The Cambridge Map Project Episode 4: F5, Reality Checkpoint

I met R at the top of Castle Mound, the agreed starting point for a Sunday afternoon random perambulation. 

On the way, I had passed Heavy Metal Bike Man near Christ's Pieces and Disco Kenny in the car park next to Castle Mound. Bike Man was parked up in a side street across the road, partially obscured from the view of the pedestrians crossing between the Grafton and the Pieces. I'd never seen him static before. I guessed he was summoning the energy for his ride. Preparing to keep the demons out of the city, using the power of tinny distorted heavy metal blasted from a plastic bag on his handlebars. I wondered if he took a pre-ordained route, one which mapped out an occult pattern connecting sites of important psychogeographic significance. Meanwhile, Disco Kenny was, as usual, kinetic and not static. He was moving across the car park at pace, coming from the North of the city and heading towards the centre. Presumably towards the first pub and  half pint, the first of several for the afternoon, where he would tell people that 'the world's gone mad'. His movements were as ritualistic and repetitive as Bike Man's, if perhaps more random.  I wondered if their paths ever crossed, or if anyone had ever mapped their movements.

Encountering both of these figures on the same day, let alone within ten minutes of each other, was unusual and seemed significant. Maybe it was symbolic of a re-emergence of some sort of normality. Town was busy. It felt like the shadow of Covid had begun to retreat, but was leaving things not quite as it had found them. I was reassured by the presence of these two familiar characters. It felt like they were maintaining a sort of equilibrium during uncertain times. Disco Kenny and Bike Man are the most significant of a much dwindled cast of these types of local figures. When they have finally departed the world will have truly gone mad. 

The mound itself is a significant site. It was identified by the London Psychogeographic Association (LPA) as an 'important place to cleanse the malevolent influence of the University which pervades the town of Cambridge'. The LPA linked the mound (or mount as they called it) to other similar structures in Lewes, Oxford and elsewhere, noting that all had largely been left undisturbed in the hands of municipal councils. That was in 1993. The mound is on the site of the Shire Hall (picture above as seen from the mound), the HQ of Cambridgeshire County Council. But not for much longer. The wheels are in motion for the Council to vacate the premises and lease them for use as a hotel. There have been concerns that the public right of way to the mound will be lost, despite reassurances from the Council that the new leaseholder will continue to allow public access to the ancient site. How that pans out remains to be seen. It seems that  'efficiency savings' are forcing the County Council headquarters to relocate to the far flung Alconbury Weald, off the A1, North of Huntingdon. Thirty years on from the LPA's 'The Ascent of Cambridge Mount Souvenir Programme', it seems that rather than the University, it is the ever ongoing expansion of 'private-public' spaces, as land and buildings are increasingly abandoned by municipal authorities and passed into the hands of private profiteers, that is the main malevolent influence these days.

I had brought the Cambridge Map and dice to use as a catapult. We spread the map open on peak of the mound. The square chosen by the dice was F5, at the centre of the map.  It included Christ's Pieces, most of what is left of The Kite and Parkers Pieces, all significant spaces in their own right. It also included grounds of three colleges, Christ's, Jesus and Emmanuel, rendering a fair portion of the square inaccessible.

We headed to Christ's Pieces and to the Diana Memorial Garden, at its centre. There were more people around than we had bargained for. All seats in the Diana Memorial Garden, which is a small circular arrangement of four benches, some metal arches and some flowerbeds, were full. Instead, we headed to one of the three alfresco ping pong tables. One was not being used and we spread the map over it. We decided to head to the perimeter of the square and circumnavigate the border. I photographed the square with my phone for easy reference. 

Christ's Pieces is significant perhaps for being the most central open green area for use by the public, in a City where the bulk of central green areas are behind college walls. Most use it to move between the town and the Grafton Centre. But there is a bowling green and tennis courts and its well used for sitting about on. Its a point at which Town rubs up perhaps most closely with Gown, if only in physical proximity. The other side of the wall on the Easterly side is Christ's College grounds. Emmanuel College is just over the road from the bus station, hidden behind its own walls.  The recently reopened Christ's Lane, that runs along part of the border with Christ's College, linking to the town centre, contains a disappointing selection of retail outlets. These have replaced Bradwell's Court, a 60s shopping precinct, that no doubt at the time of its building was much maligned. But what has replaced it is certainly no better and of  less interest.  Christ's Lane, heading away from Town, turns into Miltons' Walk, named after the poet John Milton who was a student at Christ's College. The walk links the rather dull chain stores at the Christ's Lane end with, by stark contrast, the excellent  Champion of The Thames pub at the other. At the other end of the bus station from Christ's Lane, opposite Emmanuel College, there is the bowling green and some of Cambridge's least salubrious public toilets.

R and I noticed a lack of young people drinking Thunderbird and cheap cider, which was probably the activity we most associated Christ's Pieces with from our youth. During that era, I once saw Roland Gift from the Fine Young Cannibals meditating under a tree here. He was stoically ignoring the approach of a man we only knew as 'How Do You Feel?', a tramp of the proper tradition. He had a wild beard, a knackered old jacket and had Bob Dylan lyrics as, apparently, his only means of communication. There were none of his kind here today. They seemed to have disappeared at some point in the late 1990s, before which they were ubiquitous users of the Pieces.

