The demolition and rebuilding of the Sacred Heart church in Mill Hill - A guest blog by Chris The MillHillian

During the early 1990’s Fr Aiden McGing CM became the Parish Priest of the Sacred Heart Church. He had spent most of his priestly life in teaching and this was his first appointment as Parish Priest, this was unusual for a man of his age but he actively settled into the job with much enthusiasm having served as a curate there prior to his appointment. His predecessor, Fr Joe Cunningham asked me in my capacity as Diocesan Building Surveyor to set out a schedule of works with costs to bring the building up to scratch. 

The survey revealed so much that had to be done but the old longstanding problem of subsidence and structural defects presented the main problem that had never been successfully tackled. Engineers were engaged to carry out a full review with Mr Tom Bedford from the parish discussing his various attempts to stabilise the structure in bygone years. 

Having filed the report to Fr Cunningham, it was left to his successor Fr McGing to follow up on this. We had a chance meeting at the back of the church one morning and I was asked about the report. Having explained that a total overhaul would be like taking the wheels off an old car to bolt a new car to it, he asked what I would recommend. I immediately suggested that he formed a building committee to fully interrogate the option to repair or rebuild with full cost analysis for both. 

He quickly followed up on this and decided to let his parishioners decide on whether to replace the Church with explanations of what had prompted this enquiry. He was very surprised to find that the voting was 95 percent in favour of a rebuild. This encouraged him to arrange an architectural competition to choose the most acceptable design out of six requested from different architects. The successful practice was the PRC partnership. The tenders were within budget and the works soon got underway after completion of the planning process and procurement. 

Check out these historic pictures of the demolition and rebuilding

The buildings were completed together with the option to rebuild the church hall in 1996. It weighed heavily on me having a hand in witnessing the church I loved being demolished as it was rightly an impressive landmark on the Broadway. Nearly all my many siblings and relatives were baptised there and received the sacraments. My brother was ordained a Priest there in 1974 and many of the relatives had their funerals there including our beloved Nana (my Grandma) who was the Sacristan. 

The old church was of interest from an architeectural standpoint. The front elevation designed by the Priest Architect Fr Benedict Williamson in 1922 was inspired in its architectural detailing from Egyptian architecture which became fashionable in the 1920’s following the discovery of Tutankhamuns tomb in the valley of the King’s in Egypt. The building was just seventy years old when this redevelopment came about and it needs to be known that the people who voted for a new building did so more our necessity but many favoured the architectural feature of the front facade and reluctantly had to see it go. 

 Investigations revealed that the foundations of the building were eight feet deep which was deep for that time but sadly not deep enough as the London Clay below was forever wet and sticky due to underground streams in the locality. The church was built over an old pond. That coupled with some weaknesses in the structural design with lack of movement joints would require much to correct and none of it visible on completion. 

The roof was also heavily infested by dry rot and the windows were rusting away. The new church and presbytery buildings are all built on deep concrete piled foundations without a crack in sight, so expectations are that these replacement buildings will survive much longer than three score years and ten of the old Church. If anyone is interested in seeing similar examples of the old church in London there are two in Fulham of similar period by the same architect as well as the significant church of St Ignatius in Stamford Hill designed for the Jesuits. When walking in to the church in Stephendale Road Fulham it felt like being back in the familiar surroundings of the Church of Sacred Heart and Mary Immaculate. 

 Chris Fanning the Mill Hiller

Editors Note: You can see old Sacred Heart in all it's former glory in The False Dots video "Sunday in the 70's"

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Guest blogs are always welcome at the Barneteye

Guest Blog - The One Promise Barnet Council Won’t Make About Edgware’s Transport Hub - by Anuta Zack

 

The One Promise Barnet Council Won’t Make About Edgware’s Transport Hub

Barnet Council says safety is a priority.

So residents asked for a very simple reassurance.

Before demolishing Edgware’s transport hub — the bus station, the garage, the interchange used by thousands of passengers every day — confirm that the replacement infrastructure can actually be built safely. Not eventually. Not theoretically. Actually. It sounds like the easiest promise in the world to make. And yet Barnet Labour Council refuses to make it.

