Sheffield is thriving and developing into a modern, 21st century city for people to live in and businesses to thrive in. Sheffield City Council is forward-thinking and has already played a key role in flagship projects which have changed the city’s image over the last decade, including Heart of the City, The Moor and Castlegate, as well as major infrastructures such as Lower Don Valley Flood Defence Scheme, with significant investment coming from Sheffield’s universities and global industry leaders such as Boeing and McLaren.

Investment is now at an all-time high and major regeneration programmes are set to take place across the city. The £1.5bn transformation of Sheffield coupled with the arrival of HS2 and focus on the Northern Powerhouse will see these trends continue, so understanding the potential for any new scheme and de-risking it will be vital. VU.CITY’s digital planning and design platform helps predict and examine the impact of change in cities and on the environment. The more that everyone involved can collaborate, the lower the risks.

As the major city at the heart of a wider city region, Sheffield needs to increasingly assert its role as one of the main drivers of economic growth in the north of England. A new Sheffield Local Plan will guide the future of the city by setting out how and where development will take place up to 2038, with the intention to build around 40,000 new homes over the next 20 years to cater for the growing population there. The Sheffield Plan will cover the whole of Sheffield City Council area, except for the area within the Peak District National Park, respecting Sheffield’s natural environment and the city’s identity and heritage. With VU.CITY enabling proposals to be seen clearly and readily understood at last, increasing the likelihood of a project and agreement all the way from public consultation to planning committee is all the more straightforward.

Users of VU.CITY Sheffield are benefiting from the model from being able to understand and assess a site’s opportunities and challenges, testing refined designs in context, enhancing pre-app conversations and planning submissions, to improving how everyone involved collaborates.