Tag: footpaths

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Concessions at Whalebones – but not nearly enough

A new planning application is in for the Whalebones site. The plans have been scaled back from 152 to 114 homes, but in most other respects are similar to the one we objected to in 2019. To be clear: the Barnet Society doesn’t object to some housing to fund reprovision for the artists, bee-keepers and the current tenant farmer, and for maintenance of the estate. But the Trustees want way more than that. Our Committee is minded to object again, and encourages you to submit your own objections before the deadline of 14 November.

Read on to find out our grounds for objection, and how to submit your own.

The saga so far…

The Whalebones site is a surprising and wonderful survival – almost 12 acres of greenery and biodiversity close to the heart of Chipping Barnet. Although not designated as Green Belt, it includes the last remaining fields near the town centre and is integral to the Wood Street Conservation Area (WSCA). Anywhere else in the UK, surely, building over 6 acres of green space in a Conservation Area would be inconceivable.

The WSCA encapsulates 800 years of Barnet history. At one end is St John the Baptist’s church and our original marketplace, chartered in 1199; at the other end, open fields. Their juxtaposition is richly symbolic. Barnet’s growth to national status derived chiefly from livestock: herds were driven across the country to their final pastures on the fringe of the town, then sold at Barnet market. Building over the last remaining fields would brutally contradict several statements in the CA Appraisal Statement and amount to lobotomy of Barnet’s collective memory.

Hill, the developer working with the Trustees of the Whalebones Estate, first submitted a proposal in 2019. It was for 152 homes, 40% of which were to be ‘affordable’. A new building was to be provided for Barnet Guild of Artists and Barnet Beekeepers Association. The tenant farmer, Peter Mason and his wife Jill, would have rent-free accommodation and agricultural space for life. There were to be two new public open spaces including a health and wellbeing garden. A route between Wood Street and Barnet Hospital via a new woodland walk was offered.

Before responding we asked for our members’ views. A decisive majority of respondents – nearly 90% – opposed the scheme, and only three supported it. We therefore objected to the application. The plans were refused permission in 2020, and Hill’s appeal against the Council decision was dismissed by the Planning Inspectorate in 2021.

The latest plans include 114 new homes, of which 40% would again be ‘affordable’. ranging from 2 to 5 storeys in height. The building line along Wood Street would be set back. The blocks next to Elmbank would be reduced, as would be the single-storey studio for the artists and beekeepers. Gone is the health and wellbeing garden. The rest is much as proposed in 2019, but the eastern part of the site would remain in the ownership of the Trustees.

Information can also be found on Hill’s website: https://whalebones-consultation.co.uk/

The Society’s response

Our Committee has drafted the Society’s objection. These are its key points:

  • 114 homes far exceed what is necessary to fund reprovision for the artists, bee-keepers and tenant farmer and maintenance of the estate.
  • The Whalebones fields are integral to the history and character of the Wood Street Conservation Area. Their loss would seriously harm the CA.
  • That would set a very bad precedent for Barnet’s other conservation areas.
  • A development of this scale contradicts Council, London Mayoral and national planning policies that promote the value of open space, the environment and farming.
  • It would be inconsistent with Barnet’s declaration of a climate and biodiversity emergency.
  • The remaining open space would have the character of an urban park, not the rural character it has now – part parkland, part agricultural smallholding.
  • A Woodland Walk would merely replace the permissive path Gwyneth Cowing, the previous owner, allowed across the site.
  • Some buildings would be 5 storeys high, the same as the tallest hospital buildings.
  • Setting back the building line from Wood Street would not provide a visual break between the new houses and Elmbank. The separate identities of Chipping Barnet and Arkley would disappear.
  • The application is unclear about the long-term ownership and management of the public spaces or smallholding (after departure of the tenant farmer and his wife). If 114 homes are approved, the eastern part of the site will be ripe for further development.

Conclusion

If approved, these plans will represent a huge lost opportunity for Chipping Barnet. We don’t accept the applicant’s assertion that some form of agricultural or other green land-based activities would not be appropriate and economically viable. The developer hasn’t explored activities of a kind likely to have interested Gwyneth Cowing. These include a city farm for young and old people, including those with special needs, as just one possibility. Other acceptable uses include education, training and/or therapy in horticulture, animal husbandry and environmental studies, perhaps in partnership with a local school or college.

When this project began in 2015, the Council was seeking a replacement site for one of its special schools. Last year it approved a new school for 90 pupils with Autistic Spectrum Disorder in a converted office block in Moxon Street, with no outdoor play space except on its roof. It is a dismal comment on the priorities of the Trustees and the Council that locating it on part of Whalebones – the greenery of which would have been of profound benefit to the wellbeing and education to the pupils – was never considered.