Planning Is Complicated. This Question Isn’t.

Planning debates are usually complicated.  People argue about density, housing numbers, transport capacity, retail space, sunlight, wind, viability and a hundred other things. The Broadwalk redevelopment proposal has triggered all of those debates. Reasonable people can disagree about them. But sometimes a planning question is extremely simple. Before demolishing Edgware’s transport hub, can the council demonstrate that the replacement they are proposing can actually be built safely? Not after demolition. Not “once the details are worked out”. Before. And yet that simple reassurance has not been given.

One Sentence Could Settle This

In meetings and conversations councillors and officers say what you would expect. Safety matters. Standards will be high. Nothing unsafe would ever be built. All comforting words. But words cost nothing. If safety really is the priority, the obvious step would be to put the principle into writing as a planning safeguard: 

Nothing is demolished until regulators confirm the replacement transport infrastructure can be built safely. One sentence. Thirty seconds of drafting. Problem solved. So why hasn’t it happened?

A Project With No Real Precedent

The replacement being proposed is extraordinary. It involves placing roughly 200 electric buses in a large underground depot, with high-density residential towers directly above it. Supporters call this innovation. Another word might be experiment. Electric bus depots exist, of course. But they are generally surface-level facilities serving operational sites. They are not large subterranean garages with thousands of residents living directly above them.

In the UK there are no clear precedents for dense housing built above a major underground electric bus depot. Internationally, the picture does not look much different. Electric bus depots can be found, but they are overwhelmingly ground-level facilities, not dense residential developments constructed over large subterranean fleets of electric buses. There are reasons why developments like this are rare. Large concentrations of electric vehicles introduce a known risk: lithium-ion battery fires and thermal runaway.

These incidents are uncommon, but when they occur they behave very differently from conventional fires. They burn hotter, they can reignite and they are notoriously difficult to control in enclosed spaces.  None of this proves the project cannot be engineered safely. But it does raise an obvious question.

If this really is pioneering infrastructure, shouldn’t the safety case be proven before demolishing the infrastructure that already exists?

After Grenfell, That Should Not Need Explaining

Britain has already learned what happens when safety assumptions run ahead of certainty. The Grenfell Tower fire showed what can happen when risks are treated as details that will somehow be resolved later. Edgware residents are not asking for impossible guarantees. They are asking for something much simpler. Before dismantling a transport hub that thousands of people rely on every day, confirm that the replacement can actually be built safely. That should be the starting point of any responsible planning decision.

Transparency Has Been Equally Enlightening

The same pattern appears when residents ask for basic transparency. Barnet has already sent documents to the Mayor of London as part of the Stage 2 planning process. Those documents underpin a decision that could permanently reshape Edgware’s transport infrastructure. Residents asked to inspect them. The council replied that it will consider the request in 20 days. The Mayor has 14 days to decide. In other words, the decision may be taken before residents are allowed to see the documents that informed it. If that sounds like transparency, it is a rather unusual version of it.

The Point of No Return

Large redevelopment projects rely on a simple fact. Once existing infrastructure is demolished, the pressure to complete whatever replaces it becomes overwhelming. At that point there is no going back. The town has already lost what it had. Which is exactly why the safeguard residents asked for matters so much. If the replacement infrastructure really can be built safely, confirming that before demolition should be straightforward. If it cannot yet be demonstrated, demolishing the transport hub first would leave Edgware taking a very large gamble indeed.

A Very Simple Question

Planning arguments about density and design will continue. But this issue is not complicated. Before demolishing infrastructure used by thousands of people every day, demonstrate that the infrastructure promised in its place can actually be built safely. At present that has not been done.  The London Fire Brigade has already raised concerns. There are currently no established building regulations for a development of this type.

Yet demolition of the existing transport hub is still on the table. Residents asked for one simple safeguard: do not demolish the hub until a safe, approved replacement is actually possible. It should have been the easiest promise in the world to make. The fact that Barnet Council still refuses to make it should worry anyone who assumes that common sense still plays some role in planning decisions. And it raises one final, uncomfortable question. If the replacement cannot yet be shown to be safely buildable, why is destroying the existing transport hub even being discussed?

