Yet another revised scheme to build houses and flats on the woods and farmland at Whalebones in Wood Street, High Barnet, has been shown to local residents at a public exhibition held by the estate's trustees and their developers Hill Residential.

After losing a planning appeal last year, the proposed number of new homes has been cut from 152 to 118 with the result that an additional acre of land would now remain undeveloped and kept as green open space.

Hill say the scale of the redevelopment -- as shown in the illustration above -- has been reduced by:

Abandoning the plan to build houses in the triangular field at the junction of Wood Street and Wellhouse Lane.

Increasing the depth of the green buffer between Wood Street and the edge of the new estate (opposite the Arkley public house).

Widening the green space between the existing privately-owned Grade II listed Whalebones House and the new properties.

Barnet Council indicated almost a decade ago that it intended to permit housing development within the 14-acre Whalebones site which is inside the Wood Street conservation area and which, with its mature and protected trees, provides a green buffer between Arkley and High Barnet and between Wood Street and Barnet Hospital.

But the various schemes proposed so far have met concerted local opposition.

These latest changes are designed to meet the concerns of a planning inspector who rejected the plan for 152 homes on the grounds that the benefit of residential development did not overcome the weight of harm to important heritage assets.

Richard Powles, one of the trustees of the Gwyneth Cowing Will Trust, told the Barnet Society that they had listened to what was said by both the planning inspector and nearby residents, and they had taken action to adjust their plans.

After this latest round of local consultation, and the plans can be inspected and

feedback given via a dedicated website https://whalebones-consultation.co.uk/

Hill will prepare a detailed planning application for submission to the council.

Among the local groups consulted by the developers are the Barnet Society and the Barnet Residents Association.

In preparing its response, the society proposes to examine the plans in detail and canvass the opinions of members before deciding what action to take.

At the exhibition of the plans, Henry James, a senior development manager at Hill Residential, told residents of significant changes since the previous proposal.

New detached houses that would front Wood Street had been moved further back from the road and three five-storey apartment blocks moved further south towards Wellhouse Lane and further away from properties in the new Elmbank estate.

By widening the green buffers fronting both Wood Street and alongside Whalebones House, and by removing the plan for five houses in the field at the corner of Wood Street and Wellhouse Lane, almost half of the 10.5 acres within the scheme would now remain as open space – an acre more than before.

Open spaces would remain undeveloped in perpetuity and would be transferred to a land management company which would be financed partly through a cash injection from the trustees and service charges on householders on the estate.

Entrance to the development would be via an approach road opposite the Arkley public house – with a new T junction with Wood Street – and this would provide access through the development to Wellhouse Lane for cyclists and pedestrians, but not vehicles.

There would be two other footpaths from Wood Street to Wellhouse Lane through the Whalebones woods and fields:

A woodland walk starting opposite the Wood Street junction with Argyle Road.

A footpath starting in Wood Street (midway between the bus stop and the Whalebones arch) that would lead directly to the Barnet Hospital bus terminus.

Under the scheme 40 per cent of the homes – mostly in the three apartment blocks – would be designated as affordable, with a mix of rent and shared ownership properties.

As previously proposed, Hill have undertaken to build a new community building fronting onto Wellhouse Lane with a studio for the Barnet Guild of Artists and facilities for the Barnet Beekeepers Association.

In the Wood Street/Wellhouse Lane corner of the site Well Cottage, the home of tenant farmer Peter Mason and his wife Jill, agricultural land would be set aside to replace the site of their existing smallholding.