Author: Robin Bishop

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Rambles round Barnet – enjoy them while you can!

Chipping Barnet is a great base for some glorious countryside walks, and the best are described in Rambles Round Barnet – two volumes published by the Barnet Society. The good news is that Volume I has just been reprinted in a limited edition. The bad news is that some of the walks are threatened by development, so walk them while you can.

Rambles Round Barnet – In the footsteps of EH Lucas was published by the Barnet Society in 2012 and has been out of print. It was a handy A5 booklet containing four walks from a guidebook originally researched by EH Lucas, the Society’s Treasurer (1948-70), and issued by the Society in 1948.

In 2013 a further three walks from Lucas’s guide were published in Volume II, which is still in print and available from Waterstones in The Spires or directly from the Society.

One of the few benefits of Covid-19 has been revival of interest in the countryside, with a noticeable increase in walkers and cyclists on local paths in the last year. At the conclusion of the Society’s 75th anniversary year, it seemed appropriate to reprint Volume 1.

The reprint is a facsimile, in a limited edition of 150, of the 2012 booklet. No attempt has been made to alter the charming text and illustrations of the 2012 edition, which was largely the work of Owen Jones and David Ely, but eight pages of updates and additional information have been inserted as a postscript. Both Rambles I & II are on sale from Waterstones in The Spires and Barnet Museum, or direct from the Society at £6 per volume (or £10 for both) plus postage and packing. Contact details are given below.

No-one would claim that Barnet and Hertfordshire can compete with more dramatic landscapes elsewhere in Britain. But their quiet qualities often get overlooked, and Covid-19 has reminded many of us how valuable they are. Rambles may not be up there with Guide to the Lakeland Fells, Alfred Wainwright’s famous walking guidebooks to the Lake District. But they are full of shrewd observations and good advice. Lucas, Jones and Ely are Barnet’s Wainwright, and deserve to be celebrated.

The four walks described in Rambles Round Barnet – In the footsteps of EH Lucas are:

Walk 1 – The green heart of Barnet  This takes you through countryside that was threatened, in 1945, by Barnet Council’s plans to triple the population of Chipping Barnet to 60,000. The Barnet Society was founded to fight them, and did so successfully.

Walk 2 – Mimmsy meadows and bluebell woods  Between South Mimms and North Mymms (sic) is a beautiful circuit of sequestered woods, open meadows and long views – amazingly, never more than about half a mile from the M25 or A1.

Walk 3 – Ancient fields and a magic grove only half a mile from built-up Barnet  This walk includes two delightful tracts of countryside, one each side of the A1, and an enchanted grove, half a mile long, of venerable trees bordering Dyrham Park.

Walk 4 – Traditional farmland meets modern motorway  Not a walk for those seeking respite from the 21st century, though it has sweet rustic moments. But if you wonder whether English countryside can coexist with modern technology, this is the place to find out.

The walks have all been checked this spring. As well as containing additional information, the insert picks out highlights, lists any changes since 2012, and gives tips on routes and good times to go.

All the walks take you through countryside designated as Green Belt after the 2nd World War, partly due to the campaigning of the Society. With a few exceptions, development is permitted only in very special circumstances. But that hasn’t stopped many applications being submitted. That the landscape has survived largely unspoiled for 75 years is testimony to ongoing work by us and other voluntary groups in Barnet and Hertfordshire, as well as the stewardship of both councils.

However, this reprint is tinged with concern that some of the walks will be lost within a few years. Although the UK government and Barnet Council claim to be committed to retaining the Green Belt, and the walks themselves are mostly safeguarded Rights of Way, major developments are currently being planned on or near land over which they pass.

Most of the open land north of the M25 and both sides of the A1 has been identified in Hertsmere Council’s draft Local Plan for potential housing and employment development, as well as pockets south of the M25. Huge Sky and Hertswood film studio complexes are proposed for fields south of Rowley Lane. New Rabley and Redwell ‘Garden Villages’ are proposed near South Mimms. These will all leave a massive mark on what is at present open greenery.

