Brought up in a North Eastern heritage location my earliest rail memories are of ECML Pacific hauled services and Tyneside electrics. Class 40 diesels followed by Deltics and HSTs. First generation DMUs seemed great. I left before electrification.
On arrival in Sheffield I found the first generation DMUs still running and MML services hauled by 45s and 46s. It seemed a long time before HSTs arrived. Worse, I discovered that Manchester, less than 35 mile away, was being served by one train an hour taking an hour. Inter-city service this was not.
And now we're still awaiting electrification, sometime never. We're glad to have Pacers because the alternative was no trains at all. The line to Manchester has an improved timetable, suggesting a journey of nearer 55 minutes than the hour of 40 years ago. But most trains are delayed, taking more than an hour, are often cancelled and frequently overloaded.
Crosscountry services are improved, although rolling stock is showing the strain of that increased use. They offer an hourly journey time of about 40 minutes for 30 miles to Leeds but other services take an hour or more.
The ECML at Doncaster can be reached by XC in 20 minutes, but other services take longer for about 18 miles.
Sheffield to London may be achieved in 2 hours but most services take longer. Leeds is further from the capital yet average journey times are no worse and often better.
Sheffield is in a railway backwater, and rolling stock goes with that. However rolling stock and timetables are only part of it for those wanting to use the services. Performance is dire. Not as dire as the Highland Mainline, but passenger numbers are greater and distances much shorter.
The M1 running North and South skirts the east side of the city but road links to the west across the Pennines are still basic causing many to head north for the M62. Rail should be doing so much better.
MML paused, effectively cancelled until we see work actually starting. Near my home is a site surveyed years ago for an electricity feeder station for that project. The HS2 team didn't seem to know about it, nor the team working on the delayed Hope Valley Capacity Improvement Scheme.
As an advocate of rail it's disheartening to sit in a city so badly served and largely ignored by those responsible for rail investment.