Please sign the petition to stop it being demolished.

https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/stop-edgware-s-bus-station-and-bus-garage-from-being-demolished

Guest Blog - From the Our North Finchley Campaign - Our North Finchley Campaign Launch

 

Our North Finchley: Launch Event! Wednesday 30th July 2025 at 7pm St Alban’s Church Hall, Nether Street (Entrance to the hall is to the left of the church) We are holding the official launch of OUR NORTH FINCHLEY next Wednesday! + Find out more about the campaign + Collect leaflets to deliver in your area + Meet others taking action locally Whether you can help a little or a lot, we would love to see you there! Let’s stand up for our town together!

Join our WhatsApp Community! Join now

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Guest Blog - Memories of Mill Hill Swimming Pool by Chris the Mill Hillian

Hendon UD Council opened Mill Hill swimming pool in 1935. The recent hot spell brings back memories of how it was in my boyhood. Every year, first of May marked the start of the outdoor swimming season with the reopening of the pool in Daws Lane. The swimming pool was filled with fresh water to replace the grimy green water left from the previous season. The gates were again open to visitors. It was generally the bold and the brave who fancied a dip straight away delighting in the clean fresh water although the water temperature was quite cold at the start of the season so visitors were few. The fountains which aerated the water located at each end of the pool sprang into life and the school swimming trips started up in earnest.

On the way home from school in the summer months leading up to the start of the school holidays in July, the 240 bus would stop outside the pool and one of our mates who alighted would hurriedly run to observe the water and air temperatures scribbled on the chalk board and shout them up to us on the top deck before the bus moved off, then, if possible we could dash home for our tea and go back for a late afternoon swim. There was much enthusiasm to take a dip when the temperatures were in the high seventies. As I attended St Vincent’s Catholic School we had special days off known as Catholic Holy days in May, June and July, it was amazing how many people you would mingle with amongst family and friends and people you had not seen for ages on those days, all sorts turned up at the pool throughout the season as it was the go to place to cool off and for sunny social gatherings.

As the weeks went by and the rising temperatures of June and July approached with the onset of the summer holidays, the number of visitors increased considerably, so when the temperature reached the mid-seventies in Fahrenheit, the entrance queues would get longer and wind their way around the corner into the adjoining car park with waiting time of up to fifteen minutes before passing through the clunky iron turnstile with your swimming togs under arm. If you were passing by and fancied a cool off, you could hire a costume and towel at the gate. I recall the entrance charge in the sixties for youngsters was about sixpence.

Once the full summer temperatures peaked in the scorching heat of mid-summer, the place was packed out and it was a job to find a spot to lay out your towels and claim your pitch for the rest of your stay, often from early afternoon to closing time at around 7pm. The noise emanating from the pool area when full would drift across the park alongside and beyond. Each passing 240 bus deposited another group of eager swimmers who couldn’t wait to get changed and take a plunge along with their family and friends.

Once inside, it was a real spectacle of people watching, whether it was noting the swimmers getting air and sun to their whitened skin after the long winter months, courting couples who liked to snuggle up once in the pool, Young lads rushing around chasing, diving and bombing in the water and stylish expert swimmers taking smart dives from the diving boards into the nine-foot-deep water in the centre of the pool. The novices and learners tended to splash very carefully at the front end in two feet six inches of water learning to swim until they had the confidence to venture into the deeper parts of the pool. Adults like my Mum, loved to swim steadily from right to left or up and down at a gentle pace in the deeper less busy areas.

It was quite exciting to rush in and out of the cold fountains and babies in nappies would splash in the warmer and shallow children’s pool by the far end fountain. The authorities decided to move the back fence outwards to enlarge the resting area and maintained a grassed area here for those who preferred lying on grass to hot paving slabs. I wonder how they managed the numbers before increasing the area.

