Lawrence Whyte (Let’s Talk,17 March) opines that there is no viable use for Sheffield’s Old Town Hall. Not so. The Friends of the Old Town Hall, formed in 2015, raised grants to commission professional advice on potential reuses, obtain a condition survey on the building and a costing for restoration, and a viable business plan to bring it back into use in stages, over ten years; all this work was done by early 2018.
We established a charitable trust capable of taking ownership, and had a plan to raise the funds to buy it and run it as a social enterprise. We opened discussions in 2018 with the City Council with a view to compulsory purchase for onward sale to us.
Then early in 2019 the London company that owned the building – and had done nothing with it for 15 years – suddenly sold it to a Sheffield businessman. He soon had planning consent for conversion but went bust in 2021, before any serious restoration work was begun. Another company bought the place in December 2021. To date there is no indication what may be proposed for the building, or when it might be put in order.
The Old Town Hall – essentially, a courthouse – is not an easy building to re-purpose, given its specialist nature; and long neglect has created a substantial bill to put it right. That doesn’t mean regeneration is impossible. We know there is a way.
We judge, on the basis of our detailed work, that a purely commercial solution would probably struggle to make financial sense unless the owner was allowed to make such drastic changes to the building that its historic and architectural value would be severely compromised. The social enterprise model developed by the Friends of the Old Town is another matter, and certainly viable.
Meanwhile the building languishes, alongside a big drive by the Council to regenerate Castlegate. Our advice is as it has always been: Castlegate won’t revive unless the Old Town Hall is revived, and the Old Town Hall won’t revive unless Castlegate is revived. It’s time to get on with both.
Valerie Bayliss
Chair, Friends of the Old Town Hall
Friends of The Old Town Hall 