News from The Barnet Society

New Barnet’s new leisure centre and library – complete with a 25 metre six-lane swimming pool and a state-of-the-art gym – was opened by the Mayor of Barnet, Councillor Caroline Stock Two new leisure centres, one at the Victoria Recreation Ground, New Barnet, and another at Copthall, Mill Hill, which together cost £44.9 million, both opened

A school and community farm in a six-acre field next to Totteridge Academy is a step closer to being established after the success of a fund-raising appeal.

A planning application (19/3949/FUL) has been submitted to build 152 new homes and a replacement artists’ and bee-keepers’ studio on the Whalebones site. This is probably the most significant proposal for Chipping Barnet for many years (unless the High Barnet Station development goes ahead).

Construction work has started on the pavement build outs in Barnet High Street – an improvement which community groups have campaigned for and which could be backed up by other measures proposed in Barnet Council’s draft growth strategy plan for the borough.

Barnet’s annual classic car show has a new venue this year – the vast open top deck of the NCP car park at the Spires shopping centre.

High Barnet’s long-standing blot on the landscape, the derelict nurses’ home on the Marie Foster Centre site, is finally about to be demolished.

Barnet Environment Centre is planning to install three bat boxes to help increase the biodiversity of the Byng Road nature reserve.

A large bin for the safe disposal of all bladed weapons and instruments has been installed in Union Street, High Barnet, in support of the drive to curb the rise in knife crime. “Collecting knives, saving lives” is the slogan of Word 4 Weapons, which says it is the UK’s leading weapons surrender charity.

Councillor Caroline Stock, Mayor of Barnet – and the borough’s wellbeing champion – launched the first of six healthy heritage walks which are being promoted by the council to encourage exercise and an interest in historic points of interest.

Swifts swooping and squealing high overhead have always been a regular sight in parts of High Barnet, but some local ornithologists fear these summer visitors are diminishing in numbers because of a lack of suitable nesting places.

It's 6pm on a Friday evening, the week has been a challenge, I’m tired and looking forward to the calm of the weekend and my wife asks if I would like to go for a walk in the woods.

The Council’s proposed master plan for Barnet and King George V Playing Fields, and especially its building on Barnet Playing Fields, would be a gross intrusion into the Green Belt. It would be contrary to Council, Mayor of London and Government policies. It would set a very bad precedent for future developments in the Green Belt.

Hadley Common, thought to be the seventh largest stretch of common land in Greater London, might soon be freed from archaic legal constraints that date back over 250 years to the reign of George III.

After years of fund raising, office and care staff have moved into The Ark – the new, purpose-built home of the Noah’s Ark Children’s Hospice which is rapidly nearing completion at the Byng Road nature reserve.

The Barnet Society invites you to sign the Change.org petition below. Although the subject may seem outside our normal area of interest, it is important that we should be able to voice our concerns fully to the Council when necessary.

Business advice, digital training, even possible mentoring, were all on offer at the first Barnet Business Expo which attracted a wide range of potential entrepreneurs anxious for guidance on how to start up on their own.

A plan to convert a three-storey commercial warehouse in Moxon Street, High Barnet, into a complex of 107 self-contained studio flats has attracted a flood of hostile criticism from neighbours and nearby residents. Barnet Council’s website for planning applications registered a total of 34 objections by the closing date (27.6.2019).

Customers queuing out into the street, a free donut with every purchase and champagne for the staff – a great finale for the last day of trading at Victoria Bakery, a High Barnet institution for the last 50 years.

High Barnet publican Gary Murphy, landlord of The Mitre for the last ten years, has won a significant victory over the Pubs Code Adjudicator that he hopes will ease the financial difficulties facing many of the 15,000 landlords in England and Wales.

Well over 100 residents attended a meeting at St Mark’s Church to launch a campaign to oppose Transport for London’s plans to build up to seven blocks of flats providing 450 new homes on land around High Barnet tube station.