Once through the gates the genders were segregated to the cold draughty changing rooms which were very basic with high open roofs of bare iron girders, glazed roof panels and uninsulated roof coverings. You entered the space and walked on a cold concrete floor and got changed in a narrow wooden cubicle with a wooden bench and partitions and enclosed with a plain wooden door painted sky blue. In the Male areas clothes were piled into an iron basket with a hanging frame and hook and handed over to the attendants who placed them in numbered rows in a spacious hanging area then handed you a disc with your basket number which you attached to your costume with a safety pin; it could be awkward if you lost it in the pool. In the higher sticky temperatures those changing rooms stank of a mixture of sweaty socks, B.O. and the chemicals used to keep the pool clean. Then, after an impatient wait to deposit your basket of clothes at the counter, it was out through the “sheep dip” as we called the foot bath and off to find your pitch linking up with all the people joining you.

 Some made a cautious and steady walk down the steps into the fresh cold water, whilst others made a quick stylish racing dive whilst some simply jumped in. There were two slides; a small children’s slide with a wooden base and a steeper and longer stainless steel slide next to the diving boards discharging into the deep water. On occasion an ambulance would arrive to remove a casualty who got it wrong or passed out.

After spending a good while in the cold water, you went back to the towels dripping wet, shivering and occasionally with blue lips depending on the temperature, then lay in the sunshine to warm up if the sun was out and could treat yourself to a cup of something from the pool café with a bag of crisps or any other snack you might be able to afford. If your Dad was with you there was a better chance of snacking as he could afford it as pocket money had to stretch a long way for school kids. It was great to meet up and banter with your school mates and exchange views on all the happenings around you and starting to notice how the people from your school looked slightly different in swimming costumes noticing that the girls who started to develop curves, but a bit embarrassing if they were one of your relatives receiving male attention. Looking at old photographs it is noticeable how much leaner we all were back then.

At the end of the afternoon and after a long wait to collect your clothes we dressed hastily wondered off home feeling tired but relaxed with wet togs under arm. Some liked to visit the café for a cup of hot Bovril but not my particular fancy. I would prefer an ice cream from the sweet shop opposite.

As the summer days drew to a close and days got shorter the numbers fell off, then the pool would shut again at the end of September for maintenance and preparation for the next summer season. Often lads would attempt a night time dip climbing over the fence and having a great time running away from the park wardens. All for a good laugh.

I am sure that many of the Mill Hill residents can remember those pool outings for many reasons. I particularly recall going into the pool in the hot summer of 1976 in July as I was working on a chimney in nearby Poets corner and the midday heat got to me and my assistant Dave so we simply walked down to the pool and on entering took off all except our shorts and dived in to cool off, it was magnificent! 

That was my last visit before it closed. Happy days!!!

As the years went by warmer heated indoor pools became more of an attraction than Lidos and the numbers and interests in our unheated local pool decreased so Barnet Council decided to close it for good. 

The place stood dormant for a while in a state of dereliction in the early nineteen eighties and I took my son and his friends to see as it was easy to enter into the old place and walk on the infilled pool where animals were housed for a while before it was turned into a garden centre. The Pool is now Etz Chaim school. 

Here are some more pictures of the derelict pool.

The Derelict changing rooms and pool

The Fountain

The Toddlers Pool

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Guest blogs are always welcome at The Barnet Eye. Chris the Mill Hillian is a member of a long standing, well known Mill Hill Family. 

                       

Edgware: The Canary in the Coal Mine for London's Suburbs - Guest Blog from Anuta Zack at the Save Edgware Campaign

Guest post from at the  Anuta Zack Save Our Edgware Campaign

Edgware is under threat — and so is the future of London’s suburbs.

Ballymore and Transport for London (TfL) are pushing a high-density mega-development that doesn’t just endanger Edgware — it risks setting a dangerous precedent for speculative, unsafe, and unsustainable redevelopment across the capital.

This isn’t just a redevelopment of the Broadwalk Shopping Centre. It includes the bus station, the surface-level bus garage, and the town’s only public car park. All of these vital assets are being swept aside in favour of over two dozen tower blocks, unaffordable housing, and infrastructure that doesn’t even meet basic safety standards.

Please voice your objection by filling this simple form: https://saveouredgware.co.uk/object/by-form/

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An Underground Garage With No Safety Regulations

At the heart of the scheme is an untested underground electric bus garage — located directly beneath thousands of new homes.