The amount of people of Christ's Pieces was off-putting, with the spectre of Covid almost unconsciously making us avoid anywhere crowded. We headed across to Parkers Piece, a wider expanse of green space. Parkers Piece currently has a ferris wheel located at its centre. A sort of lesser version of the London Eye. We were intrigued enough to give it a go. Not intrigued enough to ask what extras were included with the one first class 'carriage' which was distinguished by being painted black rather than white. The experience was slightly unnerving at first  It felt much higher at the top than it looked from below. At the top, the wheel stopped for a few minutes. Instead of taking in the panorama, I was distracted by the sight of some orange robed figures below, possibly Hari Krishna people which are quite a rare sight these days. I haven't been hawked one of their publications for some years.

The wheel went around three times, which was unexpected, but on the other hand one rotation didn't allow enough time to take in the panorama. Being local, most of the views were of no surprise. But I spotted two large square white roofed buildings, still apparently under construction and surrounded by cranes. They appeared to be somewhere between Mill Road and Marshalls Airport. I still haven't managed to figure out exactly where or what they are.

Back on the ground at nearby Reality Checkpoint we considered our next move. Reality Checkpoint is a four lamped post at the central point, where the two paths that cross the Piece meet. It is a well known local landmark and significant in the psychogeography of Cambridge. It is said to signify the point where Town meets Gown. For Cambridge University students it marks a transition from the University/College to Mill Road, a place much more accociated with 'Town' and a marked shift away from the 'Gown' University environment. Another persistent rumour is that the post has always provided a useful marker for drunk or stoned people who could recognise the lights as they crossed the Piece and so be roused from whatever otherworldly state they were in. In those circumstances, no doubt it serves as a useful reminder that the Police station is just across the road and to act straight.

'Reality Checkpoint' was scratched or painted on the post persistently for years. Yet more rumours have it that students and possibly staff from Cambridge College of Arts and Technology (CCAT), on nearby East Road ('town' side), were responsible for the upkeep of this. Each time the Council painted over it they reinstated 'Reality Checkpoint'. These rumours are probably enhanced by the attendance of  Syd Barrett at CCAT before he did Pink Floyd. The lights were apparently also a beacon during the 'pea 'souper' fogs of the 1950s. The name was finally made official and painted on permanently in 2017.

We found he post had been adorned with ribbons, which along with the staring red eyes of the fish, gave it a strange ritualistic air.

We headed away from Reality Checkpoint and the Wheel, which now, again, seemed much less significant in height then when we were up there.

To contrast the view from the wheel, we headed onto the roof of the Queen Anne multi-storey car park across the road. The view itself was much less impressive than we had hoped. It seemed to be impossible to get to the highest point where a profusion of mobile phone masts and other antennae were sited, on what looked like a small tower. We made do with the other side, where the stairwell door deposited us. The deserted scene looked frozen in time from the 1970s, if you ignored the few cars that were parked this high up. We saw no people, though there was evidence of skidding and fast driving which seemed out of kilter with the limited space available. I imagined dangerous late night car meets, or maybe moped meets took place here, along with associated clandestine activities.

Pedestrian access was limited, at least officially, to certain designated areas and the ramps between floors were off limits. The pedestrian depicted in the warning sign looked like a person from the era when the car park was built, judging by the slightly flared trousers and cuban heels. The person also looked to be adopting a strange hand gesture, as if the recipient of a 'back-hander'. This made me wonder about the origins of the car park. It was opened in 1971, after delays caused by lack of finance and because it went against the County Development Plan for the area. Obviously the lack of finance was somehow resolved and the planning issue somehow ceased to be a preventative factor. It still stands as one of few buildings in Cambridge that approach 60s/70s Newtown architecture, not quite brutalist but the nearest thing we have. The only other comparable buildings I can think of are other car parks, including Park Street ,which is of similar vintage and soon due for demolition to make way for a hotel.

We came back down a different stairwell and upon reaching the ground floor encountered a tea set, that had apparently been unpacked from a plastic bag and laid out on the floor. with some care. Rather it was a mixture of bits of different tea sets. The arrangement was odd but apparently deliberate. There was no sign of the people responsible and the purpose remained ambiguous. It looked like they may have been disturbed and left the scene in a hurry before anybody saw them, judging by the teapot on its side.

Gareth Rees described a plethora of unusual and normally unnoticed human activity in car parks in his book Car Park Life. But I don't recall him mentioning anything to to with clandestine tea and cake rituals in the stairwells.

Although I was quite taken with some of the plates, it seemed wrong to interfere with the crockery and we we left it undisturbed. Once we were the other side of the stairwell door, there was no readmission. The door was locked behind us and the scene preserved, at least until the next curious passer by came along down the apparently little used stairwell.