In our view, any of the alternatives mentioned above would enhance the CA. They would also be in keeping with the spirit of Ms Cowing’s will. On the planning portal, a ‘Master Pipistrelle’ has posted a poignant Ode to Gwyneth. It includes these verses:

Eighteen ninety-nine was the year of Gwyn’s birth
At Whalebones, in Barnet on this green Earth
Was the Cowing’s estate, her manor-house home
A place where both artists and bees could roam…

Plan after plan, they’re ignoring Gwyn’s will
But the People are here, trying to instil
the ambition of Gwyn, for her home to enthral
To remain in the community forever and for all.

Too right! We’re currently consulting our members on our response.

How to object

Submit your own objections directly via the planning portal.

Or you can writing, with the application reference no. (23/4117/FUL) clearly at the top, to the Planning Officer:

Josh McLean MRTPI

Planning Manager

Planning and Building Control

Barnet Council

2 Bristol Avenue, Colindale, NW9 4EW

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Goodbye to our Green Belt?

Above is the Green Belt between Barnet and St Albans. It’s the site of Bowmans Cross, a new settlement planned by Hertsmere Council. It will eventually have 6,000 homes for around 15,000 people – nearly as many as live in High Barnet ward. It will be a net-zero carbon, self-sustaining community, and the sketch above shows lots of trees. But if Hertsmere’s draft Local Plan is accepted, over 10% of Hertsmere’s (and also effectively Barnet’s) Green Belt will be lost forever.

Bowmans Cross is a showpiece of the Plan, which is currently out for public consultation. Another is a 63-hectare Media Quarter east of Borehamwood, which it is hoped will provide thousands of jobs. Other proposals include 2,770 houses in and around Borehamwood, 900 on the fields south of Potters Bar and 225 at South Mimms village (to list only those close to Barnet).

Good news for Barnet is that no new building is planned for the countryside south of the M25 and east of the A1. The media work opportunities will be welcome, to Barnet as much as to Hertsmere residents. But the Plan is vague about crucial details, and there’s much to cause concern:

  • Well over 10% of Hertsmere’s Green Belt will be built over.
  • At the low housing densities proposed, few homes are likely to be affordable.
  • About half of the new housing is to be built on brownfield land, but the proportion ought to be higher.
  • Little information is provided about Bowmans Cross, a new town half the size of Borehamwood and seven-tenths that of Potters Bar.
  • The economic case for a massive Media Quarter, or its long-term viability in a distributed digital age, is unexplained.
  • How Hertsmere residents will be prioritised for either housing or jobs isn’t stated.
  • Very little is said about transport, which will be vital to the Plan’s success, especially in semi-rural areas.
  • There is a potentially serious conflict with Enfield’s Local Plan over land use around M25 Junction 24.

We sympathise with Hertsmere’s predicament. It has to meet an ambitious government housing target, yet 79% of its area is designated as Metropolitan Green Belt, where development is only justifiable under very exceptional circumstances. But how hard has Hertsmere’s looked at its housing need and re-use of its brownfield land?

Its housing target is for a minimum of 760 new homes a year, or at least 12,160 homes by 2038. That’s based on the South West Herts Local Housing Needs Assessment, which appears not to have been challenged. Those who’ve been following the U-turns in the government’s proposed planning reforms will wonder how robust such figures are. The results of the 2021 Census are urgently needed to substantiate predictions of continuing population growth in the South-East, post-Brexit and post-Covid.

There’s also the question of whether Hertsmere’s houses will meet its own needs. It’s not explained how existing local residents will be prioritised. New homes near Barnet are almost certain to be cheaper and more spacious, internally and externally, than in Barnet itself. They’re bound to attract young couples and families struggling to afford property in our area. It would be ironic if much of Hertsmere’s new housing ended up benefitting Londoners at the expense of its own residents.

A further doubt surrounds affordability. The Plan says that 35% of new homes will be affordable, but CPRE research shows that only a tenth of homes built in the Green Belt are affordable, and these are rarely for social rent.

The Plan says, “The strategic green belt will be protected…and improvements made to the countryside and biodiversity to offset the impact of development.” That glosses over the fact that at least 10% of Hertsmere’s present Green Belt will be sacrificed to the developments listed above. Across the borough, the total will be greater, but the Plan is silent about the figure.

It‘s unclear how rigorously Hertsmere has investigated the alternative of re-using brownfield land. Table 3 in the Plan claims that 6,020 new homes – nearly half of its 15-year total requirement – would be on urban sites. According to its Table 2, 2,765 of such sites are available excluding smaller villages/hamlets, which seems scarcely credible. If true, it’s good news, but no brownfield register is mentioned to substantiate it.

