Notes on the Breakfast Meetup this morning - By Paul Evans of Finchlinks

By Paul Evans,
(This article was originally posted on the Finchlinks website- http://www.finchlinks.com/2012/12/notes-on-the-breakfast-meetup-this-morning/#more-409 )

Thanks to everyone who stepped out in sub-zero temperatures this morning for the Finchlinks Business Breakfast at Cafe Buzz in North Finchley. There was a good crowd there to hear Hugh Flouch of Harringay Online outline the success of the Hyperlocal website that he runs covering the streets around Green Lanes in the London Borough of Haringey (note the difference in spelling!)
Harringay Online was the subject of a 2010 study by London Councils into the hyperlocal online communities. It concluded that sites such as this (and there are a few comparable sites elsewhere in London) help to improve the sense of collective efficacy within the area that they cover. In plain English, it means that – where such a site exists  – the people living in the area have more of a sense that they can achieve something by working together.
Other benefits range from there being …

• a more vibrant network of local community groups,
• a place where people can get genuinely useful recommendations for local tradespeople,
• a greater sense of trust between local people and the local authority / police,
• a more effective local  business community with some business relying significantly upon custom that is generated by the site

Rog T of The Barnet Eye was there this morning talking about the kind of issues that he covers, and he made a very good point about the relative disengagement of the local press from the area. Rog covers politics and news throughout the borough – often filling the gaps left by the commercial press. But –for me – even those gaps are often of mixed relevance. Rog covers stories in Burnt Oak. He lives and works in Mill Hill, and both of these places are within the borough of Barnet, and are relevant to the task he has set himself as a blogger covering this borough.
There’s no question that its a good thing that they are being covered now that the press have lost interest, but we really need a network of people doing what Rog is doing – providing a volume of stories that are relevant to individuals about their own locality.

On a personal note, I’ve lived in the borough for over 20 years and I’ve visited Mill Hill and Burnt Oak precisely once each.

Everybody’s notion of locality is different. Critical mass is important to a local community site and I think that defining locality along local government lines is to cast the net too widely. I remain convinced that Hyperlocal communities would benefit both North Finchley and Finchley Central / Finchley Village and I’m happy to work with anyone who wants to get one going in the area. But I do think that it’s important that we keep focussed on the hyper part of the term hyperlocal.

We have at least two more similar breakfasts planned and we’ll be announcing the guest speaker for the next one shortly. The next breakfast is on the 17^th January. Please pass details on to any local businesses that you think may be interested.
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Finchlinks is a Hyperlocal site covering North Finchley. More info here - http://www.finchlinks.com/about/

Business breakfast meetups in North Finchley

Reproduced from the Finchlinks website:-

As promised, here are the details of those business breakfast meetups. All welcome – and remember, IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT PARKING!!!!

All of the details are here – you can book your places online via this link.

Please note that Eventbrite (the site I’ve used for these events) uses that annoying US date format (MM/DD/YY) and not the UK format. So the events are on the 13th December 2012, the 17th January 2013 and the 7th February 2013.

Please keep an eye on Finchlinks for more details - http://www.finchlinks.com/

Finchley traders forum - 17th April 2012 - Cafe Buzz

7.30 am this morning I arrived at Cafe Buzz for the inaugural North Finchley traders forum. The meeting was set up by Paul Evans of the Finchlinks website, with the mission to start the process of reinvigorating the North Finchley High Street shopping Centre.

Paul kicked off the meeting by stating that the aim of the meeting was to bring business owners together to try and reinvigorate the High Street. He said that although Parking charges were the hot issue, there were other issues and other things which could be done to help.

Helen Michael, who is the owner of Cafe Buzz on the High Street mentioned the Mayor of Londons fund and the opportunity to spend some of the £1million fund on tarting up the High Street. Although she felt that this was a minor issue, compared to the damage caused by parking charges, she felt that as the cash was there, it should be utilised as effectively as possible.

Dr Julia Hines, attending as a representative from Age UK, suggested that shop owners should consider ways to enable elderly customers to shop more effectively and suggested a home delivery service was one way to assist elderly shoppers.