Back over the road on Parker's Piece, we stopped at the trio of monolithic concrete structures in the South Easterly corner. These memorialise the invention of the rules of Association Football, which were conceived by the University Football Club in 1848. These days the University is more associated with Rugby. Meanwhile, Cambridge's second football team Cambridge City are no longer even located within the City. They share a ground with Histon FC, just outside the city boundary on the other side of the A14. Their previous grounds near Mitchums Corner was sold off for development a few years ago. Cambridge United, meanwhile, continue to remain at the Abbey Stadium but there has been talk in the past of selling the grounds and moving further out of town. Cambridge United are currently in 'Sky Bet League One', which as far as I can work out translates into what used to be called the Third Division. Meanwhile, City play in something called Level Four of the Non-League Pyramid. So, while the rules of modern football may have been invented on Parker's piece, the City's association with football prowess in living memory is not notable. I doubt Cambridge even made the long list for Ian Nairn's 'football towns' series. However, the location of both grounds is significant for being on the 'town' side of 'Reality Checkpoint', while two of the three Rugby Grounds in Cambridge are located well within the vicinity of the University dominated area around Grange Road and Newnham.

R said he'd heard that originally the football rules memorial was originally going to be a giant Subutteo referee figure, sited where Reality Checkpoint is. The idea was been scrapped in favour of the more subtle trio of monoliths, which align with Reality Checkpoint if you stand behind them in the right place.

We drifted into The Kite and stopped at the Elm Tree for a pint. The Elm Tree is one of a trio if pubs situated close together and the one with the most interesting beer. It was quiet when we arrived and we took a bench outside. Gradually more customers appeared and the other benches became occupied. We hadn't been there long when a character known as 'Dead John' made an appearance. I think it was a former barman at the Elm Tree who I first heard refer to the aging black clad figure using that name. Dead John always appears in modern day 'goth' garb; large thick soled black boots, a bag with rubber spikes on and sometime a top hat and cane. I have never heard him speak or seen him smile. The Elm Tree seems to be a place he gravitates to. It is said he is an academic of some sort. Unlike Disco Kenny or Bike Man, he is a character from the Gown side of Reality Checkpoint. The Elm Tree exists in a sort of transitional interzone where both sides meet. Disco Kenny is certainly no stranger to the Elm Tree and the other pubs nearby.

 

After a nourishing pint of Brazilian Coffee Stout, we headed towards Mill Road, with the intention of taking the side entrance into Anglia Ruskin University (formerly CCAT). Near to this, at the end of Willis Road, is The Sinclair Building. This had been the HQ of Sinclair Research between 1982 and 1985, during the heyday of early home computers and the height of the popularity of the ZX Spectrum. Coincidentally, Clive Sinclair had died the week leading up to the walk and I had seen the building, with its original logo eblazened on its silver facade, featured on a regional news report that used archive footage. The report also had a man at the Cambridge Computer Museum demonstrating an old ZX Spectrum in action. He had the game Jetpac loaded onto the screen, one of hundreds of primitive computer games that are seared into the memory of a certain demographic. 

 

Now Spectrum emulators are available online so that these pre-digital, originally tape loaded games can be re-lived. Like old music, films and other cultural artefacts that would otherwise have aged into obscurity, obsolescence and inaccessibility, the digital age has brought these games back from the dead, into a period where they are no longer the captive of a particular time or space nor belong to a particular generation. Sinclair was part of 'the Cambridge Phenomenon', a phrase coined in 1980 to describe the explosion of Tech companies in Cambridge that began in the 1950s. I recently found a publication in a charity shop of the same name, a report by some consultants produced in 1984. It is contemporary with Sinclair. The 'phenomen' has continued to explode and now Cambridge is home to offices of Microsoft, Amazon and Apple among many others in the tech field. ARM now occupy the site of the old Acorn building on the edge of Cambridge. Acorn was a comtemporary rival of Sinclair with its Acorn Electron and BBC B computers. The old games played on Spectrum and Acorn computers are still alive and well, embedded in the digital world far more advanced but that descends directly from the earlier technology those companies helped create.

 

The building behind the gates we stood next to still had the silver facade at one end, but the old Sinclair logo had gone. The building is now part of Anglia Ruskin University. An older looking sign still remains on a low wall outside.

 

We found the back gates of Anglia Ruskin locked. It turns out they are only open during the week, when the public are free to pass through. It serves as a useful and interesting shortcut to East Road, which is where we intended to head next. We had to take the alternative route through the graveyard that runs behind the campus instead. 

The graveyard in recent years has become more popular for use not just as a cut through but almost as a park. During lockdown it became a place festooned by dog walkers, who could be seen chatting in the middle of a small green space on the site of the old chapel. Meanwhile, their dogs would run amok into the surrounding graves and bushes to chase balls thrown by their owners and occasionally would make unwelcome advances to other people who sat on benches hoping for some peace and tranquility before work. Previously, the graveyard had been noted for anti-social behaviour like drug taking, drinking and grave vandalism. Indeed, during lockdown for a short period, an apparently threatening character had been marking graves with satanic symbols and was aggressive towards anyone who challenged him. I never encountered this troubled character, and I suppose by comparison the odd irritating dog approach or stray turd is much easier to deal with.