Nor is Barnet Council exempt. Although it plans to create a major new Regional Park between Arkley, Mill Hill and the A1, it also proposes to build an £11m community and leisure hub in the middle of Barnet Playing Fields – which the Council itself has designated Green Belt.

This web post is therefore not simply an invitation to buy Rambles Round Barnet – Volume I while stocks last. It also urges you to get out and savour our wonderful countryside while it is still there to enjoy.

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Last chance for Whalebones fields

Hill Residential Ltd and the Trustees of the Gwyneth Cowing estate, whose planning application for 152 homes on the Whalebones fields was refused last November, have appealed against Barnet Council’s decision. Their case will be heard at a 5-day public inquiry starting on 31 August. It is a major test of Barnet’s planning policies on green spaces and Conservation Areas.

The Barnet Society will be submitting a representation against the appeal, and you can submit your own. To do so, contact the Planning Inspectorate by Friday 18 June via:

Online: www.gov.uk/appeal-planning-inspectorate

Email: Holly.dutton@planninginspectorate.gov.uk

quoting the appeal reference: APP/N5090/W/21/3273189.

For the benefit of new readers, the Whalebones development has been brewing for five years, and is probably the most significant proposal for Chipping Barnet for decades (unless the High Barnet Station development goes ahead). Although the site is not designated as Green Belt, it includes the last remaining fields near the town centre and is in the Wood Street Conservation Area.

When a planning application was submitted two years ago, we consulted as widely as possible among our membership. A decisive majority of respondents – nearly 90% – objected to the scheme in its present form, and only three members supported it. The general public agreed: the planners received 570 objections and only five comments in support.

We objected to the proposals on three grounds, summarised as follows:

Conservation Area Policy

Firstly, the development would be an unacceptable breach of Conservation Area policy. The Council’s Wood Street CA Character Appraisal Statement says that, ‘The Council will seek to ensure that new development within the conservation area seeks to preserve or enhance the special character or appearance of the area…’ This would do neither.

The western meadow in particular (see top photo), in addition to offering fine open views across the site to north and south, is an essential natural and visual buffer between Chipping Barnet and Arkley; without it, the settlements will lose their separate identities forever.

Even worse: approval of this scheme would create a dreadful precedent for other Barnet CAs.

Overdevelopment

Secondly, it would be overdevelopment of the site. We are unconvinced that so many homes are necessary to pay for replacing the studio and upkeep of the rest of the estate. Given the profits to be made on such an attractive site, such a large development needs rigorous justification.

A serious consequence of the quantity and type of new homes would be some 200 additional cars and 300 cycles, exacerbating already heavy congestion at peak times. A further consequence would be higher levels of air and noise pollution – especially unfortunate near a hospital.

Sustainability

Thirdly, although the developer promises a net gain in biodiversity, we are not persuaded that the ecological impact of such a large development and extended construction period could be entirely mitigated.

And although the design represents an advance on today’s environmental norms, it will need a carbon-offset payment to be zero-carbon.

Conclusion

We do not ask for Whalebones to left as it is. We accept that commercial agriculture is no longer viable on the site, and that some new housing would fund replacement facilities for the artists and beekeepers and future maintenance of the estate – but not on such a scale.

Moreover, the developers have made no serious effort to explore other land-based activities of a kind likely to have interested the former owner (and Barnet Society founder) Gwyneth Cowing. These include education, training and/or therapy in horticulture, animal husbandry and environmental studies, perhaps in partnership with a local school or college. A city or care farm for young and old people, including those with special needs, is another possibility in keeping with the spirit of Ms Cowing’s will.

The value of such uses, and of retaining greenery and promoting biodiversity is recognised in the London Plan and the government’s current Environment Bill. Those sorts of development we would gladly support.

Below: Visualisation of proposed houses and apartment blocks on Whalebones western meadow (Architects: Pollard Thomas Edwards)

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Vote for Something for Young People in the Community Plan

Our teenagers and young adults could be among the greatest casualties of Covid-19. The Plan must offer them something, whether work experience or youth-focused leisure attractions.

The Council is consulting us on projects to help regenerate the Barnet High Street area. Our web post on 1 February described how the Barnet Society has responded to the Community Plan by agreeing five priorities: something old, something new, something for children, something for young people and something green.

