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Barnet Residents Association was formed in 1934, initially named Barnet Ratepayers Association. The name refers to the then Hertfordshire town of Chipping Barnet and now serves residents in the wards of High Barnet and Underhill in the London Borough of Barnet (see map below). The Association became dormant in 2000 but was reactivated in 2006 with just 215 members: we now have over 700.

The Association is non-political with activities including scrutiny of planning applications, protection of the environment - especially conservation areas, highways, public transport, parking, policing, healthcare provision and the economic well-being of the town centre.

We publish three newsletters a year along with occasional emails to members on matters of particular interest or importance. Membership is open to anyone over 18 but only residents of the two wards have voting rights at General Meetings. To join, see below.

News

NEWSLETTER OCTOBER 2019

Our newsletter for October 2019 has been published. We do hope our members have a keen interest in planning because there is a lot of it about. So planning does dominate this issue and we do apologise if this makes the read a little more hard going than usual. We have been wrestling with large developments such as The Station, Whalebones, Brake Shear House, the ghastly ‘flatlets’ proposed for Moxon St and Park Rd, as well as numerous smaller schemes where we report on the most significant. We also have the regular round-up of changes in the High St, where as usual the news is mixed, and as ever we feature more neglect and breaches of controls in the Conservation Areas. There is however good news on heritage matters and the pavement build-outs.

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING MINUTES

The minutes of our Annual General Meeting on Wednesday 10th July 2019 are now available.

WHALEBONES PARK PLANNING APPLICATION

Following a lengthy consultation process a planning application has now been submitted to redevelop the Whalebones site, currently mostly fallow farm land with no public access, with a mix of 152 homes and a public open space. We have submitted comments supporting this scheme and explaining why we support it.

HIGH BARNET STATION HOUSING PROPOSALS

Transport for London (TfL) are proposing to redevelop land around High Barnet station, including most of the car park, to provide up to 450 flats. We have sent a lengthy submission to TfL making it clear that we consider the scheme to be deeply flawed. We anticipate having a dialogue with TfL over the coming months and will be keeping our members informed on progress. The submission can be found in the left hand column.

49 MOXON ST - CONVERSION OF WAREHOUSE TO 107 FLATS

Many residents were horrified to learn of this proposal to convert a windowless warehouse to house 107 tiny studio apartments that would be less than half the current minimum space standard for a studio. This could happen under a Government 2015 Permitted Development Order which was designed to make it easy for developers to convert offices to flats. The applicant has argued that both the historical and the current classification of the building is as offices.

Our objection (see left) on the grounds that the application did not fulfill the 'office' criteria has been supported by the Council and the application has been rejected. However the developer has submitted a further application seeking to convert just the offices part of the building to 39 tiny flats. We have objected to this application as well.

BRAKE SHEAR HOUSE

A planning application was lodged in August last year to demolish the existing workshops and construct blocks of flats comprising 66 one-bed and 2 three-bed flats. Our objection, which encompassed six main areas of concern, can be seen in the table to the left. We are pleased that the developer has conceded on all of the points we raised and there is now a revised application for a complete redesign incorporating 8 houses. 29 two-bed flats and 21 one-bed flats. We have decided we can live with this vastly improved scheme.

17 PARK RD

The planning application for change of use of offices at 17 Park Rd to 36 tiny flats has been rejected. We could not find any reason under planning law why this application should be rejected but the council has refused it on the grounds of inadequate parking. We now wait to see if there is an appeal.

What was unusual was that the applicant was a charity. We wrote to the charity pointing out that providing such accommodation seemed incompatible with the aims of a charity and asked that the application be withdrawn. It was disappointing that this was not done. A copy of our letter can be seen opposite.

WHERE TO PARK

We have a map showing where to park in High Barnet, courtesy of Slim's Records.

[Mapping image produced from the Ordnance Survey electionmap service © Crown copyright and database right 2011]

The map shows the extent of the High Barnet and Underhill wards covered by the Association. Click on the map for a high-resolution version, or visit www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/election-maps/.

To be alerted when a new newsletter is published on the web site, subscribe to the web feed.

Our exact terms of reference can be seen in the Association's Constitution.

How to Join

Individual membership of the Barnet Residents Association is open to anyone over the age of 18, although only those people with a home address in the area covered (High Barnet ward and Underhill ward) will be entitled to vote at the Annual General Meeting or other general meetings.

Corporate membership is available to organisations with a presence in the area. Like wise these members are not entitled to vote at an Annual General Meeting.

Membership fees are fixed annually at the Annual General Meeting and are currently:

Individual - £4
Family membership (at same address) - £6
Corporate membership - £6.

If you would like to join us please send us your name and address via email, and we will let you know our bank account details so that you can transfer the membership fee or set up a standing order. Our email address is at the foot of the page -- it is an image to prevent spam, so you will have to type it in again.

A standing order form (PDF, 38Kb) is available for you to download, print, fill in and pass direct to your bank. Note that you will have to add the BRA's 8 digit account number when you fill it in. The account number has been deliberately omitted for security reasons.

If you have a PayPal account, you can also pay via PayPal. See the membership page.

If you prefer to pay by cheque, please send the appropriate membership fee and your details (name, address, telephone number and if possible email address) to our Membership Secretary.

Membership Secretary,
BRA,
71 Byng Road
BARNET
EN5 4NP