News from The Barnet Society

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

A cup of Battle of Barnet tea or a pint of Battle of Barnet bitter are just two of the tempting offers that are being lined up to promote the Barnet Medieval Festival at the Byng Road playing fields over the weekend of Saturday & Sunday, June 9 & 10.

The Barnet Society supports the current planning applications for both a Premier Inn and relocation of the market to The Spires bandstand site – but only subject to several strict conditions. And we do so in the belief that a big opportunity could be lost.

If Barnet Council gives approval, 26 hand-painted heraldic banners are to be hung along Barnet High Street to promote the Barnet Medieval Festival – a weekend of medieval displays and re-enactments of scenes from the battles of St Albans (1461) and Barnet (1471) to be held at the Byng Road playing fields on Saturday and

Old Fold View was one of several roads in and around High Barnet that was closed off to traffic so that residents could hold a street party to celebrate the Windsor wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.

Barnet’s annual Classic Car Show on Saturday 30 June is to be bigger and better than ever before – and will be held at a new venue, the Army Reserve Centre, in St Albans Road, Barnet, as part of the celebrations to mark National Armed Forces Day.

Before Selfies is the title of a collection of photographs taken during the lifetime of Fred Jarvis, Barnet’s oldest and most famous trade union leader.

An attempt to set a new world record for endurance in performing press ups is to be the highlight of a fun day at the Spires shopping centre in Barnet, which is being organised to raise money for Great Ormond Street Hospital and Noah’s Ark Hospice.

 The coat of arms of Henry VI is the latest to be painted as part of the Battle of Barnet Project – and it is one of 30 heraldic banners that it is hoped will be hung along the High Street to celebrate Barnet’s role in the Wars of the Roses.

Barnet Borough Council is back firmly under Conservative control after the Labour Party failed to make its much-anticipated breakthrough and ended up losing five seats in the council elections.

A computer-generated image shows the proposed Premier Inn hotel and restaurant to be built on the site of Barnet Market, at the junction of St Albans Road and Chipping Close.

Footfall in the Spires shopping centre is up by over 50 per cent in the first three months of this year – just one of the statistics the management are quoting to squash rumours that two leading tenants, the H&M fashion store and Carluccio’s restaurant, are thinking of pulling out.