 

We emerged onto Norfolk Street, opposite the small parade of shops. R and myself used to come here on Saturday mornings many years ago to eat breakfast at the Athena Restaurant. This was a particularly excellent Grease Cafe of the sort no longer seen in Cambridge. There are still places to get a fry up, but none are really proper greasy spoons. The premises are currently occupied by Eko Kitchen, an African Restaurant, which I still need to try. Previously, after the Athena, it was the Pandahar Indian Restaurant. So it was good to see that, though the Athena has been lost to the whims of history, the tradition of interesting and not overpriced food continues on its location.

The demise of the Grease Cafe in general has parallels with the decline of the proliferation of traditional wet led pubs. Both seem superficially to be the victims of a culture promoting healthier lifestyles. But since places like McDonalds and Kentucky Fried chicken, and sales of wine, beer, energy drinks and other junk food items at shops don't seem to have declined much, this can't be the sole cause. Property development and Whetherpoons are probably equally, if more, to blame.

 

I'd never really noticed the metal shutter across the street before. I couldn't recall what, if anything other than the metal, had been there before. The ubiquitous Nigel had got there before me, or possibly one of many Nigels. The tag is everywhere. I suspect behind it there is a grafitti/street art version of Luther Blisset, with a multiplicity of people using the tag and acting as a loose collective.

 

We left Norfolk Street, and crossed into Burleigh Street, past the old Boat Race pub, now a vegan eatery of some sort. Burleigh Street was busy with post Covid shoppers, emerging mainly from Primark. We avoided this by taking the route behind the shops, before re-emerging further up the street near the entrance of the Grafton Centre. 

It was announced recently that the Grafton Centre had been sold. Its future looked uncertain. Before Covid it was struggling to fill shops, and saw the departure of British Home Stores. Covid made things worse and the loss of Debenhams was perhaps the final straw. While neither of us had ever had much of a fondness for the Grafton Centre, we thought a (possibly) final visit was in order. This was also influenced by the comparative lack of people inside as compared to outside on the street and the knowledge that it contained a toilet. The stout quaffed earlier was re-making its presence felt. 

The atmosphere inside was lacklustre. The people wandering around inside looked even more bored and aimless than usual. The Grafton had been used as a Covid vaccination centre but that activity seemed to have ceased. Of the few shops opened, none enticed us inside other than a sort of Mediterranean deli/shop. Though some of its wares were tempting, there was nothing that could be consumed immediately and I couldn't really muster up much enthusiasm. I think in part, this was due to the 'indoor shop-ness' of it. In my mind there is still something not quite right in emerging out of a shop and still finding yourself indoors.

 

Some of the other 'units' that were not empty were being put to alternative uses. In the indoor ping-pong hall that had been here a while, the cow statues from the Cambridge Cow Trail had been herded inside. This was to allow viewing for their auctioning off. The Cow Trail had been a phenomena over the summer, consisting of a large number of identical cow sculptures that had each been customised by artists and schools. I had considered doing the trail in its entirety, but never quite felt like it, instead I had 'visited' the sites of some of the cows during random walks. The cows had been mostly confined to central Cambridge and the area around the Station, but a couple had been posted at Cambridge North Station. 

We decided not to go in, due to the relatively high number of people. Instead we headed up to the balcony, where the entrance to the cinema and various eateries link to the stairs and the car park and some toilets. We checked out a couple of the food vans, the sort that normally park up as  'streetfood' offerings at events. Somehow these had been elevated up to the second floor. We were not enthused by their offerings or of those in the cafe below.

The view across towards the former British Home Stores (now H&M and a Gym), invoked feelings of emptiness and fatigue. Even though the Grafton was not my favourite place and I've never quite forgiven it for replacing the part of The Kite that I never really got to see, I did feel a bit sorry for it. I even had a flash of nostalgia for the days of fish smelling supermarket Prestos, the Reject Shop, Our Price and even the officious security men and their random tannoy announcements.

The scene we looked over now had once been a continuation of Fitzroy Street before it was bulldozed to make way for the Grafton Centre. It represented a lost future where there might have been a proper outdoor street lined with shops, grease cafes and pubs surrounded by reasonably priced terraced housing for rent or purchase. But more likely it would have ended up heading towards gentrification in the same way as Mill Road. Instead, the Grafton Centre and the pedestrianised Burleigh and Fitzroy Streets immediately outside, are places 'ordinary' people go to shop. Places firmly on the Town side of Reality Checkpoint, physically and metaphorically, as they would have been before the Grafton was built, back to when the Kite was part of Barnwell. So paradoxically, the bland Grafton Centre has in some ways been a force against gentrification, if nothing else. But with its sale and the mystery of what it might become, maybe that will all change.

The lacklustre atmosphere of the Grafton had permeated us. We walked a bit further to Jesus Green. Somewhere here border of F5 crossed the Green but we had lost our concentration and overshot. Somewhere around Jesus Green Lido, well outside outside square F5, we called it a day.

Market: Unwittingly wandering into the 'opportunity area'

A short lunchtime. I went to the nearby Peterborough Market and walked it's perimeter in a clockwise direction. An undertaking that could be carried out in about five minutes if done in the most efficient manner. But although time was short, maximum efficiency was not on the agenda. It was lunchtime after all.

