News from The Barnet Society

British Telecom has been forced to admit that there will be another lengthy delay in providing a fast broadband service to up to 3,000 High Barnet households.

One of the many vacant frontages along Barnet High Street is about to get a new lease of life as a pop-up shop where aspiring independent traders, artists and voluntary groups can display samples of their work, goods and crafts.

New look for Spires shopping centre: a continental cafe-style culture for Barnet High Street? A computer-generated image released by the Williams Pears property group gives an impression of the proposed new-look entrance to the Spires shopping centre and an outside seating area in front of a new Carluccio’s restaurant.

Barnet Council has promised that a heritage officer will carry out an inspection in Church Passage in the “very near future” in an attempt to resolve continuing disagreement over cladding on the frontage of retail premises in the heart of the High Barnet conservation area.

Barnet Council has almost £150,000 available which could be spent immediately on improving the road junction at the top of Barnet Hill, if only an agreement could be reached on how best to ease traffic congestion and make it safer for pedestrians.

An imaginative array of ideas for reviving Barnet’s shopping centre was outlined at the Barnet Society’s annual question and answer session with the Chipping Barnet MP Mrs Theresa Villiers.

A final decision is expected by the end of January on the extent of financial support from the Heritage Lottery Fund towards the cost of an archaeological excavation to determine the precise site of the Battle of Barnet of 1471.

A planning inspector has ordered that unauthorised timber cladding must be removed from the frontage of retail premises in the heart of the High Barnet conservation area. An appeal by Mr G. Cramer, owner of 1 Church Passage, has been rejected and Barnet Council has won official backing for an enforcement notice requiring its removal.

Like much of the south-east of England, Chipping Barnet is seeing a rapid rise in home extensions and offices being converted into flats.  An easing of planning restrictions has given home-owners and property developers greater freedom.  But are large home extensions an intrusion for neighbours?

Local residents who are against plans for tree-felling and landfill on the site of Old Fold Manor Golf Club off Hadley Green have been promised the support of the Chipping Barnet MP Theresa Villiers.

After sustained pressure from local traders and community groups, Barnet Council has agreed to provide a sizeable number of free spaces for car parking close to the High Barnet town centre. Moxon Street car park, which has 64 spaces, is now available for up to an hour of free parking.

All the fun of the fair filled the High Street for the annual Barnet Christmas Fair, which many judged was the most ambitious and best supported since the event was first held twenty years ago.

Local shops and businesses are pulling out all the stops to ensure a spectacular line-up of events and attractions for High Barnet’s annual Christmas Fair on Sunday 1st December. A fun fair, a stage for dancing, food stalls and other attractions will fill the High Street, which will be closed to traffic from 8am to 7pm.

A plan to deposit landfill on the golf course that takes in part of the site of the Battle of Barnet has alarmed the Battlefields Trust. Old Fold Manor Golf Club at Monken Hadley is drawing up proposals to re-landscape the 900 yard stretch of the course which runs parallel to the St Albans Road.

While work is underway resurfacing Barnet Market, its temporary home is the area around the bandstand outside Waitrose supermarket at the Spires shopping centre. Shoppers visiting the market on Saturday morning (21.9.2013) were handed leaflets announcing that at last the William Pears property group is to start its £100,000 upgrade of the site.

While work is under way resurfacing Barnet Market its temporary home will be the area around the bandstand outside the Waitrose supermarket at the Spires shopping centre. hoppers visiting the market on Saturday morning (21.9.2013) were handed leaflets announcing that at last the William Pears property group is to start its £100,000 upgrade of the site.

The Spires' new owner wants to create a more 'enticing' entrance from the High Street that would attract more shoppers - and that may include the removal of the twin spires.

In 2011 an application to demolish the Barnet Court House and replace it with a modern block of flats was refused by the Council and that decision was subsequently upheld at appeal.

The Fayre on the first weekend in December was a very good event this year – despite the weather being bitterly cold – with many people getting out and enjoying all that was on offer.