The Urban Circle

I've spent most of the day today at Meadowhall (or rather 'Meadowhell' owing to my passionate dislike for shopping) having intended only to stock up on Mother's Day, Birthday and Easter cards, buy a few books and make a cool, sharp exit. However, I ended up buying all of the above as well as a new, faster, whizzier computer, a kingsize duvet set and some new sunglasses!!

As a result, I didn't leave myself much time for photography. That said, on my way home, I dropped by the Centenary Riverside Nature Reserve in Templeborough, Rotherham, to seek out the urban take on the stone circle which my friend David captured so vividly about a week ago. Not quite Stonehenge or the Castlerigg Stone Circle that graces the Lake District, nevertheless, the 'Ironhenge' of Rotherham isn't a bad supplement for an urban landscape and I hope I've captured a sense of stature in the proud lumps of metal neatly arranged in a sun trapped circle.

Centenary Riverside is at the centre of Rotherham's Templeborough Regeneration Area, midway between a sewage works, the M1 motorway and Rotherham Town Centre. It is bounded on one side by a thriving industrial engineering works, on two sides by the River Don, and to the north, by a railway. As part of Rotherham's ongoing economic regeneration, a large area of the western part of the Town, near to the River Don, is gradually being redeveloped, on the sites of previously industrial brownfield land.

Officially opened on 27th March, 2009, the nature reserve is the centrepiece of Rotherham's £14 million flood alleviation scheme, which is being created through a partnership led by Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council, the Environment Agency and the Wildlife Trust for Sheffield and Rotherham.

There have been 3000 trees planted and there are already swans nesting and plovers, lapwings, a heron and a sparrowhawk have been spotted. At the Magna end of the site an otter home has been built and large mounds in the centre of the lake - the remains of slag from the furnaces which was put into skips and dumped, rather than remove them - will, hopefully attract sand martins once holes have made to provide them with the shelter they crave.