I lingered in Laxton Square and perused the plaque that commemorates Ray Laxton and his services to 'the building of the new Peterborough'. Laxton was a member of the Peterborough Development Corporation, the body set up when the city gained New Town status in the late 1960s. The plaque states he died in 1980. Too early for the opening of the Queensgate Shopping Centre or the advertising campaigns promoting 'The Peterborough Effect' featuring Roy Kinear dressed as a Roman Soldier. Both were events that marked a peak in the City's fortunes in the mid 80s.

The square is part surrounded by large office buildings including the Passport Office. It is occasionally used for union gatherings and public meetings. But today, like most days, it was occupied by a handful of coffee drinking workers, depressed looking vapers and a man staring vacantly into the distance.

I moved on before stopping to observe the pigeons that occupy the roof of the former 5th Avenue nightclub among feral grass and other vegetation. The building has been unused since the nightclub closed in 2002. Prior to that it had been used as the County Court and Probate Office.

Recently planning permission was granted for conversion of the building into 'co-living' space accommodation.  The Brightfield Group, who's Managing Director recently stood as candidate for the Brexit party in the Peterborough by-election, are behind the plans. In the local rag their CEO was quoted as stating, 'it will attract all ages but with a core focus on embracing the increasing mobility of Millennials and their stronger sense of community and connected living'.  In the market today there was an apparent lack of 'mobile Millennials'. Whether they will materialise and come to embrace this sort shared house/youth hostel/university halls of residence sounding amalgam, or if not whether a planning variation for short stay hotel/air b n b style accommodation will be required as plan b, only time will tell.

Thoughts and fears of future dystopian housing arrangements abated as I was drawn to the remnants of an old fly-poster underneath the clouded aperture of a long disused window. It was stuck on top of the grey and blue abstraction of ancient looking peeling paintwork from an earlier decade. I could make out the poster had advertised a gig and tickets had been available for £2.50 from Andys Records.

Andys Records was the foremost record shop chain in East Anglia, rivalled briefly by Parrot Records in the 80s and 90s. Both had long gone by the time the current vinyl revival had begun. The ghost fly-poster had drawn me away from visions of overpriced communal shoe box accommodation to memories of  hours spent rummaging through racks of records in my teens in Cambridge.  I recalled the comforting smell of secondhand vinyl at The Beat Goes On (Andys' secondhand department) and the epic (at the time) walk from Cherry Hinton to the Mill Road shop to buy punk records when I had just started secondary school. On an a rare early trip to Peterborough around the same time I visited the local branch and bought 'Bomber' by Motorhead on blue vinyl.

Andys had its origins on Felixstowe Pier in 1969, with a stall on Cambridge market following soon after. By the 90s it had expanded outside of East Anglia and was a national high street chain. The Cambridge shops on Mill and Hills Roads later amalgamated into one larger concern located on Fitzroy Street. It traded there for some years and although still a necessary Cambridge institution, I can't help feeling  it's proximity to the much maligned Grafton Centre played a part in the chains' eventual downfall. It would have been much more suited to the considerably less sterile pre-Grafton Fitzroy Street as part of the old Kite area, a place that the fly-poster I was looking at now could have belonged.

Feeling somewhat cleansed by nostalgia, I drifted across the road where I observed the signage for the Hereward Cross Shopping Centre. The name of course refers to Hereward The Wake, the semi mythical outlaw/mercenary who resisted the Norman occupation of Britain. References to Hereward abound in The Fens. The shopping centre stands across the road from the Cathedral which Hereward helped sack back in the 11th century.  The Cathedral was later rebuilt. The shopping centre is it's physical and spiritual opposite. A 60s flat roofed carbuncle with a car park and tower block attached. The signage provides a bullet pointed list of 'nos' below the symbols of the cross keys and the lion. The cross keys commonly refers to the gates of heaven. Neither the shopping centre nor the forthcoming 'co-living' development struck me as being particularly 'heavenly'. In heraldry, the Lion symbolises strength, courage and nobility. I couldn't make any connection to that other than maybe the brute strength of the concrete used in the construction of the building.

Moving on, I reached the grease cafe on the corner which sits underneath the large brown Northminster multistory car park next to the market. I had never ventured into the car park and considered going up to the top floor for a look round and to check out the view. But the notice near the (closed) toilets underneath confirmed this was no longer possible and I'd missed my chance. The car park was closed in July due to 'safety fears'. Structural engineers have recommended either that significant investment is needed to repair the buiding or it is demolished. Some, including the Peterborough Civic Society, are suspicious of a hidden agenda. Rumours have circulated that the council already has a deal agreed for development of the car park and the market.  A glance at LP47 in the Local Plan does little to quash these rumours with it's references to the 'Northminster Opportunity Area', 'mixed use development', Student Flats, possible relocation of the market and a reduction in the number of vehicles in the area. Anyone who has still to retrieve their car from the car park would probably be best advised to call the number below sooner rather than later.

Wandering the Steel City

Staying just outside of Sheffield for a few days provided the chance for a wander around the 'Steel City' with my partner. An 'alternative' city guide book provided by our hosts served as a starting point. It was split into sections for different 'quarters' of the city.  An odd term I always think, since there usually seem to be more than four of them. Sheffield originally had eleven according to Wikipedia and later a twelfth was  added from what I can gather. Confusingly, Sheffield also has four city centre 'districts'.  In Roman times cities were often divided into four actual quarters where presumably the term originates. I suppose more accurately calling an area the 'Devonshire Eleventh' might be more confusing but I think  would have a certain ring to it. Anyway, I digress. The guidebook provided enough inspiration to make up a very rudimentary checklist of areas/things we might incorporate into our wander which gave us a very loose plan. My partner was not really up for the idea of just wandering off in a random direction and seeing what happened in my usual fashion. Having had a cursory look at a map the night before, put an A-Z in the rucksack for emergencies and with combined vague memories of previous visits some years back, we caught a train to the Steel City armed with probably very different but equally unreliable mental maps.

Leaving the station at Sheffield we were confronted by the steel wall of the Cutting Edge sculpture. An 81 foot long graffiti proof water fountain, this is part of something called the 'Gold Route'. A series of spaces and streets incorporating public art, intersecting with both Universities and the main shopping 'spine', representing 'The Heart of the City'. We weren't aware of this formal route while we were there but our walk took us through its early stages. Had we not been heading for the Millennium Gallery anyway, I'm sure we would have found ourselves pulled in it's direction.

Along the way there was street art complimented by giant poems on the side of buildings, written by ex-poet laureate Andrew Motion and Ian McMillen (that bloke from 'the Verb' on Radio 3). The painting on the side of the building below is Harry Bearley , credited as being the inventor of stainless steel.

Poetry in Motion.....

In the Millennium Gallery we were confronted by an impressive sculpture of a sunflower made out of steel cutlery. While we were admiring it a very friendly woman approached and introduced herself as the former art teacher of the sculptor. We had no reason to doubt her. Following this brief encounter and chance connection with the object made of steel cutlery, which itself represented the city in some way (sunflowers, roots, rejuvenation??), we soon had a less than brief encounter with another Sheffield resident.

The man in question, it turned out, had worked in the steel industry in some capacity since he had left school, and was  a victim of its decline. In his 60s and baffled by the internet age, he had been left behind by technology after being made redundant.  I got the impression he was a frequent visitor to the cutlery room and would to talk to anyone who would listen about the industry, it's decline and his plight. The environment of the Millennium Gallery seemed to represent rejuvenation of the city and hope for the future.   This man was a living ghost of its recent past, haunting the cutlery room as an inconvenient reminder of the  washed-up and de-skilled. The cruel irony of all this was all too apparent. But he did go on. As we attempted to politely extract ourselves from his rambling monologue, he recommended the pubs of Kelham Island where he said he was heading later. A good pint of Barnsley Bitter could still be had, he said.

Between the encounter with cutlery man and the teacher, in another part of the gallery I saw an excellent exhibit about the journey of tomato seeds through the sewage system. Tomato seeds remain intact when they pass through the human digestive system, and during their journey through the sewage system, ending at waste dumps where the sludge is piled up and tomato plants thrive.  The main part of the exhibit was a film on loop depicting the journey of the  the tomato seed through the liminal civil engineered landscape.  The artist harvested fruit from some of the plants, had it checked out and found it was safe to eat so made some jars of  'Shit Chutney'.  More about this can be found at the artist Ruth Levene's website. Some of her other work covers maps, water and walking and is worth checking out.

Away from the gallery we found ourselves in a square featuring a temporary 'seaside' with fairground rides, stalls and somewhat alarming rubbish bins.

A short distance from this we found ourselves in an area evidently in the process of 'development'. The Salvation Army had abandoned it's citadel. I didn't know the Sally Army had citadels. Such things sound a bit exotic for an organisation associated with Jesus, temperance and brass bands. But I liked the building and felt sad that it might be demolished to make way for something far less interesting. 

Near a car park and what was left of light industrial/workshop type buildings the other end of this street, a sort of army Captain was depicted, maybe a Salvation Army Captain as viewed by a less temperant member of the community. Maybe pointing in warning of both 'the drink' and of the bland shopping centre that the notices nearby showed planned for the area.

We had planned to visit the iconic bookshop Rare and Racy, but it turned out it had recently closed. Devonshire Road (in the 'Devonshire Quarter') was undergoing development. Jarvis Cocker from Pulp viewed the idea to close the shop as a crime and somebody the local paper asked said they would not walk down that stretch of road anymore. The street currently has a mixture of  coffee shops, restaurants, vintage clothes emporiums and a miscellany of other independent shops, but there is concern whether these will last before more bland development and more generic chain outlets move in. Same old story. I acquired a very fine suede jacket in one of the shops, getting a bargain and doing my bit to support them.

