Posts Tagged ‘Sheffield’

Sunday afternoon Sheffield

Friday, March 20th, 2020

We found ourselves at Sheffield station a couple of hours before our train was due to leave – as usual we had booked Advance tickets that were only valid on a particular service to save ourselves a small fortune on the journey, but hadn’t been sure when exactly we would be able to travel.

Rail fares in the UK are a crazy system which has become much worse since rail privatisation, leaving us with a system where standard fares are the highest per mile in the world, thanks largely to rail companies owned by foreign governments and dodgy capitalists all hugely subsidised by the UK taxpayer.

It’s now hard to find what the standard price is, but for the journey we were undertaking I think around £85 each. But then there are Off-peak, Super Off-peak and advance tickets, these latter often being sold at various prices depending on how far in advance you book. The whole system is more like a lottery than a ticketing system and is seldom understood even by those who sell the tickets. But by advance booking and taking a slightly slower route (including a 55 minute wait in Birmingham) we were able to get the price down to less than a third of the standard fare, even without going into any of the complex methods involving split ticketing and other dodges that have spawned an new web industry.

It truly is a crazy system, and at times it’s better for us to book from London rather than our suburban station, with at times a 200 mile journey into the city actually costing less than the tube across London and the 19 miles to our local station.

One of Labour’s more popular policies at the last election was the re-nationalisation of the railways, but unfortunately it was an election fought on ‘getting Brexit done’ rather than so many more important policies. And so we ended with a government pledged to get us out of Europe, but with no comprehension of the other desperately needed changes in policy, nor the ability to make any realy sensible deal over Brexit, with too many among it committed to a ‘no deal’exit. And which is now proving itself utterly incapable of handling a global pandemic.

Back to October in Sheffield, Linda saw the wait as an opportunity to indulge her tea-room obsession and led us off towards one in the canal basin, but unfortunately it had closed down since she was last there. There was a pub open, but that wasn’t what she required, and after some discussion and a short walk around the area we retired back to the station where she was at least able to buy a takeaway tea and cake.

I would happily have had a rather longer walk around and would probably have avoided Victoria Quays, which I’ve photographed on several previous occasions.

Quite a few more pictures, both of the canal basin and from the walk there and back to the station at Sheffield, Yorkshire.


All photographs on this and my other sites, unless otherwise stated, are taken by and copyright of Peter Marshall, and are available for reproduction or can be bought as prints.


October 2019 complete

Saturday, November 16th, 2019

It’s taken me a lot of work to get all my pictures from October sorted out and on the web on My London Diary, and two trips away from home didn’t help. Apart from those visits to Unstone, Sheffield and Matlock it was also a busy month with more protests by Extinction Rebellion and around their actions, ending the month with 39 posts including over 1500 pictures.

October 2019

IWGB Protest UCL outsourcing

St Mary’s Hospital Strike For Equality
Support Chilean protesters
Algerians call for free elections
Assange – Tell the Truth BBC
Iraqi solidarity with Iraq protesters

UFFC 21st remembrance procession
End Family Courts aiding violent fathers
Against compulsory relationship education

Catalans say release Political Prisoners
Lumsdale & Matlock
Matlock Town Walk
Cuba leads on climate say RCG
March for a People’s Vote
Windsor

XR demands Murdoch tell the truth
XR defies protest ban
Protest defends freedom of speech
XR No Food No Future protest
Rally supports Bolivia’s Evo Morales
Against Ecuadorian President Moreno
Solidarity with Rojava – Kurdish Syria

XR Strength in Grief Procession
Brexit unfair for EU citizens
Trade Unionists join the Rebellion
Brick Lane Night
Bangladeshi students protest campus violence
Extinction Rebellion Day 3
Biofuel Watch – Axe Drax at BEIS
All Rise For Climate Justice
Stirling Prize for Architecture
Extinction Rebellion continues

XR Rebels marry on Westminster Bridge
Extinction Rebellion occupy Westminster
Sheffield, Yorkshire
Unstone, Derbyshire
IWGB at Mayfair club Loulou’s
Saudis support killer Prince MBS
Justice For Jamal Khashoggi

London Images