Veronica Woolf, who owns www.traxtoworks.co.uk a company assisting people to find better jobs assisting in personal development, stated that the day Owen Owen department store closed was the start of the decline of North Finchley.

David Boxer, a local businessman suggested that the migration of "The Multiples" (ie large chains) was symbolic of the decline of the High Street. He asked how business could combat the funding requirement, which the council use to justify an unfair parking regime. He suggested a scheme to welcome back shoppers.

John Greenaway from Kinleigh Folkard and Howard KFH.CO.UK estate agents suggested that High Streets were not reliant on multiples and succesful High Streets such as Crouch End had "moved beyond the multiples". He suggested that traders must see beyond the parking issue (many other people felt that it was such an overriding issue that this was impossible).

Helen Michael stated that the Arts Depot should be an engine driving the North Finchley trading community, but it seemed to exist in it's own little world with no interaction with other businesses.

Roger Tichborne of millhillmusiccomplex.co.uk (and author of this blog), suggested that traders should consider pooling resources for advertising and leveraging better deals from local papers. he also suggested that local papers should focus advertising by area, so that we have a focus on a specific High Street or area. Mill Hill Businesses have done that this week for the local Press newspapers.

Keith Martin suggested that the formation of Barnet Council in 1966 had destroyed local accountability and suggested that decision making be devolved to a more local level.

Paul McCrossan suggested that traders needed to work to create a sense of community and outlined several ideas for doing this.

There was much lively discussion around these issues. It was agreed to hold another meeting in approx 6 weeks and to concentrate on the subject of High Street regeneration.

Many of the delegates suggested that it would be nice to see representation from Barnet Council at the next meeting.Check http://www.finchlinks.com/ for details of future meetings.

Guest Blog - North Finchley Business Forum – detailed research

By Paul Evans

(First posted on Finchlinks Website at http://www.finchlinks.com/2011/10/north-finchley-businss-forum-detailed-research/ )

Click the image to download (PDF)

Last week, I posted a write-up of the North Finchley Business Forum meeting at the Arts Depot.
A survey of local businesses was circulated at that meeting, and I’ve now had an electronic copy of it passed on to me. You can download a copy of the report here (large-ish PDF file). It doesn’t contain too many surprises. The focus among respondents on the parking issue is particularly notable, but you probably knew that before opening the report. That’s parking. Every aspect of parking. Everyone is annoyed about it. Parking – get the picture? Other issues include the high local Business Rates and a general sense that the area has deteriorated and isn’t particularly cared for. There was quite a lot of comment about petty crime and anti-social behaviour. Overall, it’s not a hugely optimistic picture, and this is something that needs to be addressed.



One thing that I found strangely lacking though, was an absence of calls for any kind of co-ordination.
Not wanting to put too many noses out of joint, but my experience of North Finchley isn’t always positive. There are lots of empty shops and the landlords don’t seem to realise that leaving them looking scruffy does nothing for the area or … er… the attractiveness of their own property.
This project in Walsall – getting local photographers to help dress the area up – would be good to see copied locally. Also, some places have freindly and helpful staff. Others don’t, and I suppose that’s their lookout. But the way shops serve people and present themselves has a knock-on for neighbouring shops.
I’m surprised at the lack of dialogue between local businesses – and the lack of a sense that it’s needed. There doesn’t seem to be much peer-pressure going on. Most businesses in the area are hugely dependent upon the reputation of the rest of the High St. Yes – that means that the parking needs sorting out, anti-social behaviour and crime need to be looked at and a bit of TLC could be applied by the council to the street furniture. But it also depends upon collective action by the local shops – and I was surprised no-one mentioned this in the survey. It does make me think, wouldn’t it be good if Mary Portas could be persuaded to come by and give a few pep-talks?
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Paul Evans runs the Finchlinks website, which promotes the local community in Finchley. The Barnet Eye is always pleased to support local community and business initiatives. Please get in contact via the email link in my profile.

Guest Blog - North Finchley Business Forum – a few points that came up

By Paul Evans - 

(originally posted on Finchlinks - http://www.finchlinks.com/2011/10/north-finchley-business-forum-a-few-points-that-came-up/#more-303 )


Last night, I was at the North Finchley Business Forum meeting, hosted jointly by Barnet Council and a company called North London Business. It was interesting, and (up to a point) very positive.