If that brownfield land were to be redeveloped at densities equivalent to, say, the award-winning Newhall in Harlow – i.e. no more than four stories high, at 22 dwellings per hectare – even more of Hertsmere’s housing need could be met without resorting to Green Belt land. Alternatively, doubling the density currently proposed for Bowmans Cross (under 10 dwellings per hectare) would have a similar beneficial effect.

For Barnet residents, 900 homes on Green Belt separating Potters Bar from the M25 will be saddening. Not only do the present fields provide an attractive working agricultural landscape between Potters Bar and Barnet, they link visually with Bentley Heath, Dancers Hill, Wrotham Park, Dyrham Park and other greenery to create a panorama that’s much greater than the sum of its parts. The Baker Street and Barnet Road motorway bridges will make dismal southern gateways to the new housing, and it’s hard to imagine a pleasant life in the shadow of the M25.

For Hertsmere residents – and for Hertsmere Council – all this should be even more worrying. The London Green Belt Council’s report earlier this year ‘Safe Under Us’? revealed that 233,276 homes have already been given, or are seeking, planning permission in the Metropolitan Green Belt. Such has been local concern that several councils have been voted out of office or lost overall control, and the government has lost its parliamentary seat at Chesham & Amersham.

Another weakness of the planning process is illustrated by a potentially serious conflict with Enfield Council’s draft Local Plan. Hertsmere is designating land south-east of Junction 24 for wildlife. But Enfield’s Strategic Policy SP E1 allocates 11 hectares close by for industrial use. Furthermore, Enfield casually mentions that it would “seek to deliver the redevelopment of the wider site (in LB Hertsmere) to provide a coordinated employment offer”. This would detrimentally impact not only wildlife but also existing and proposed residents of Potters Bar.

 

The Media Quarter needs critical scrutiny. It will be vast – 63 hectares – and will have 34 sound stages, many times more than currently exist in Elstree & Borehamwood. The future for TV and film may look bright today, but for how long will digital industries continue to rely on centralised production? Unless the Mass Rapid Transport system tantalisingly mentioned in the Plan comes to pass, moreover, access will depend largely on two motorways, one of them notorious for traffic jams.

Transport is a major weakness of this and most of the Plan’s proposed developments. CPRE research shows that people living in Green Belt developments are tied to owning and using cars, as well as being stuck with the cost of commuting, creating further financial stress for families on low incomes. Hertsmere already suffers from poor public transport to and from its outlying estates and villages, but travel occupies only 10 out of 245 pages in its Plan.

A couple of final points from a neighbourly perspective. Firstly, Barnet already suffers from road and parking congestion caused at least partly by the rising number of commuters from Hertfordshire into London. Building new homes and workplaces near our border seems certain to exacerbate that.

Second and lastly, our Society was founded in 1945 specifically to protect the countryside around Chipping Barnet. In 1947-8, our then Treasurer E.H.Lucas researched and wrote Rambles Round Barnet & Rambles in South Hertfordshire, both of which were published by the Barnet Society. The majority of the walks follow public footpaths in Hertsmere, and have benefitted from its careful stewardship. Several generations of Barnet residents have learned to love countryside that is now planned for development. The footpaths may be safeguarded, but without their green environment they will offer a tragically diminished experience.

If residents of either Hertsmere or Barnet object to the draft Plan, it’s vital for them to do so by 6 December; after then, no changes of substance will be possible.

Hertsmere’s draft Local Plan can be found at:

https://www.hertsmerelocalplan.com/site/homePage

The deadline for public comments on it is 5pm on Monday 6 December.

The Barnet Society will be submitting a response, but you can also do so yourself as follows by:

  • completing an online survey under the Have Your Say tab on the plan’s bespoke website here
  • submitting comments via the consultation portal also available on the website
  • emailing local.plan@hertsmere.gov.uk
  • writing to Local Plan Consultation, Hertsmere Borough Council, Elstree Way, Borehamwood WD6 9SR.

 

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Rambles round Barnet – enjoy them while you can!

Chipping Barnet is a great base for some glorious countryside walks, and the best are described in Rambles Round Barnet – two volumes published by the Barnet Society. The good news is that Volume I has just been reprinted in a limited edition. The bad news is that some of the walks are threatened by development, so walk them while you can.

Rambles Round Barnet – In the footsteps of EH Lucas was published by the Barnet Society in 2012 and has been out of print. It was a handy A5 booklet containing four walks from a guidebook originally researched by EH Lucas, the Society’s Treasurer (1948-70), and issued by the Society in 1948.

