its eighty-two feet-tall flagpole, actually a ship’s mast made of steel, which forms Sheffield’s War Memorial. To the left is the impressive neoclassical frontage of Sheffield City Hall, which opened in 1932 as an entertainment venue: in addition to the various performers it has hosted, it was also where Winston Churchill was awarded the Freedom of the City in 1951 and where, less happily, Oswald Mosley and his British Union of Fascists held a rally in 1934. Turn left just past the City Hall and walk along Balm Green, and follow this as it bends left behind the City Hall, then turn right along Holly Street then right again along West Street.

Turn right almost immediately into Leopold Square, which lies at the centre of the former School Board offices, Firth College and Central Schools. Leave Leopold Square on Leopold Street, cross this, and continue straight ahead into Orchard Square. Turn left and walk through the department store at the end of the square (currently TK Maxx) to exit on Church Street. Turn right to reach the Cutlers’ Hall, then left along St. James Row and follow this to Sheffield Cathedral.

Sheffield Cathedral

Formally the Cathedral Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, this was originally Sheffield Parish Church. Sheffield’s Anglican Cathedral (one of the city’s small number of Grade I-listed buildings) is not England’s most famous nor most impressive, but like all old churches it has seen plenty of history. Parts of it date from c.1116, although most of the current building was built in 1430 with later additions, including the divisive plain sandstone twentieth century extension completed in 1966. Continue past the cathedral along St. James Row to reach Campo Lane, then turn left. Take the next right along Lee Croft, then turn right again along Silver Street Head, passing the Three Tuns public house on the corner.

Follow Silver Street Head into Paradise Square. This handsome Georgian square was built between the 1770s and 1790s and John Wesley preached there in 1779; many of its buildings are Grade II*-listed. Once residential, it has long been occupied by offices. Cross the square to Paradise Street, take a short detour down Wheats Lane to Church Street to view a Synagogue built in 1872 by Sheffield’s small Jewish community, then turn left and follow Paradise Street to Queen Street. Turn right, then take the second right turn along Figtree Lane, passing Victoria Chambers on the left, a Grade II-listed house where the first Sheffield Hospital for Women was established in 1864. At the top of Figtree Lane, turn right along Hartshead, passing Bank House Chambers on the right. This is the oldest surviving brick built house in Sheffield, dating from 1728. Turn left along East Parade, now passing to the left of the cathedral, and looking out for a statue of James Montgomery (1771-1854), a Scottish-born hymn writer, poet and editor, who eventually settled in Sheffield.

At the end of East Parade, cross High Street, then bear left across Fargate to reach Chapel Walk. Follow this pedestrian lane, which is one of Sheffield’s oldest streets, until it ends at Norfolk Street. Turn left, passing the Victoria Hall Methodist Church on the corner. Turn left again, along George Street, and follow this to High Street, then cross over and turn right. Turn left along High Court and follow this to Hartshead Square, then turn left along Hartshead and right along Meetinghouse Lane. When this ends at Bank Street, turn left and follow this to Angel Street, then cross over and continue straight along Castle Street, looking out for the brick Steelworker mural built into a wall of a building on the left.

Follow Castle Street to Waingate, then turn left past the Old Town Hall. The old Town Hall was actually the third town hall building in Sheffield and was built between 1807 and 1808. It is Grade II-listed. Follow Waingate to a crossroads, then turn right along Castlegate. On the left, Lady’s Bridge crosses the River Don; ; a wooden bridge existed here from the late twelfth century and the current stone one dates from 1485, although it has been widened several times since then. A little further along Castlegate, the River Sheaf runs into the Don. This is close to where Sheffield began: if the Don is the largest river in the city, the Sheaf is the one which provided its name, back when Sheffield was a tiny Anglo-Saxon hamlet on the river’s banks. At the end of the path, we reach Lady’s Bridge, which carries the Wicker over the River DonOn the right hand side of the road is the site of Sheffield Castle, currently being excavated and developed into a public park, as part of which the River Sheaf is being de-culverted. Cross Blonk Street and turn left, then cross Furnival Road and walk straight ahead through a stone arch to reach Victoria Quays, constructed between 1816 and 1819 and forming the terminus of the Sheffield and Tinsley Canal. The canal is one of Sheffield’s hidden gems, built for industry, later filthy and neglected, and revived in the second half of the twentieth century for pleasure cruising. Its towpath forms part of a popular circular walk, the Blue Loop”, and we shall be meeting it again on a walk from another South Yorkshire station. Take a detour to the left to view a pair of Grade II-listed warehouses – the Straddle and the Terminal Warehouse – then bear right and leave Victoria Quays on Exchange Place.

Turn left, then walk up a ramp leading to a junction of tram tracks above Park Square Roundabout. Bear right and descend another ramp to Ponds Forge Swimming Pool, then bear right to reach Commercial Street and follow this, passing the former Sheffield United Gas Light Company Offices on the opposite side of the road. Turn left into Fitzalan Square, built on the site of a former beast market in 1881. Long dilapidated, the square was extensively renovated in 2003 and its central statue of Edward VII cleaned and protected from the city’s numerous pigeons. The square is dominated by the impressive former Central Post Office building, now given a new lease of life as Sheffield Hallam University’s Institute of Arts. Leave the square by bearing left along Flat Street, which becomes Pond Street, and then turn left along Pond Hill and continue to the Old Queen’s Head on the right. This is probably the oldest building in Sheffield, dating from the fifteenth century. Timber-framed and quaintly lopsided, this Grade II*-listed public house sits incongruously in the midst of far more modern buildings, including Sheffield Interchange. After passing the pub, turn right and follow a road past Sheffield Bus Station to Harmer Lane, cross this, and continue along a covered walkway to Sheaf Street. Finally, cross this to return to the railway station.

Before we head further north from Sheffield, we first head south-east, for three walks from stations on the Sheffield–Lincoln line, originally the main line of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway.