SPRING HILL SHEFFIELD 1980 - present day
This aerial photograph of Spring Hill was taken circa 1980. The road that disects the picture is School Road - Commonside. Starting on the left of the photograph the first road that leads off School Road to the right is Conduit Road. The bottom of Conduit Road joins Crookesmoor Road at the junction with Northumberland Road. The second road that leads off School Road to the right is a cul-de-sac Ainsley Road. At the top of Ainsley Road was the bakery of Thomas Jewitt and Son. Adjoining the bakery is the car park which was used to park the firm's delivery vans. A number of vans were in the park when the photograph was taken which may indicate that it was sometime in the early afternoon when the photo was taken.
As a point of interest I was contacted by a resident of Ainsley
Road who stated that the road "was named after the builder of the
houses. There is a manhole cover stamped Ainsley Builders ( or some such ) in
our back yard and also I have the freehold document (which I don't fully
understand) whereunder, in 1901, Ainsley and Wilson obtained the land (or the
right to build) from a J C Middleton who - according to the plans - also
owned land on the Spring Hill side. A Mr Bunting of Chesterfield is also
involved but I don't understand how".
The car park adjoined the third road that ran off School Road namely SPRING HILL. After Spring Hill, School Road runs into Commonside which has been the source of confusion over the years from visitors to the area. The third house down on the right hand side was and still is the home of the author. On the other side of the road is a white Ford Consul (P Reg) that belonged to Bill Belfitt who lived at 50 Spring Hill.
In fact the most noticable aspect of the whole photograph is how few cars there are parked in the roads. Today due the policies of successive councils the roads in the Crookes area are heavily congested with parked cars but more about that and other similar matters in the near future
There is another arial photograph taken in the summer of 1989 probably June. This shows the area to the bottom of Spring Hill where it joins Crookesmoor Road. The road in the bottom right is Harcourt Crescent. The building in the centre is the Unity Church which was sold soon after the photograph was taken. The purchasers were developers acting on behalf of the University of Sheffield who promptly gutted the interior of the Church and converted the building into student accomodation. The building to the top of the photograph is also owned by the University and houses the University's Law Department. The road outside is called Conduit Road and joins Crookesmoor Road with School Road. Crookesmoor Road incidentally runs diagonally across the centre of the photograph
The photograph below was taken a couple of years later in the winter sunshine of late 1994 and shows one of the houses that line Spring Hill
The next photograph shows the top of Spring Hill in the late summer of 2002. The lock up garages that line Commonside were built on the site of cottages that were reputed to be some of the oldest buildings in Crookes. Needless to say they were demolished during the 1950's and the garages erected. The land the garages were built on was owned be Sheffield City Council. Years of financial mismanagement and ineptitude led the Council to sell the land at auction to private developers who were subsequently granted planning permission for the construction of residential flats. The garages were demolished and the site redeveloped. It is now occupied by a row of residential flats that are form part of "An exclusive development of only six apartments all with two double bedrooms, fully fitted kitchens and bathrooms and balconies to the lounge area"
The next view is from the roof of our house taken in July 2006. The tall building in the centre is the University's Arts Tower
The final photograph was taken in the year 2000. Spring Hill is in the centre of the photograph
This page was last updated on 02/09/24 16:55