Parking. It came up at the meeting, y'know?

It is the first in a series of meetings – the next one is pencilled in for late November (details to follow – join the LinkedIn group to stay in the loop).
There was a lot of good intentions from the council officers there, and some potentially interesting developments for the area surrounding a bid to the Lord Mayor’s Outer London Fund, a subject that I’ll return to another day soon here.
North London Business appear to be instrumental to the continuing energy around the meetings and, presumably, any bidding that is done. They say that they’ve a budget of £300.00 to do the research that they handed out at the meeting (details to follow), the publicity, and four meeting (including last night’s one). That’s a lot to do for that budget.
Predictably, and understandably, the meeting was dominated with barely supressed rage about the parking situation – the ramped-up charges, the decision (which I’ve only just heard about) to remove all of the parking ticket machines so that they can only be bought online, with a mobile phone, and from selected shops.
I don’t think we need fortune telling-skills to know how that one is going to work out.
Either way, on the parking issue, leaving aside the policy issues, I think the biggest problem is the lack of human dialogue.
There’s a lot to disagree with in the policy itself (more here), but there are also a lot of simple suggestions that could be put to a human being who has the ability to open negotiations with local people on this issue. Ideas like ‘pay-for-what-you-use’ parking in the car-parks or the situation where North Finchley’s CPZ runs from 9am-5.30pm instead of the one-hour restriction elsewhere nearby.
As Cllr Schneiderman put it on Twitter…..

“Just attended N Finchley business forum – to say there was some anger about parking is putting it mildly! Officers left to take flak as usual”

We were, however, promised a higher-quality witness from the council on this subject at the next meeting.
Other highlights: Steve Murrant – the Enforcement Investigation Manager at the council (Google tells me he’s a former Chief Inspector, so mind how you go!) spoke about plans to discourage street-drinking, outlining an enforcement plan that he claimed had worked very well in Cricklewood and elsewhere. The meeting was urged to become more involved in the Safe Neighbourhood Team and in ‘Shopwatch’ – a meeting that takes place every three months (but one that had mixed reviews from the businesses in the room).
It was agreed that the police would be invited to come to the next meeting.
Also, the question of the Arts Depot came up. The possibility of it housing a library to replace proposed closures in North Finchley and Friern Barnet (outlined here by Cllr Rams with counter-commentary from Vicky here and as reported, with some scepticism, in Private Eye recently) and the anticipated ‘footfall’ that it would bring to the area was thought to be pertinent to The Bid.
But what about the venue’s role in helping to regenerate the area? Well, the meeting resolved to invite someone from the Arts Depot to the next meeting.
In summary, a lot came up, each issue worth a short article of it’s own.

• Parking (and parking, parking and parking!)
• The stats that we were given at the meeting (interesting – watch this space)
• The Bid
• The Arts Depot – the library and the wider role of the venue regenerating the area
• Anti-social behaviour, petty crime and making North Finchley feel safer

I’ll try and post a few of them here, but if you want to weigh in, please let me know!
One last thing though. Initiatives like this have been kicked off before, only to dissolve into nothing. A few people at the meeting offered examples to illustrate their frustration.
Personally, I like to stay as positive as possible on this kind of thing. I think that the meeting was handled very well and the officers at the Council were keen to do anything that they can to work with local businesses to improve the area. With someone there from the Council (on parking), the police and the Arts Depot, the next meeting should be worth going to.
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Paul Evans runs the Finchlinks Community blog, where this post is taken from. Finchlinks aims to promote local business and community. The Barnet Eye is always pleased to promote community based initiatives in the London Borough of Barnet

July 9th is Independents Day in Finchley

The Finchlinks Website is launching "Independents Day" in Finchley, where locals are asked to buy something in a local shop, which they'd normally buy elsewhere - http://www.finchlinks.com/2011/06/independents-day-a-day-in-july-to-help-finchley-shops/ - The Barnet Eye supports this initiative and thinks other High Street's should follow suit. It would be great to have an Independents Day in Mill Hill to celebrate the Mill Hill Music Festival. We'd suggest Saturday June 25th. Whereever you are support your local traders when you can.

