CENTRAL SHEFFIELD

Just up the hill from Sheffield Interchange is Fitzalan Square, once a bit of a hub for Sheffield's trams. Here's a bit of trackwork going on.

 

Trams through the years at this location.

The "new" Supertram also serves Fitzalan Square. Here are a couple of them in early Stagecoach livery in 2006.

The bowstring girder bridge over a busy road intersection is in the background of the above photo. In this one, a tram in its smart new colours is about to pass over it in 2016.

Opposite the tram stop was a short lived micropub, the Drink Inn, seen in 2017.

Plenty of Sheffield's buses pass Fitzalan Square. Here's a SYPTE example.

The early 1980s saw SYPTE have a vehicle crisis and various buses were hired in, including this example from Hull, seen in Fitzalan Square in 1981.

The entry from Market Hill into Fitzalan Square provides plenty of opportunity to photograph buses. Mainline, in 1993, were operating "bendibuses" around the city centre.

It's a good place to capture the vehicles of Firstbus. The bus in the lower photo is painted into the old Doncaster Corporation "purple stripe" livery.

Stagecoach buses can also be seen here.

Passing the tram stop in 2022 is a Powell's bus on a tendered service.

A short distance away is Castle Square tram stop, conveniently situated by a Wetherspoons, the Bankers Draft.

Come out of the back door of the 'Spoons and there's the Dove & Rainbow.

The next tram stop is Cathedral. 

Here's the cathdral itself, seen around 1970.

Two more famous Sheffield buildings - the Town Hall (above) and the City Hall (below). 

Next to a small city centre shopping centre, a pub (now Greene King) called The Museum.

Sheffield's trams could be seen throughout the city centre. 

Pinstone Street was a good place to find them.

A few SYPTE buses in the city centre, plus a Leicester Leyland Atlantean on hire.

Not all buses served Pond Street/Interchange. Ladyline was an example.

Another good city centre pub is the Brown Bear, owned by Sam Smiths.

That leads us to Fargate, once served by trams.

Here's Fargate in 1969.

Another of Sheffield's major throughfares was The Moor. Here's the first tram, in 1899.

The Moor suffered terribly during the Blitz of 1940.

Much of The Moor is now pedestrianised, as seen in this postcard of the late 20th century.

That's it for now. Next time, we'll look at the fringes of the city centre.

POND STREET (PART 2)

 We remain at Sheffield's main bus terminal and now have a look at some of the other operators using it. Potteries Motor Traction was one of them, on a long distance route from Staffordshire.

Trent Motor Traction provided a regular service, inherited from North Western Road Car.

Trent is now part of the Wellglade Group, who operate around Sheffield using the name TM Travel.

Here are a few visitors, including Silver Service from Darley Dale (Derbyshire), United and Hants & Dorset.

Prior to deregulation, few independents served Sheffield. Wigmores was one of the exceptions.

Dearneways introduced an express service towatds Thurnscoe.

In 1986, Whyte's of Calver were operating a service to Buxton.

New post deregulation operators included Groves, Powells and Richardsons.

Northern Bus rose from the old Wigmore fleet and fell into the clutches of Mainline.

Another large operator was SUT.

West Riding, under the name "Sheffield & District", began services in the city, for a short time.

Andrews, Sheafline, Sheffield Omnibus and Yorkshire Terrier all got absorbed by the Yorkshire Traction Group.

Until its recent demise, Hulley's ran several services into Derbyshire (Lower photo by Andrew Fieldsend).

Sheffield Community Transport ran out to Penistone for a while.

And there you have it, a potted photographic history of Pond Street Bus Station/Sheffield Interchange. Now it's time for a long awaited pint, at the historic Old Queens Head, right alongside the Interchange.

In the next post, we'll move into the city centre.