The prospects of secondary school and college students have been thrown into disarray by the pandemic and its economic consequences. Not only have their pathways to educational qualifications been disrupted, but their chances of secure and well-paid employment have been reduced. On top of that are the adverse consequences for their health and wellbeing. It is essential for the Plan to do something to repair the damage and give them hope for the future.

Here we invite you to consider the two potential projects in the Plan that would specifically offer something for young people – and would also benefit the wider community:

  • The Bull Theatre
  • Teenage Makers

Don’t miss the opportunity to let the Council know that you support at least one of these projects in the Community Plan here. The deadline for comments is Friday 19 February.

The Bull Theatre is the heart of the Susi Earnshaw Theatre School (SETS), which offers a specialist curriculum to pupils aged 9-16, focused on the performing arts. In normal times, SETS plays a prominent part at Barnet and London events.

The Community Plan project is not intended to alter SETS’ core educational role, though if successful, SETS would certainly benefit. It’s partly about taking school performances out to local schools and other audiences. It’s also about attracting the community into its building, particularly its auditorium, to engage in a range of educational and enjoyable activities at times of day, evening or weekend when it would otherwise be empty.

SETS has expertise in, and passion for, the creative and expressive aspects of the curriculum that research shows are invaluable to the development of children and young adults, but for which mainstream schools are often unable or unwilling to provide. Lockdown has made us aware of how important the arts are for all of us. Whether as participants or audiences, our mental health and wellbeing depends on them to some degree.

The Bull Theatre has been a valued but under-used resource in Chipping Barnet in the past. A project to broaden public access to it would be well worth your support.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/the-bull-theatre/

The other project in the Community Plan for young people, Teenage Makers, would build on the success of the Teenage Market that ran for two years pre-Covid on The Spires bandstand site. That provided a platform for youngsters to market their own goods and to entertain visitors with musical gigs. Teenage Makers would take this model a step further.

Partnership with Barnet & Southgate College, and possibly local secondary schools, would enable a programme of teaching and learning through making and selling that could lead to formal qualifications, work experience, employment – and with luck, a new generation of entrepreneurs.

This would also fit well with the government’s recent recognition that vocational education has in the past been undervalued and underfunded, and deserves better support in future.

A Teenage Makers market on the College’s square would also bring life to that attractive but under-used space, and encourage staging of other public events there.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/teenage-makers/The Society would like to hear how you rate these ideas. If you’re a member, we’ve already written to you, so email us at the address in the letter, by Monday 15 February. If you aren’t a member, please contact us via the comment box below – and consider joining us!

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Vote for Something for Children in the Community Plan


The town centre must become more child-friendly. Only if families have reasons to come here that appeal to their children, not just to parents’ need to work or shop, will it become important in their lives.

The Council is consulting us on projects to help regenerate the Barnet High Street area. Our web post on 1 February described how the Barnet Society has responded to the Community Plan by agreeing five priorities: something old, something new, something for children, something for young people and something green.

Here, we invite you to consider the four potential projects in the Community Plan that would support something for children:

  • Play Masterplan
  • Walking & Cycling Quiet Routes
  • Safer Road Junctions
  • Family Hub
It’s important to let the Council know that you support at least one of these projects in the Plan here. Below, we explain why they are worth considering in more detail.

Much is being made about the damaging – and potentially long-lasting – consequences of Covid-19 for children not able to go to school. Less is said about their loss of opportunities to play outdoors and to socialise with other children and adults across the generations. Yet educational research and practice has proved the fundamental importance to children’s development of interaction with people and the environment from the earliest years. Four projects in the Plan offers a chance (once lockdown ends) to replace at least some of this loss.

The Play Masterplan envisages not only improvements to Old Courthouse Recreation Ground (or Park), but also a plan for play facilities in other parts of the town centre. The Barnet Society strongly supports both aspects of this project.