Congratulations to my great friend, Paul Evans at Finchlinks for a great idea and we wish him every success.

Weekly News Roundup - tour of local info blogs

First some news about whats been going on in the local blogosphere. It appears I have a rival on my doorstep, here in Mill Hill for the affections of the people of Mill Hill ! It seems that a cheeky young upstart has launched a Mill Hill Broadway Blog, the nerve ! Now I like a bit of competition and so far it has been quite an interesting read. The bloggers mission seems to be to promote business in Mill Hill, which is a thoroughly commendable objective. The blogger doesn't seem too interested in local politics (and who can blame them). The blog is still finding it's feet, so I'll be interested to see a few more detailed restaurant reviews, a few more detailed write ups of some of the more interesting businesses and maybe a few trips beyond the confines of the Broadway (Finchley Nursuries, The Three Hammers). One thing I've always fancied doing was a "nights out by bus and train from Mill Hill" detailing a few easy to get to places. The Broadway blogger mentions their love of Portuguese wine, so maybe they'd like to jump on a Thameslink train 2 stops up the line to Radlett and check out a fine Portuguese bistro their called Lagar. Anyway, we'll watch with interest. Most interestingly, the author of the blog hides there IP address when leaving messages so their ID is a complete mystery. Maybe I'll have to drag myself out of bed at 8am and see if I can catch a happy snapper in the Broadway, as that appears to be the time they take their pictures. The profile picture appears to have been taken from one of the flats above the Broadway. Some of these were raided by Police a couple of years ago in a clampdown on Prostitution a couple of years ago (I'm not suggesting that the Boradway blogger is up to no good). I wonder if we'll see any blogs on this aspect of commerce in Mill Hill "Hidden Mill Hill Special". I did discuss doing some such reseearch for a blog myself, but Mrs T (The wife not the blogger) suggested that would result in a trip to A&E to get some appendages sown back on.

Now if you are a Barnet Based reader and you are feeling left out, a local sound engineer (what is it about sound engineers and blogging?) has launched his own blog about Barnet - www.barnet4u.co.uk - There's a nice write up about it in this weeks Barnet Press. Again this blog is in its infancy, but appears to be a useful local resource.

There's also the well established Finchley blog - http://www.finchlinks.com/ - rather amusingly the guy who runs this blog, is not a fan of the Barnet Eye. He described it in rather unflattering terms and then was deeply offended when we responded in kind (to another blog he wrote not Finchlinks). As a result he refuses to put a link to us on his blog. Oh well never mind.

Also a quick mention of the Coalition for a sustainable Brent Cross blog. Unless people start listening to these guys, then the London Borough of Barnet is basically shagged. And finally, if you just want to read a really great blog - check this out.

Barnet Eye : Spotlight on Finchley and Finchlinks

There's a new website for anyone interested in Finchley - http://www.finchlinks.com/ - Unlike this site, it's not a blog but a community resource. Theres an interesting suggestion for a West Finchley Conservation area amongst other things, which sounds like a good idea (although I wish Barnet Council would enforce the rules on the existing areas before adding to them). Anyway, it's always good to have information about the locality, so I'll be adding a link in the sidebar. If you are interested in Finchley have a look (I don't suppose they'll be putting a link to me because I upset the bloke who runs it a while back, but thats another matter).

If you are looking for a night out in Finchley, my personal recommendation would be to visit the Phoenix Cinema - one of the few suburban "proper cinemas" left. If you want to eat out there, my favourite restaurant is the Japanese food at Tosa. It's always been great. Sadly Barnets premier rock venue, The Torrington shut down a couple of years ago, but if anyone knows a good gig venue, please post a comment. No mention of Finchley would be complete without mentioning The Arts Depot.  I was highly amused to see a press release from Boris Johnson giving the Arts Depot the thumbs up. Those of us locals with long memories well remember how our local Tory party poured scorn on the place when in opposition. Now they are in charge they think it's marvellous. I am proud that the Lib Dems and Labour administration at the time had the vision to build such a fine resource.

The picture is the cover of the 1967 album by the New Vaudeville band. Sadly this was the most iconic picture of Finchley I could find.