Before I became a PVC I very often came in to work by bus.  But my going-home times are now so irregular, and often stretch beyond the time when the bus service frequency drops, that I generally now drive in.  That brings me through the 'student quarters' of Broomhill and Crookesmoor - and sometimes through Crookes or Walkley if I vary my route.

The urban landscape in these areas has suddenly changed in the last few days.   A forest of signs has suddenly appeared, placed in permanent brackets on the sides of houses, on posts in gardens, or pasted to windows.  The landlords have decreed that now is the time to seek tenants for their propoerties for next academic session .We are in the seventh week of the 2011-12 academic year, with 23 more weeks of undergraduate education to come, plus the Christmas, Easter and summer vacations, yet we are already into the 2012-13 letting cycle.  And it is very difficult for students to resist it.

What it means is that first year students who are in the early stages of making friendships are thrust into deciding who they might want to share a house with next year - with a reasonable chance that by next September, 10 months away, their friendships will have changed and they will regret the groups they made now.  It means that second and third year students living in rented property will be expected to put up with other groups inspecting their accommodation with a view to taking it over next year.  For stduents who will graduate next summer it gives added anxiety to decisions about whether they might want to stay on to do a Masters programme or seek employment in the city, because the feeling grows that if they don't make their minds up now all the best accommodation possibilities will have been snapped up.

For all of these individuals this early housing blitz is a reminder of the transitoriness of the student lifestyle, at a time when everything should be settled for the main part of the current acacdemic year with students feeling secure and stable in their lifestyles and networks - whatever type of accommodation they are in.  We can try everything we can to help students to recognise that dealying the housing search for a few months will not bring disaster.  But everywhere you look around the student neighbourhoods today those little 'to rent' signs build an atmosphere of anxiety and the feeling that 'I must do something now' about next year.

If I were allowed a little piece of legislation I would ban all advertising of housing offers for the following acacdemic session until Easter at the earliest.