Although the Park already has a playground, it’s of the conventional ‘Kit-Fence-Carpet’ kind: an enjoyable but artificial enclosure with expensive equipment and safety surfacing that limits, instead of expanding, children’s choices. It has its place, but the settings that stimulate children more, physically and imaginatively, are those that offer a wide range of materials – ideally natural – with which they can experiment and interact. Examples are discovery areas, sensory gardens, adventure playgrounds and forest schools that have flourished in places like Scandinavia, and which are increasingly used by the best UK nurseries and schools.

There are opportunities within the Park – and in other open spaces around the High Street – to develop new types of play-space, more varied and appropriate to children of different ages and abilities. Preferably they would also be close to the places adults visit, and be an incentive to bring children with them into the town centre – which, if it is attractive and safe, is after all another important learning experience for children.

Just as young or vulnerable children need their own space, so the Plan should include provisions for older children and young teens in the form of a more challenging adventure/nature playground. This should preferably be linked to a youth club with opportunities for enterprise, work experience, extra-curricular lessons for art and the like, as there is currently nothing in the town centre for them to do or anywhere for them to go.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/play-masterplan/

In order for children and families to reach the town centre, of course, pleasant Walking & Cycling Quiet Routes would make their journey healthier and more enjoyable. Only a couple of generations ago, Meadway was a country lane much used by residents of New Barnet walking to market. Today, a less-travelled but lovelier route can be followed across King George’s Field, and with an all-weather path it would be practicable and fun for children.

High Barnet also needs better provision for cyclists. (As one myself, I speak with feeling!) It should not be too difficult or costly to construct a separate cycleway parallel to the A1000 up Barnet Hill, under the canopy of ‘Lee’s Trees’. Once at the top of the hill, cycling is fairly easy, especially on the side roads. But in places such as Hadley Green and Common new cycleways would be more pleasurable, and enable younger cyclists to acquire confidence.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/walking-cycling-links/

For children, as well as for pedestrians and cyclists of all ages, Safer Road Junctions would be an advantage. We know, from the success of the recent High Street pavement widening, that pedestrian crossings can be narrowed without significant detriment to traffic.

Something similar could be done, for example at the High Street/Wood Street junction. Judith Clouston wrote more about this in her recent post on something old about the need to improve the appearance and safety of this area – an idea that The Barnet Society has been pushing for many years.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/safer-road-crossings/

The town centre isn’t exactly short of cafés, but a Family Hub would provide one with a difference: a place on or close to the High Street specifically for parents or carers with kids, offering activities as well as refreshments. We have plenty of empty shop and business premises, some of which would surely be suitable. Even better would be if the Family Hub were to be linked to one of the new workspace initiatives described by Gail Laser in another recent post on something new.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/family-hub/

The Society would also like to hear how you rate these ideas. If you’re a member, we’ve already written to you, so email us at the address in the letter. If you aren’t a member, please contact us via the comment box below – and consider joining us!

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Vote for Something Green in the Community Plan

Barnet has precious green open spaces, mature woodlands, streams and wetlands. Last year brought home what we stand to lose with climate change and bad building development. Surely this is the moment to invest in green initiatives.

The Council is consulting us on projects to help regenerate the Barnet High Street area. The Barnet Society’s web post on 1 February described how we’ve responded to the Community Plan by agreeing five priorities: something old, something new, something for children, something for young people and something green.

Chipping Barnet’s abundance of green spaces is one of its unique selling points. Wherever you may be in the area, you’re never more than a few stones’ throw away from a park, wood or nature of some kind, which is indeed a luxury considering our proximity to central London. But protecting the environment is also about reducing our carbon emissions in other ways, which can be active (e.g. generating energy from renewable sources) or passive (e.g. saving and enhancing existing buildings).

Here we invite you to consider projects in the Plan that would support something green in various ways:

  • Routes & Riches Wayfinding
  • Rewilding
  • Community Energy Company
  • Opportunity Clusters: Historic Centre, Civic & Market and Hadley Green

It’s important to let the Council know that you support at least one of these projects in the Community Plan here. Below we explain why they are worth considering in more detail.

Our green assets aren’t always utilised and enjoyed to their full potential. In her recent web post something old, Judith Clouston described how Routes & Riches Wayfinding could result in a series of specially-commissioned signs or markers to highlight the locations not just of our historical and architectural gems, but of our green spaces. This would celebrate them and make them as accessible and enjoyable as possible.