The woman who sold me the jacket said the area had some shops in the street could do with improvement. I'd noticed a Private Shop nearby and wondered if she had been referring to it. The chain of sex shops always seemed to locate in slightly less salubrious parts of town. We have one in Cambridge on Chesterton Road, which is another area currently undergoing a sort of post-hipster gentrification. I've often wondered how on earth such shops keep going in the age of the internet and relentlessly bland urban development. You'd have thought they would have declined at a similar rate to 'bramble mags' which, like white dogshit, you rarely see anymore.  While I'm not inclined to go into such places, I think as long as they exist they represent something 'other' and have the ability to make passers by feel a bit uncomfortable in their surroundings. As such they give two fingers to those who want to 'smarten up' areas to the point of sterility.

Not far from the vintage shop we saw a man my partner was convinced was on the 'zombie' drug 'spice' standing (just about) on a corner. Another man was sprawled half unconscious outside a pub. She maintained he must have been on spice too. It was hard to argue that the bloke may have just been very pissed considering the pub had only just opened and I don't doubt she was right. The contrast between the men out of their heads and the future aspirations of the encroaching developers on the  Devonshire Quarter seemed to symbolise the opposite and grim ends of the pole of contemporary urban development and (post) modern Britain in general.

The mural above was somewhere at the end of the road. The area has a good amount of streetart. This one done by Tellas, an Italian artist, was part of something called 'Feature walls' in 2016. The street art of the City is extensively documented on Street Art Sheffield, including a map which would be good for anyone wanting to conduct a 'street art' walk.

Soon after we found ourselves in the pedestrianised shopping area known as The Moor.  The link is actually for an article about 'The Moor Quarter' which presumably includes a slightly wider area. This is one of the major shopping areas in the City. It was good to see it thriving despite the presence of the out of town Meadowhall, which at one time was seen as a threat to city centre shops. I'm not a great one for shopping but if I have to a shopping street, without a roof over it, is in my view far preferable to an out of town covered 'Mall' with its own security guards and terrible piped music. I went to Meadowhall on a geography field trip in the early '90s and found the experience profoundly uninspiring.

Across the road at the end of the street we walked past the giant brown ziggurat-like behemoth of the Moorfoot building dwarfing a small precinct of shops at its base. The building housed Civil Servants from various Government Departments until 2014. Now it's occupied by Sheffield City Council, following an abandoned plan to demolish it. The building dates from 1981 and originally had a staff restaurant, a rarity these days in the workplace and bar which is even rarer.

The other side of the building we crossed the inner ring road through an impressive underpass which I failed to photograph. Over the other side, at the end of London Road, the face above may have been trying to scare us off. I read somewhere later that London Road had a reputation for drugs and violence. We saw some rowdy football fans (there was a match on, one of the Sheffield football teams plays not far away), and a couple of dodgy looking blokes outside a pub. But a bit further down the road were newer coffee bars and restaurants opening.

Before we started down the road I was trying to photograph the Chinese Fireworks Company. I always seem to encounter establishments connected to fireworks on these walks. I only managed the effort below before my partner suggested we move on swiftly. She'd spotted Cutlery Man  in a nearby phone box looking for money or fag butts. We didn't have time for a second  prolonged encounter with him and luckily he didn't see us.

Just further up is a Sainsburys housed in what's left of a former cinema. The facade is retained but much of the original building was demolished as part of a development. The building had been used as a nightclub called Tiffany's in the 70's and more recently known as known as 'Bed' before closing down.

We were heading towards Abbeydale Road, a long stretch in the 'Antiques Quarter'. Unfortunately the splendidly named Rude Shipyard, the first shop we passed,was closed. The name made me wonder if the proprietor was an antique selling nautical version of Bernard Black from the TV comedey  'Black Books'.  The road contained various other antique/vintage/junk shops. There is also a cafe, said to be frequented by scooter boys and mods from the Ace Scooter Club but there was no sign of them when we went by, just a lady in a Sari. Maybe they had given up scooters, tonic suits and fry ups for expensive push bikes, beards and posh javas at the new cycling cafe nearby.

The splendid building below appeared pretty derelict from a distance. The Abbeydale Picture House dates from 1920. The original cinema closed in 1975 and was subsequently used as a furniture showroom and then a  snooker hall and bar. The building is listed and attempts were made to restore it by the 'Friends of the Abbey Dale Picturehouse' between 2003 and 2012, These 'friends' included Michael Palin and Peter Stringfellow, an alliance I am trying hard to imagine. According to wikipedia, in 2012 the venue hosted a stage version of Hi-De-Hi, an 80s sit com based on a Butlins-style holiday camp in the 50's. Later in the year the Friends went bust. Eventually the lease was acquired by the Sheffield based arts charity CADS which facilitates film screenings, music events and flea markets while restoration work and fundrasing continues to take place.

On the wall outside, a black fox. Not sure if a black fox is a similar portent to the Black Dog, or if this was some sort of warning sign or maybe a homage to a local beast? It turns out there are others painted on walls in and around Abbeydale Road. The artist and the motivation behind them appear to be a mystery, in the same vein as the 'Lewisham Natureman' White Stag in South East London or the Heron in Cambridge. Although in the latter case, the artist has spoken to the local press and has Facebook and Twitter accounts but attempts to keep  his identity hidden.