There are no UK building regulations that support this type of structure. The London Fire Brigade has raised serious concerns — including the risk of high-intensity electric fires, inadequate ventilation, and even structural collapse of the buildings above in the event of an incident.

Equally alarming: Ballymore and TfL are proposing, as a fallback, to use the space for a diesel bus garage underground — despite the fact that no such facility exists anywhere in the UK. Why? Because the idea of diesel buses running underground has always been considered dangerously unviable — due to carbon monoxide, explosive risk, and lack of air circulation.

This isn’t regeneration. It’s reckless experimentation with public safety.

Outrageous Density: A Town-Sized Development Within a Town

Ballymore is proposing 3,828 new residential units — in a ward that currently contains just7,212 households.

That means increasing the local population by more than 50% in a single development, without proportional investment in infrastructure, healthcare, education, or transport capacity. This isn’t solving a housing crisis — it’s creating a services crisis, while setting a dangerous precedent for hyper-density in suburbs not designed to absorb it.

And yet, despite this immense scale, essential transport facilities are being reduced, not expanded.

A Model That Destroys Local Economies

Edgware’s high street and town centre economy are facing destruction.

The proposal would:

• Remove all commuter car parking, and cut public parking from a capacity of 1,035 spaces to just 292 — barely enough for a supermarket, let alone a town centre with a catchment of 400,000 people;
• Close the covered bus station and instead run all buses along a series of bus stops on Station Road — Edgware’s main shopping street. This would turn a busy pedestrian and retail area into a noisy, polluted bus corridor, making the town centre less safe and less welcoming, particularly for older residents, families, and people with mobility challenges;
• Cause up to 20 years of phased construction, choking off footfall and displacing long-established small businesses.

Station Road, the spine of Edgware’s economy, cannot survive this scale of disruption. The “new shopping centre” model Ballymore proposes has already failed in nearby towns — producing hollow retail spaces beneath towers, disconnected from the communities they are supposed to serve.

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A Town That Will No Longer Qualify as a Town

In 2013, Barnet Council’s own strategy documents stated:

“The average weekly footfall through the centre is estimated to be 130,000, with a broad catchment population of 400,000.”

It was these figures — along with Edgware’s strategic transport interchange andregionally significant shopping centre — that earned it designation as a Major Town Centre in the London Plan.

This scheme removes the very features that justified that status.

Without a functioning integrated bus station, without adequate parking, and without a viable shopping core, Edgware will no longer qualify as a Major Town Centre — even as it is forced to absorb one of the largest housing increases in the borough.

This is not regeneration. It is planning vandalism.

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A Dangerous Precedent for All of London

TfL is now functioning not as a public transport steward, but as a land developer — one willing to:

• Eliminate critical transport infrastructure,
• Gamble with unregulated, unsafe experimental designs, and
• Funnel public assets into speculative private development.

If this scheme proceeds, it will become a template for unsafe and unsustainable development across outer London — undermining community integrity, reducing infrastructure, and accelerating the breakdown of suburban town centres.

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Edgware Deserves Better. So Does London.

We are not anti-development. We are pro-safety. Pro-economy. Pro-community.
This scheme fails on all three counts.

• You do not build thousands of homes on top of a fire hazard.
• You do not destroy a town’s transport interchange and shopping economy.
• You do not erase a community to test a speculative model.

Edgware is the canary in the coal mine. If this goes ahead here, it will not stop here.

#SaveOurEdgware

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Anuta Zack is a memb er of the Save Edgware Campaign. Guest blogs are always welcome.

The history of Fanning Builders in Mill Hill. A guest blog by Chris The Millhillian

Fanning Builders were founded by brothers George and Jimmy Fanning in Mill Hill after being demobbed  from the army after World War two. They found plenty of building work in Mill Hill, undertaking many bomb damage repair jobs and other projects. Their first yard was located in the old Bunns Farm buildings (now known as Bunns Lane Works) situated at the junction of Flower Lane and Bunns Lane next to the old railway sidings and coal depot with the entrance opposite Mill Hill Park. The firm eventually moved out of there in the early fifties and their buildings were taken over by Laurie Tichborne who co founded Macmetals, a car crash and metal work repair shop. There were other business owners in that yard including Lynn Products making kitchens for local councils, Smiths Coffee roasters (now based in Hemel Hempstead), Higginsons Joinery, Daleys fire places and Blake engineering. It was an industrious workplace with a strong smell of freshly ground coffee and cellulose paint wafting across the park land.

