White Lion closure threat

Suggestions that the White Lion pub in St. Albans Road is threatened with closure, and that the site may be sold off for housing, have been denied by Fuller’s Brewery’

Its publicans for the last four years have just left, and Fuller’s is advertising for a new landlord, but at a higher rent, which is thought unlikely to improve the pub’s viability.

Regular customers fear that if the pub is considered no longer viable and has to close, Fuller’s will be able to claim that redevelopment is the only alternative.

Behind the building is a big yard, and the site as a whole could accommodate a large number of houses or flats, which would be highly profitable.

In a statement to the Barnet Society, Fuller’s Brewery said the company had no plans to close the White Lion.

Whenever there is a change of tenancy we get rumours like this but we are not proposing to close the pub and we believe it has a viable future.

Robin Bishop, chair of the Society’s planning and environment group, says the White Lion offers more than a pleasant, traditional ambience for drinking real ale – though that’s not a bad reason to preserve it!

It is one of Chipping Barnet’s dwindling number of former coaching inns – complete with former stable-yard – which were, along with Barnet Market, fundamental to our town’s existence.

It was probably built soon after the construction of the St.Alban’s Road by Thomas Telford in 1826, in the expectation of profits from the (then major) coaching trade.

The pub itself has some protection because it is on Barnet’s list of buildings of local significance.

However, neither it nor Christ Church is within the Monken Hadley Conservation Area – surprisingly, because they abut the Conservation Area boundary and are attractive parts of the street scene for travellers arriving at, or departing from, Chipping Barnet.

The Barnet Society is discussing with council planners the possibility of extending the Conservation Area, which would give the pub further protection.

Do you care about the future of the White Lion as a drinking establishment?  Or do you support retention of the building, but converted to another use such as housing?

Please post your comment, or you can email the Barnet Society direct.