Further up we stopped in a vegan cafe for tea and cake. The cake selection was excellent, portions large and very reasonably priced. Fortunately we had finished when a woman came in and stated that ten of her friends would be turning up shortly, some with pushchairs and babies. The proprietor obligingly moved tables and chairs to accommodate their imminent arrival. The scraping of chairs on the floor and prospect of  the hubbub to come hastened our departure.

After a rummage round an impressive three story junk/vintage/antique emporium we took a right turn off Abbeydale Road with a vague intention to visit a vegan cafe for lunch, the name of which I can't remember but it had a good write up. It was too busy when we got there so we didn't bother. The nearby osteopath sported some novel advertising in the form of a skeleton, with what looked like immaculate bone structure and sporting some fine socks and a scarf.

A little further along, and up a bit of an incline, we passed these beehives in someones garden. I'm not sure if they were occupied or if Bob Marley and the Beatles have any association with bee keeping.

After this there is something of a gap in my photographic record. The beehives, and the pictures above are from, I think,  the area called Nether Edge. We were heading for the Botanic Gardens where we thought we'd have a rest but went slightly of course and found ourselves in the evidently very popular Endcliffe Park. Ecclesall Road, which  runs along the south east corner of the park had been on the original hit list from the guide. I can't recall why exactly and we didn't walk down much of it in the end but I suspect I might have been hoping for a crafty beer in the Portland House micro-pub. We never got there. Wards Brewery was located along the road until 1999 and is now the sight of luxury flats (really?!). The old sign still stands. We didn't get there either.

Endcliffe Park is bisected by the Porter Brook. The name derives from the brown colour the water takes on after passing over iron-ore deposits, making it resemble dark beer.  Porter Brook rang a distant bell and the park felt familiar. I was fairly sure this was the place I visited on the geography field trip where I thought I'd broke £1000 worth of river velocity reading equipment. We'd followed the brook (I think it was the Porter) from a tributary out in the sticks and eventually were dropped off in what I'm sure was Endcliffe Park for our final reading. My memory of the park the first time was of somewhere much smaller and quieter. This time it seemed large, noisy and busy with ice cream vans and people playing football. It was good to see people outside doing things.

After a meander through the park, we found ourselves in a part of town that seemed to be a University area, with large houses and places that looked like halls of residence. The environment didn't change until we reached the Botanic Garden. The garden features an impressive pavilion building. There was a wedding going on in it so we couldn't go in. The gardens were more like a normal park than the Cambridge Botanic Garden and unlike the Cambridge version,  free to get in.

We headed back towards the centre through Nether Edge (I think). At some point, just before we crossed the inner ring road we could hear loud dub step type music getting progressively louder as we approached. Id assumed we were about to encounter a  gig in a park. But on side road there was a party going on and the music seemed to be coming from somebody's house.

After crossing the ring road we made our way through what looked like an ex-industrial area  against a ride of football fans heading home after the game. Stokes Tiles and similar buildings appeared abandoned but it being Saturday it was hard to tell.

After passing back through The Moor we found ourselves in the other main city centre shopping street, the other side of the urban seaside we'd visited earlier. It appeared a Tardis had parked.

We found ourselves back near the Millennium Gallery, and passed through Millennium Square. I was taken with the building at the back of the photo below and wondered what it was. It turns out it's the Charles Street Car Park, or 'The Cheesegrater'. In 2013 it was named as the third coolest car park in the world. Here's all ten.  By then the 'Get Carter' car park in Trinity Square in Gateshead had been demolished so was out of the running for such accolades. It made way for a new Trinity Square development which includes a very large Tesco Extra, and was nominated for the 2014 Carbuncle Cup. The Millenium Square was much more pleasant than anywhere with a Tesco Metro and far from a carbuncle. I'm not often impressed with these sorts of developments, and while it had some of the same features as countless others (Pizza Express etc), there was something different about it. Maybe it was the calming effect of the water flowing over the 9 steel balls.

The balls represent steel industry heritage (steel, craftsmanship, water, stonework). They looked more gold coloured than steel to me. This may have been a figment of my imagination or faulty eyesight.

Just before the station we passed the vulture mural below. In the other direction, from the front of the station you can see Park Hill. I wondered if the vulture mural might be a swipe at the re-development/renovation/sticking up coloured plastic bits being carried out by Urban Splash.  Similar to what has happened to the Trellick Tower in East London, luxury and upmarket apartments are being created in a Brutalist development inspired by Le Corbusier and originally a council estate. These dwellings, and those who lived there, would have been derided in the not too distant past as a problem. But these days they are highly sought after. Maybe it's better than them being torn down completely. But it does bring the expression 'social cleansing' to mind. Architects For Social Housing (ASH) have quite a bit to say about that.

I would have liked to have had a wander around Park Hill but we had to catch the train and were knackered. It's reputation in the past was not good. A friend of mine at Uni planned to do some research for his dissertation there but his mum wouldn't let him. He told me of incidents where people had heavy items thrown/dropped on them from balconies. So back then I probably would have avoided it. Whether it was really that bad, I don't know. And maybe going there now for a wander round would  be an act of heritage tourism and an insult to those being decanted out when their homes are demolished.

We also never got to Kelham Island for a pint of Barnsley Bitter.