The move was to occupy larger premises on the sloping railway sidings of Mill Hill Station fronting Bunns Lane. Most of the buildings were old wooden site huts and the office building was constructed at street level to designs submitted to Hendon Council by George. They operated there until the yard was taken over by the council for use as a car park and the old Station Masters House, Garden, sidings and station yard and buildings were all demolished and built over in 1973. There were no toilet facilities at the yard so staff would use the toilets at the station which were also basic. The joiners shed was heated with off cuts of wood in an old iron burner and the hot water was fed to iron radiators rescued from jobs.

 The yard man Joe, who was the uncle of George and Jimmy,  a Lancastrian. Joe would chop up all the old scrap wood and sell it at the gate for firewood for about 6 pence a bag. This paid for his beer at the service men’s club in Hartley Avenue.

At Christmas the men knocked off early and went to the yard for a Christmas booze up and ham sandwiches from a barrel supplied by the Brothers. There was a Christmas club, so each week the staff contributed to a fund and the firm matched the funding which was put into Premium bonds and shared out at Christmas including any prize money. Joe would create a crib in the shop window with a light which was always fascinating for the children to look at. Each summer was a firms coach outing to Southend which was a boozy and jovial affair.

 

There was quite an industrial set up in Mill Hill situated all along the railway sidings where several businesses thrived. There were builders merchants such as C. J. Hunts just by the bridge, the roof tiling suppliers were along the railway siding’s behind Millway, several garage repair places, joinery shops and next to Fanning's yard was Ace shop fitters. There was the Rawlplug factory in Hale Lane, Middlesex Reboring engine restoration at the bottom of Lawrence Street, an iron fabrication place called Rocar welding in Bunns Lane and an asphalt roofing company in Daws Lane. Builders really had it all on their doorstep except for specialist stuff such as cast iron but that was brought at the Thames Bank iron Company in St John’s Wood.

 

Tea breaks were often taken in local cafes as parking outside was always possible, there were a few choices such as, the cafe across the road, the Ivy in Daws Lane, San Remo in Staton Road and my favourite, the old Forge at the bottom of Lawrence Street. This was run by Phil Matthews who lived there as a boy with his brother Geoff, sons of the last Blacksmith. Builders vans all parked up on the green to pile in for a cup of tea poured from a large metal pot. Geoff was was carpentry foreman, very skilled and bit of a character who told many a yarn particularly about Mill Hill. He would hold court filling us with his mixture of angst and witty humour, the original stand up comedian.

Fanning Building Supplies closes in 1972

When the yard was shut down the company moved over to a more concealed yard in Daws Lane but it seemed like the builders had gone forever. The brothers split the premises in the mid sixties leaving Jim Fanning to run the building Company and George Fanning to run Mill Hill Building Supplies. They were offered alternative premises in Graham Park but George sold out to Lawfords and Jim wanted to remain closer to Mill Hill centre.

 In those days parking was always possible outside any property we worked on and that was just about every road in Mill Hill. Lorry loads of sand were simply poured at roadside as well as several thousand bricks and rubbish was piled along the pavement verge to be collected and loaded to a tipper lorry as seen in the attached photo and then dropped up at the landfill site at Hendon Wood Lane and later in Radlett. Fanning Builders Ltd closed in 1987 and Jim retired and moved away as he was battling with cancer. He had six sons who all spent time working on the firm during the summer holidays. I became his apprentice bricklayer and my first job was working on the fabric at the UK optical building- now demolished. There are still some examples of my brickwork in different places.

 
It was great being a builder in Mill Hill getting to know so many people and all over town. Very fond memories for us all.

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Chris the Mill Hillian worked at Fanning Builders and was a resident for many years.
Guest blogs are always welcome at The Barnet Eye.