A heartfelt plea for the creation of a visitors’ centre or historic trail to mark the site of the 1471 Battle of Barnet was made by the celebrated author and historian Alison Weir after she gave a lecture on Richard III: Man or Myth, at Barnet Parish Church.
Continue reading Putting the Battle of Barnet on the map for historical tours
Premier Inns have submitted a new planning application. The design has been improved since its first scheme, rejected in July, and the Barnet Society is minded to support it.
Problems caused by uncontrolled street drinking in High Barnet and rough sleeping in shop doorways along the High Street topped the issues raised at an Engage Barnet question time.
Continue reading Unruly street drinkers troubling High Street shoppers
Offering High Barnet residents and shoppers a free-to-use cash machine is proving an expensive nightmare for the Paper Shop in the High Street.
Continue reading Hefty council tax bill for High Street cash machine
A new planning application is in for the Brake Shear House site. The design has good and weak points, so the Barnet Society is minded to be neutral about it. You can comment on it until Friday 7th September.
High Barnet’s struggling High Street shopping centre is facing fresh challenges: another two national chains are pulling out just as plans are announced to convert empty retail premises on the corner with St Albans Road into a house in multiple occupation.
Continue reading Shop closures and conversions changing town centre
Barnet might have lost its football club, but another of the town’s sporting traditions is still making history: Barnet Elizabethans Rugby Football Club is about to start a year of commemorative events to celebrate its centenary.
Residents of Chipping Close were out in force to express their continuing opposition to the construction of a 100-bed Premier Inn opposite their homes on the site of Barnet Market.
The stunning success this summer of the first-ever Barnet Medieval Festival – which the organisers are planning to repeat next June – has added fresh momentum to several initiatives to celebrate the 1471 Battle of Barnet.
Continue reading Sketch for new Battle of Barnet oil painting
The controversial proposal to build a Premier Inn on the former Barnet Market site has been rejected by Barnet’s planning committee, against the planning officers’ advice.
Paula Gabb says her much-celebrated cat Millie – known locally as Barnet’s “library cat” and latterly “Waitrose” cat – has died “peacefully” after being poorly for some time with a thyroid problem.
Residents in four roads that were hoping to be included in the new Barnet Hospital controlled parking zone have been told they may have to wait until early next year before they can be incorporated into the scheme.
Continue reading Angry reaction over exclusion from Barnet Hospital CPZ
Barnet Guild of Artists’ 70th annual summer exhibition is dedicated to its founder, Gwyneth Cowing, who in 1948 brought together a group of local artists to stage their first show at Queen Elizabeth’s Girls’ School.
A campaign to restore the obelisk at Hadley Highstone that commemorates the Battle of Barnet, is one of a series of initiatives aimed at building on the success of this year Barnet Medieval Festival and the ongoing efforts to trace the precise site of the battlefield.
Continue reading Restoration plea for Hadley Highstone obelisk
A competition to find the best possible site for a three-metre high bronze sculpture to commemorate the Battle of Barnet is about to be launched as part of a crowdfunding appeal.
A row of square, flat-roofed houses in Raydean Road are among the buildings in and around Barnet that are highlighted on a website that celebrates modernist and art deco architecture in the London suburbs that became known as Metro-land.
Continue reading Raydean Road houses – a tribute to modernism
Most High Barnet residents are familiar with the Marie Foster Centre – awaiting demolition for redevelopment – but few probably realise that when opened in 1973, the 30-bed hospital in Wood Street was the first purpose-built home in the country for young people suffering from multiple sclerosis.
Continue reading When Barnet pioneered multiple sclerosis care
Local residents and nearby businesses are to be consulted over a plan to build a 100-bed care home for the elderly on the site of the former Marie Foster Centre in Wood Street, Barnet.
Continue reading £22 million care home for Marie Foster site
To help celebrate the school’s 130th anniversary, pupils at Queen Elizabeth’s Girls’ School, Barnet, organised a wide range of events for their summer fair.
Continue reading Queen’s representative at QE Girls’ summer fair
A joint display of classic cars and vintage armoured vehicles drew record crowds to the fifth annual Barnet Classic Car show at the Army Reserve Centre in St Albans Road, Barnet.
Barnet’s annual Classic Car Show on Saturday (30 June) is to be a joint display alongside vintage armoured vehicles to mark National Armed Forces Day.
Continue reading Barnet’s classic cars joined by vintage armoured vehicles
After lying abandoned and derelict for years the former nurses’ home in Wood Street, Barnet, is to be demolished to make way for a new care home for the elderly to be built on the Marie Foster care home site.
Continue reading Care home for elderly to replace Barnet eye-sore
Two teams of keep-fit enthusiasts entertained shoppers at the Spires shopping centre with a marathon session of continuous press-ups – and raised over £5,000 for charity.
Charging £3,000 to hang heraldic banners from 26 lamp standards in Barnet High Street was condemned as the latest example of the dysfunctional relationship between Barnet Council and its web of private contractors providing out-sourced services.
Continue reading Medieval Festival treated “appallingly” by Barnet Council
Such was the enthusiastic response to a real-life re-enactment of the Battle of Barnet that military re-enactors, organisers and visitors were unanimous in their hope that the first-ever Barnet Medieval Festival can become an annual event.
Continue reading Battle of Barnet re-enactment – a weekend to remember
After the closure of High Barnet’s police station in November last year, the local safer neighbourhood police team is keen to improve and maintain contact with local residents.
A development plan for the woods and fields around Whalebones in Wood Street, Barnet, proposes the construction of between 150 and 180 homes to be offset by the creation of two new green spaces and footpaths open to the public.
Continue reading Whalebones: up to 180 homes plus green spaces
Barnet High Street is flying heraldic banners from the Wars of the Roses to promote the town’s first-ever medieval festival which is being held this weekend (Saturday and Sunday, 9 and 10 June) to commemorate the 1471 Battle of Barnet.
Continue reading Wars of the Roses banners transform Barnet High Street
After months of speculation about the future of the Whalebones estate of woods and fields in Wood Street, Barnet, the trustees are about to announce further details of what they say will be “high-quality residential development” together with green spaces open to the public.
Continue reading Developers to unveil plans for housing at Whalebones
A three-week public consultation has opened on a new scheme of improvements to the High Street – and it’s vital that residents support this chance-in-a-generation to rejuvenate it.
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Green Belt Briefing
Commemorating the 555th anniversary of the Battle of Barnet
An evening of song at Monken Hadley Church in aid of Church House appeal - Monday 20th April
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