Looking back… and down: aerial views of 1980s Peterborough show time of huge change

The 1980s was a time of great change in the UK. With traditional heavy manufacturing industries waning and new-fangled ‘service’ industries rising to replace them, this was the decade when Britain took its first tentative – and frequently very painful – steps towards becoming a truly modern country.

The eighties was a time of enormous change for Peterborough, too. Indeed, it could be argued that the face of the city, certainly in some quarters, would have been almost unrecognisable at the end of the decade to how it appeared near the beginning.

Large-scale building projects and ambitious infrastructure projects, conceived and started in the 1970s, combined with increased investment generated by the lauded ‘Peterborough Effect’ resulted in sweeping, long-lasting physical developments right across the city.

At the same time, centuries old buildings, outdated transport hubs and housing deemed no longer ‘fit for purpose’ was consigned to the history books.

Of course, the Peterborough Telegraph (or the Evening Telegraph, as was) was on hand to report on and document the most significant episodes in the city’s development.

Here are some of our own recently digitised from the 1980s archives that clearly show our modern city in its infancy.

SEE MORE: Looking back: 14 classic photos show how Peterborough looked in the 1980s