Cholera Monument, Sheaf Valley Park
This is a new kind of endeavour for the Sheffield Timewalk Project. Having walked the Sheffield Round Walk a few times as a youngster and noticing on the map that there were many more woodlands than those on the Round Walk route I started to think that it would be interesting to string some of them together. Since those days, areas such as Sheaf Valley Park, Gleadless Woodlands and Gillfield Wood have attracted some very dedicated and active friends groups and, during the lockdowns, I started to explore how a route could be pieced together from Sheffield Station to Baslow Road at the top of Gillfield Wood. I have since found out that there is a good amount of ancient woodland along the route.
Jervis Lum, Norfolk Park
Some parts are easy – the Round Walk route is one of the best known walks in the city: signposts can be followed from Gleadless Woodlands to Twentywell Lane and is moslty through woodland. Gillfield Wood follows the Totley Brook and is a well defined path through woodland.
So I focussed most of my investigations on the link through Totley Rise from Twentywell Lane to Gillfield Wood – there are a couple of routes through plentiful woodland there – and the city centre to Gleadless Valley section. This is how I found Jervis Lum, a wonderful strip of ancient woodland tacked onto Norfolk Park. So the tricky part of the route was now reduced to the Norfolk Park to Gleadless Valley section.
Wooded Brook in the Gleadless Valley
The route which seems to make the most sense to me goes up through Arbourthorne Playing Fields and past Arbourthorne Pond – something else I wasn’t aware of before the lockdowns. It’s got its own friends group, and is a popular fishing spot. A boggy field next to it (maybe tree planting would improve this?) leads to East Bank Road, from which small roads and a gennel lead to an entrance to Buck Wood, Gleadless Valley. There are various routes through the wood, leading down through a narrow waist of built up area to Bankwood School and an extensive area of urban woodland beyond, which links to the Round Walk Route.
Dramatic sky at Graves Park
With a bit of TLC in some of the more neglected areas, a few signposts, some path improvements in Buck Wood and maybe some tree planting in Arbourthorne, we could have a fairly low-cost asset for the city, and one which connects some of its wealthiest and poorest areas, ticking all sorts of boxes on the way: green spaces, encouraging exercise, publicising ancient woodlands and, hopefully, community engagement – there are a couple of dozen groups along the way from friends groups to schools who I’m hoping will get involved. Labour, Green and Lib Dem councillors have expressed interest already, so hopefully the South Sheffield Woodland Walk – whatever it eventually becomes known as – will be a reality one day.
Chris Bullivant
Time Walk project 