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2024 Meetings - East Finchley Constitutional Club, 7:30pm (doors open from 7pm).

Jan 11th

QUARTERLY Meeting

March 7th

Networking meeting

April 11th

QUARTERLY Meeting

May 9th

Networking meeting

July 11th

QUARTERLY Meeting

Sept 12th

Networking Meeting

Oct 10th

QUARTERLY Meeting

Town Team Updates

 

Are you keen to improve the local environment and services in East Finchley? Do you want to help ensure East Finchley High Rd continues to be an inviting and viable local centre for customers and traders? If so, please come to the open Town Team meetings organised by local people with those aspirations.  We meet on a quarterly basis in a formal way to discuss current issues and we meet as an informal network on other months to deal with matters as they arise. All meetings are on the second Thursday of the month.

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Location of meetings is The Constitutional Club, 9 The Walks, London N2 8DE

Meetings start at 7.30 (Doors open from 7pm). 

East Finchley CPZ Poster 11th April Meeting.jpg

11th April CPZ public meeting
 

The below presentation was given by Town Team at the CPZ event on 11th April. Thanks to Councillors Alan Schneiderman and Alison Moore for attending and an especial thank you to all the residents, businesses, schools and community organisations who provided such detailed contributions. Thanks also to the Consitutional Club for hosting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Below is the report of the public meeting held by the Town Team on 11th April 2024 regarding the East Finchley CPZ.

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Please see below for the documents linked to the previous consultation.

Update: 5th April 2024

 

The Town Team have now received the Council's response to our request for the appendices to the Officer Decision report. Our request has been refused because:

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“We consider that regulation 12(4)(d) - Material which is still in the course of completion, unfinished documents or incomplete data applies to the information requested because we consider that the request involves information that is in draft form. Therefore, we have decided to withhold some of the information.”

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You can read the full response in the PDF here:

Town Team Meeting Summary,

7th March 2024

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A good crowd turned up at the Constitutional Club last Thursday 7th March to hear a wide range of updates at one of our informal monthly meetings.

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The town square plans are moving ahead. They have been sent to Barnet council and meetings with council officers will hopefully take place in the very near future. In addition a bid to the London festival of architecture 2024 has been made to manufacture the staging and bench arrangement which we hope could be in place this June.

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East Finchley’s Got Talent is moving ahead nicely and will take place on Sunday 21st of April at the phoenix cinema along with East Finchley’s own Bake Off competition. More details will be found on our 'What's On' page.

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Dave McCormick from Barnet Friends of the Earth ranged wide on a number of issues to do with air quality, active travel, buildings and energy, citizen science and all other issues connected with sustainable Barnet Net Zero 2040. The use of air quality monitors for both inside your home and outside are being employed across Barnet to obtain pollution information. Town team are thinking about how we can employ such air pollution monitoring perhaps starting at the London Festival of Architecture event in June. The Barnet food plan along with healthy high streets initiatives including a good food charter for businesses and a new scheme being promoted by Barnet council about eating legumes, beans, peas and lentils led to an interesting discussion.

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We heard an update about Asian Hornets and the problems that they can cause. There has been a good response to the request for people to take traps into their gardens and nearly 20 people are taking part.

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The next meeting of town team on April 11 will focus on be proposed CPZ extending to the north circular in East Finchley. This will be held in the constitutional club and the focus for town team will be to look at its implications on businesses organisations and services along the High Road.

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A New Town Square for East Finchley: Plans Revealed

SETTING THE STAGE FOR TOWN SQUARE TRANSFORMATION

by Mark Power (Mills Power Architects)


Plans can now be revealed for transforming the High Road Wide Pavement outside Budgens and Amy’s into a new Town Square for East Finchley.


Last month Diana Cormack reported that local architects Mills Power had shared early
drawings and details during Town Team’s first quarterly meeting of the year at the
Constitutional Club. These proposals were inspired by fantastic public responses at the Town Team’s Happening event held during the London Festival of Architecture last June: food, music, performances and an opportunity for passers-by to air their thoughts on what a town square could be by pinning postcards onto a ‘wishing line’.
Analysis of these ideas reveals that more than 50% of visitors want improved planting, more trees, better seating and space for community events – effectively a green Town Square where both residents and visitors to the neighbourhood can enjoy healthier surroundings and celebrate the wonderful community and cultural variety East Finchley has to offer.

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Although EF Town Team is a new organization, individual members have campaigned tenaciously over the years for public spaces to be taken seriously and see here strong possibility that dreams could at last be realised. Currently the wide pavement is cluttered, raised planters obstruct pedestrians and prevent other activities. Electronic billboards have been added recently, prioritising instrumental rather than human uses of the space. The below illustrations show instead a generous expanse of uninterrupted and usable open space, where people can pause, meet, gather, as well as pass in both directions, and where sometimes stalls can be set up for festivals and family friendly events. A grove of young trees near the pedestrian crossing, level with the pavement, allows you to walk among them, leaves filtering the air overhead. Wooden bench seats face one another rather than confront the traffic, and in one place are broad enough to become a stage for outdoor plays and concerts, impromptu busking or stand-up. The scheme looks to re-instate a full complement of tall plane trees marking and shading the edge of the pavement, accessible to car-parking, open to the opposite side of the street. A sustainable urban drainage scheme with local planting, porous tree aprons and road surfacing will all help the immediate ecology. With winds of change at last prevailing, and the support of three Ward Councilors, we will shortly be finalising these suggestions to put to the Planners. If you have comments on the designs please do drop us a line at eftownteam@gmail.com before the end of March so that we can consider them. You can also find the drawings and details online at https://www.eastfinchley.london/ Fund-raising for the project is about to commence in earnest with the aim of implementing aspects of the transformation later in the year. East Finchley Town Team will be celebrating London Festival of Architecture again in June: watch out for our innovative Camera Elucida installation inviting further re-imagination here in the heart of East Finchley!

Town Team Meeting Summary, 11th Jan 2024

There was a good crowd at the Constitutional Club on a cold, damp evening to see the emerging plans for a new Town Square outside Budgens drawn up by local architects Mills and Power based on comments from the public last year. Ideas include a new grove of trees, improved circulation for pedestrians, more seating – some doubling up as a stage area - along with more planting to capture rainfall would all ‘elevate the quality of the environment.’ Lots of helpful comments arose in discussion , including where the stage should go, what to do about the return wall of Budgens, shading for seats and how the Christmas lights would work in future were all aired. The plans will be featured in the Archer in March and comments sought from residents and traders. An exhibition of the drawings should also be in place along the High Road. Discussions will now be opened with Barnet Council about funding aimed at getting the proposals realised on the ground. It was acknowledged that this will be a challenging stage but all agreed that having an overall plan would put us in better position to bid for any available funds. In other discussions the proposed new CPZ is causing concerns amongst both Traders and residents. The Town Team are looking to organise a future meeting around parking. Later in the year High Road crime will be a key discussion topic.

High Road to North Circular Road Plans

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In addition to the Budgens proposals detailed above, Town Team have been looking at the wider High Road – from the Station north up to the North Circular Road. The plans below show initial ideas – and they are no more than that at this stage – to stimulate discussion and hopefully other ideas which can be added to the mix. The overall idea is that when pots of funding com along from various sources Town Team, and others will be a in a good place to put forward clear ideas which can be worked up and could be implemented.

 

Have a look – see if you think the ideas are any good. Suggest your own and together we can improve East Finchley High Road for all. Drop us an email at eftownteam@gmail.com  and let us know what you think.

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