News from The Barnet Society

Barnet Football Club’s vacant stadium at Underhill is to be demolished to make way for a proposed new free school – Ark Pioneer Academy – that would eventually accommodate more than 1,800 pupils.

Work could start as early as January next year on High Barnet’s largest housing development since the opening of the Dollis Valley estate. If planning permission is obtained, Linden Homes plan to construct over 100 new homes on the vacant Elmbank site that extends from Barnet Road, Arkley, almost to Barnet Hospital.

After a run of closures over recent months, the High Street now offers several new restaurants and cafes. The proprietors are hoping the custom they attract will encourage increased business for other shops and traders in High Barnet’s shopping centre and perhaps attract other new retail ventures.

Barnet residents who cannot get high speed broadband from British Telecom have been offered an alternative solution that can offer speeds of between 16-30mps. The system uses radio waves instead of the fixed line technology deployed by BT and is being offered by Sentia, a small telecoms provider based in Peterborough.

A street-by-street survey conducted by local residents has demonstrated overwhelming support for a campaign to persuade British Telecom to provide up to 3,000 High Barnet residents with the fast broadband connection they so desperately need.

All seven primary schools in High Barnet and Underhill have again been oversubscribed, leaving 32 children without an agreed place in September – yet another indication of the strength of local demand for an additional school.

Barnet Council has been accused by supporters of the Campaign for Real Ale of acting in an underhand way in rejecting an application to grant community asset protection to the now closed Old Red Lion public house at the bottom of Barnet Hill.

One of High Barnet’s worst eyesores, the derelict former nurses’ home opposite the Arkley public house, is to be demolished to make way for a housing scheme that aims to provide approximately 100 new homes.

Torchlight tour of Barnet’s historic physic well but is another historic building at risk?  Local residents had a rare opportunity to see inside Barnet’s historic physic well when Barnet Museum organised an open day at the well house, a short walk from Barnet Hospital.

Six candidates have been nominated for the Chipping Barnet constituency in the general election on Thursday 7 May – a seat currently held by Theresa Villiers, who has been the Conservative MP for the constituency since 2005.

Barnet Society member Sheila Durchslag has issued an alert over two missing George V plaques from the entrance to the fields off Barnet Lane. Has anyone photographs of the original metal insignia badges?

High Barnet residents without access to a fast broadband connection are canvassing their neighbours in the hope of demonstrating to British Telecom that there is strong local demand that would more than justify investment in the nine additional fibre-enabled cabinets that are needed.

A scheme to re-landscape much of the Old Fold Manor Golf Club at Hadley Common that involves felling mature trees along half a mile of the St Albans Road needs to be explained in much greater detail before being granted planning permission by Barnet Council.

Military archaeologists from Huddersfield University hope to start work in May surveying the possible site of the Battle of Barnet of 1471, in preparation for a full-scale investigation.

Barnet Council is being urged by the Campaign for Real Ale to prevent the demolition of the Old Red Lion public house, at the bottom of Barnet Hill, by declaring it a community asset for the use of local residents.

A joint attempt by the Barnet Society and the Barnet Times to persuade Barnet Council to introduce a period of free car parking to boost trade in the borough’s high streets was rejected by the environment committee.

Barnet Council is being asked to give its support to a bid to re-open Barnet Cricket Club pavilion at Underhill and to convert its disused pitch into a new community playing field for cricket and football.

A group of feisty women, happy to be renowned for their stubbornness, gathered in Union Street, Barnet, for a ceremony marking the start of construction on a unique project – the first purpose-built co-housing scheme of its kind in the country.

British Telecom has promised to send an executive to High Barnet in mid- March to meet the Chipping Barnet MP, Theresa Villiers, and local residents to discuss the lack of high-speed broadband in many of the roads in and around the town centre.

At a time when Barnet’s library service is threatened with savage cuts, The Hyde Institute in Church Passage is a reminder of the proud place libraries deserve in the community, and a celebration of craftsmanship.