News from The Barnet Society

Maintaining the great musical tradition of Barnet parish church has been the outstanding achievement of Terence Atkins, its organist and choirmaster for the last 40 years.

The future operation of the 107 bus service, which has stops in High Barnet on its route between Edgware and New Barnet, is in doubt because of a decision by Hertfordshire County Council to make further cuts in its funding for subsidised bus routes.

A guarded welcome has been given by the Barnet Society to plans for a £7 million upgrade for the Spires shopping centre. Barnet Council is to be asked to give planning permission for a two-storey fashion store and three new restaurants.

A seasonal concert that drew on the great range of musical talents at Queen Elizabeth’s Girls’ School, Barnet, rounded off the year, and also the first term of the new headteacher Mrs Violet Walker.

Whalebones Park, a 14-acre stretch of fields and woods between Barnet Hospital and Wood Street, is about to be considered by Barnet Council as a possible area to be developed for future housing and community use.

It is not well enough known that British cinema was born in Chipping Barnet 120 years ago.  Moving images were then as revolutionary as virtual reality seems now.

Getting on his high horse: Nick Jones, Barnet Society Chair, arguing for free parking on ITV’s Parking Wars Barnet Council has finally agreed to review its parking charges along Barnet High Street following a campaign by the Barnet Society on behalf of local residents, shoppers and traders.

Renewed uncertainty about the future of the White Lion on St Albans Road has led to a successful bid to persuade Barnet Council to declare that the pub is a community asset of value to local residents.

Violet Walker, the new head teacher at Queen Elizabeth’s Girls’ School, has every justification for her assertion that she felt instantly at home on taking up the head-ship at the start of the new academic year in September.

The purchase by a property company of Barnet’s former British Legion hall at the corner of Moxon Street and Tapster Street has opened up for residential redevelopment another swathe of land immediately to the east of the High Street.

 Two Victorian measuring jugs from a former public house in High Barnet have turned up mysteriously in the archives of St Peter’s Church at Formby on Merseyside.

A set of painted wall tiles revealed during building work at 89 High Street Barnet depict a dairy maid holding her pail, with cows and chickens in the background.

Number 89, the community-run pop-up shop selling local arts and crafts that was in the High Street until a few months ago, has reopened round the corner at 10 Union Street, and now trades under the name room 89.

Dr Gillian Gear, who fought a heroic battle to save and maintain Barnet Museum when Barnet Council withdrew its financial support, has died after undergoing treatment for some weeks at Watford General Hospital.

Fibre4Barnet, the pressure group set up by Ken Rowland to try to force British Telecom to complete the rollout of high-speed broadband to the whole of High Barnet, says a possible wait of up to two years for further improvements is “totally unacceptable”.

Almost 30 small businesses and workshops with premises on land behind Barnet High Street may have to relocate within months to make way for a massive redevelopment.

After a determined campaign by local residents the “mighty oak” of Whitings Road has been saved from the axe. Barnet Council has approved a tree protection order and, more importantly, has agreed to change its plans for the approach road to a proposed housing development on land next to Whitings Hill Primary School.

Parking Wars on ITV The Barnet Society's campaign for a 30 minute free parking period in the High Street is featured in the latest series is Parking Wars at 8pm on ITV 1 on Thursday 15 September.

“Pineapples, two for a pound!” – father and son David and Tyler Bone have both been shouting out prices for fruit and vegetables at Barnet Market since before they were ten, and together they are carrying on a tradition that was started by David’s father Albert in the 1950s.

After months of campaigning by the Barnet Society, British Telecom have finally given an assurance that it will improve the broadband service in High Barnet by upgrading at least half the cabinets that need to be fibre enabled.