In 2013 a further three walks from Lucas’s guide were published in Volume II, which is still in print and available from Waterstones in The Spires or directly from the Society.

One of the few benefits of Covid-19 has been revival of interest in the countryside, with a noticeable increase in walkers and cyclists on local paths in the last year. At the conclusion of the Society’s 75th anniversary year, it seemed appropriate to reprint Volume 1.

The reprint is a facsimile, in a limited edition of 150, of the 2012 booklet. No attempt has been made to alter the charming text and illustrations of the 2012 edition, which was largely the work of Owen Jones and David Ely, but eight pages of updates and additional information have been inserted as a postscript. Both Rambles I & II are on sale from Waterstones in The Spires and Barnet Museum, or direct from the Society at £6 per volume (or £10 for both) plus postage and packing. Contact details are given below.

No-one would claim that Barnet and Hertfordshire can compete with more dramatic landscapes elsewhere in Britain. But their quiet qualities often get overlooked, and Covid-19 has reminded many of us how valuable they are. Rambles may not be up there with Guide to the Lakeland Fells, Alfred Wainwright’s famous walking guidebooks to the Lake District. But they are full of shrewd observations and good advice. Lucas, Jones and Ely are Barnet’s Wainwright, and deserve to be celebrated.

The four walks described in Rambles Round Barnet – In the footsteps of EH Lucas are:

Walk 1 – The green heart of Barnet  This takes you through countryside that was threatened, in 1945, by Barnet Council’s plans to triple the population of Chipping Barnet to 60,000. The Barnet Society was founded to fight them, and did so successfully.

Walk 2 – Mimmsy meadows and bluebell woods  Between South Mimms and North Mymms (sic) is a beautiful circuit of sequestered woods, open meadows and long views – amazingly, never more than about half a mile from the M25 or A1.

Walk 3 – Ancient fields and a magic grove only half a mile from built-up Barnet  This walk includes two delightful tracts of countryside, one each side of the A1, and an enchanted grove, half a mile long, of venerable trees bordering Dyrham Park.

Walk 4 – Traditional farmland meets modern motorway  Not a walk for those seeking respite from the 21st century, though it has sweet rustic moments. But if you wonder whether English countryside can coexist with modern technology, this is the place to find out.

The walks have all been checked this spring. As well as containing additional information, the insert picks out highlights, lists any changes since 2012, and gives tips on routes and good times to go.

All the walks take you through countryside designated as Green Belt after the 2nd World War, partly due to the campaigning of the Society. With a few exceptions, development is permitted only in very special circumstances. But that hasn’t stopped many applications being submitted. That the landscape has survived largely unspoiled for 75 years is testimony to ongoing work by us and other voluntary groups in Barnet and Hertfordshire, as well as the stewardship of both councils.

However, this reprint is tinged with concern that some of the walks will be lost within a few years. Although the UK government and Barnet Council claim to be committed to retaining the Green Belt, and the walks themselves are mostly safeguarded Rights of Way, major developments are currently being planned on or near land over which they pass.

Most of the open land north of the M25 and both sides of the A1 has been identified in Hertsmere Council’s draft Local Plan for potential housing and employment development, as well as pockets south of the M25. Huge Sky and Hertswood film studio complexes are proposed for fields south of Rowley Lane. New Rabley and Redwell ‘Garden Villages’ are proposed near South Mimms. These will all leave a massive mark on what is at present open greenery.

Nor is Barnet Council exempt. Although it plans to create a major new Regional Park between Arkley, Mill Hill and the A1, it also proposes to build an £11m community and leisure hub in the middle of Barnet Playing Fields – which the Council itself has designated Green Belt.

This web post is therefore not simply an invitation to buy Rambles Round Barnet – Volume I while stocks last. It also urges you to get out and savour our wonderful countryside while it is still there to enjoy.

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Ensuring historic footpaths are preserved

Efforts are underway to identify and map the many alleyways and footpaths that add so much to the local landscape and help make High Barnet such an attractive place to live.

Continue reading Ensuring historic footpaths are preserved

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New finds may throw light on Barnet’s history

When work starts in October on a survey and excavation to find the site of the Battle of Barnet of 1471, local residents and schoolchildren will have their chance to play a part in the great upsurge in interest in medieval history that has occurred since the discovery of King Richard III’s remains in a Leicester car park.

Continue reading New finds may throw light on Barnet’s history

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Parking claims another casualty

High Barnet’s “impossible” parking controls are forcing another independent trader out of the High Street.

Continue reading Parking claims another casualty