How many people know that loads of free blackberries grow in public spaces within 10 minutes’ walk of the High Street? Or that one of the best views of our Green Belt can be seen from Whitings Hill, only five minutes’ walk beyond Barnet Hospital? This project would be an inexpensive way to show locals and visitors where these delights can be found.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/routes-riches-wayfinding/

The Society is particularly glad to see Rewilding among the Plan projects. Over the last 25 years, we’ve planted, and persuaded the Council to plant, many hundreds of trees and shrubs in and around the town centre. We’ve supported other local organisations active in conserving and enhancing the environment such as Green Beings and Barnet Environment Centre (illustrated above, right). And we’ve drawn attention to neglected corners that would benefit from better design and management, such as the pocket park between The Spires and the Stapylton Road bus-stop (illustrated above, left).

The strengths of this project are many. It would require relatively little to deliver: mainly seeds or saplings – which are cheap – and labour to find, prepare, plant and maintain new spaces. There’s great and growing enthusiasm for planting among the public, and especially in schools, so much of the labour could be voluntary. It would produce results within a growing season or two, but could also be carried out in stages as money and enthusiasm allow. It would bring quiet satisfaction to those taking part, and to all the passers-by who enjoy the results.

We know that Green Beings are particularly keen to engage the community with re-wilding (and maintaining) suitable pockets of land in and around the town. Provided we can get a handle on our litter problem, this can add significantly to the character and identity of Chipping Barnet, as well as offer opportunities for pollination, biodiversity and habitat creation.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/rewilding/

The idea of a Community Energy Company could hardly be more different. Given sufficient uptake by local residents and businesses, this could lead to a significant reduction in our energy costs and carbon emissions.

Putting solar panels on the roofs of suitable buildings around the town centre must be a better response to the need for renewable energy, surely, than the Council’s current inclination to approve solar panels and battery stores in parks and open spaces that it deems to be ‘low quality, low value’?

Of all the green projects in the Plan, it is the most ambitious but could have the greatest impact. But it would need substantial investment upfront before economic and environmental benefits would be felt. And for it to remain a locally controlled initiative, the Council and Chipping Barnet Town Team would need long-term commitment and in-house expertise.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/community-energy-company/

Green initiatives on a more modest scale are also contained in the ideas for Opportunity Clusters in the Historic Centre, the Civic & Market Quarter and Hadley Green. Some could involve actual new greenery – in, around, on the rooftops of, and growing up the walls of existing buildings. But a sustainable environment is not just about plants: it’s about safeguarding the massive amounts of embodied carbon locked up in building fabric. Our town centre is full of interesting architecture, but often so neglected that it goes unnoticed. We already know how to transform the environmental performance of old buildings without destroying their character; what we need is the care and imagination to do it.

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/opportunity-cluster-historic-centre/

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/opportunity-cluster-civic-and-market/

https://cbcommunityplan.co.uk/opportunity-cluster-hadley-green/

The Society would like to hear how you rate these ideas. If you’re a member, we’ve already written to you, so email us at the address in the letter. If you aren’t a member, please contact us via the comment box below – and consider joining us!

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Barnet Society responses to consultations on the Green Belt

The Barnet Society’s 75th birthday in 2020 was a timely moment to celebrate, in three recent Website articles, the local Green Belt that was the original reason for our existence. In recent years, the Society has submitted responses to public consultations regarding the Green Belt by the All Party Parliamentary Group, the London Assembly, Hertsmere Council and the London Borough of Enfield.

Continue reading Barnet Society responses to consultations on the Green Belt

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Rambles Round Barnet Update 17th June 2020

The previous update of 29th June 2019 referred to the progress made by the Darlands Conservation Trust since their inception in September 2017. True to their word, they have carried out some very significant work in the reserve over the past year but the working parties have had stop since the COVID 19 impacted on all group activities. I am very grateful to Vicki Philips, herself a keen rambler, who told me about these improvements to the reserve which helped my later visit.

Continue reading Rambles Round Barnet Update 17th June 2020