Displaying items by tag: Friends of Barnet Market

Nearby residents have been given an assurance that the design of the new Premier Inn planned for the historic site of Barnet Market will respect the local conservation area and will be in keeping with terraced houses across the road in Chipping Close.

If planning approval is given, a Premier Inn hotel and restaurant is to be built on the historic St Albans Road site of Barnet’s much reduced stalls market.

The launch of Barnet’s teenage market – planned for Easter Saturday – is a step closer with the purchase of twenty stalls that will fill the bandstand area in front of the Waitrose supermarket at the Spires shopping centre.

A damp Sunday afternoon did little to dampen the excitement for countless children who enjoyed the traditional fun fair that has become such a popular attraction at Barnet’s annual Christmas Fayre.

Barnet market stall holders are delighted by the news that the managing agents for the Spires shopping centre are planning to move the twice-weekly stalls market to the paved area between Waitrose and the bandstand.

The Friends of Barnet Market have orgainsied a series of events this Spring to encourage new shoppers to visit the Market site.

Celebrations along the high streets of Britain have been few and far between in the last few years, so the official re-opening of Barnet Market after its recent make-over was just the kind of fillip local traders have been crying out for. Hopefully the revival of the market, much strengthened by the attraction of additional stallholders, will give a much-needed boost to the Spires shopping centre and help to stem the run of retail closures.     New steel frames for the market stalls, topped off with a smart set of awnings, gave the market a fresh look as friends, supporters and stallholders celebrated the first Saturday’s trading on the resurfaced site (9.11.2013). At last the Friends of Barnet Market had a positive story to tell: after six years’ disruption and uncertainty the market finally had a settled site and an opportunity to rebuild the custom lost since the demolition of what was once Barnet’s cattle market. Rarely has High Barnet been so united than in its campaign to preserve one of the town’s few remaining living links to its historic past – a market that was originally given its royal charter by King John in the 12th century. Among those who joined the celebrations to mark the re-opening were the Chipping Barnet MP, Mrs Theresa Villiers, and leading members of the Friends of Barnet Market, the Barnet Society, Barnet Residents Association and other local groups. Their presence was a chance to say a collective “thank you” to all those who had campaigned so steadfastly on the market’s behalf and who have done all they can to encourage customers to remain loyal to the small band of stallholders who never gave up of returning to their traditional site.  

Rarely has the presence of a mechanical digger been welcomed with such enthusiasm as greeted its arrival on the site of Barnet Market, heralding the start of a long-promised and much-delayed resurfacing and improvement. Seeing contractors working on the site after so much disappointment in the past was in itself a “terrific victory”, says Chris Smith of the Friends of Barnet Market, who has campaigned so energetically on behalf of both stallholders and shoppers.

While work is underway resurfacing Barnet Market, its temporary home is the area around the bandstand outside Waitrose supermarket at the Spires shopping centre. Shoppers visiting the market on Saturday morning (21.9.2013) were handed leaflets announcing that at last the William Pears property group is to start its £100,000 upgrade of the site.

Planning applications have been made for the Barnet Market site - one for improvements to the site for market use and the other for use as a car park on non-market days.  The scandalously-neglected site will be due for a new surface, storage and welfare facilities for stallholders.