Barnet Fair - Barnet Where?

 Looking At London Buses Route 383 (1)

This 1920s map shows the small, almost village, community of Chiipping Barnet with a railway line just creeping in lower right. That line is the Great Northern Railway from Kings Cross to Edgware with a branch to High Barnet.

The Edgware, Highgate and London Railway was established by a private act of parliament passed on 3 June 1862. The route, measuring 8.75 miles (14.08 km),[2] ran through parts of rural Middlesex (now suburban north London) from Finsbury Park through Stroud Green, Crouch End, Highgate, Finchley and Mill Hill to Edgware. 

This was a different "Edgware" from the terminus of today's Northern Line.

Additional acts in 1864 and 1866 granted powers to construct branch lines from Highgate to Muswell Hill and from Finchley to High Barnet respectively.

The railway was sponsored by the larger Great Northern Railway (GNR), whose main line from King's Cross ran through Finsbury Park on its way to New Barnet and Potters Bar and the north. Before the line to Edgware was opened, it was purchased in July 1867 by the GNR and was opened on 22 August 1867.

The lines was taken over as part of the Northern Heights Underground expansion, the completion of which was delayed by World War 2 and partially thwarted by changes in Government policy (The Green Belt) post WW2.

So we have already collected Chpping Barnet, Nigh Barnet and New Barnet ...

... and there are more.

We now have East Barnet and Barnet Vale.

Chipping Barnet seems to have become just Barnet whilst High Barnet appears to be a suburb of (Chipping) Barnet.

Then there is East Barnet's station ...

... which is called Oakleigh Park (naturally!) and, to complete the set we have Friern Barnet ...

... a separated community from (Chipping) Barnet. Friern Barnet used to be known at Little Barnet. Its centre is at the junction of the A1003 (RED) and B550 (BROWN) and this is about half way between Woodside Park Station (far left), New Southage Station (right)and Arnos Grove Station (very far right).

Then there is the Borough of Barnet to consider.

The London Borough of Barnet is a suburban London borough in North London and is the largest London borough by population with 384,774 inhabitants. It was formed in 1965 from parts of the counties of Middlesex and Hertfordshire.

It borders Hertfordshire to the north and five other London boroughs: Camden and Haringey to the southeast, Enfield to the east, as well as Harrow and Brent to the west of the ancient Watling Street (now the A5 road, the straight line border). The borough's major urban settlements are Hendon, Finchley, Golders Green, Friern Barnet, Chipping Barnet, Whetstone, and Edgware; there are also rural settlements, notably Totteridge and Arkley.

Barnet's head officer is, as you might expect ...

... in Hendon. The official title is "Barnet London Borough Council"

Out 383 bus route rests entirely within the London borough, but it used to run further north from Potters Bar.

The wonderful Ian Armstrong's site tells us the the 383 started in 1998 and tern years laster was cut back from Potters Bar to its current northern terminus of (Chipping) Barnet. But it wasn't really new in '98, being a replacement for part of route 326 which started in 1991 and tan from Potters Bar to Brent Cross.

It's too complicated for fbb (without futher research) because there has been some swapping of roads served; but today's 326 has a similar but parallel trajectory to the 383.

So Back to the 383 which starts at what might well be called Barnet's bus station ...

... but actually named "The Spires". Robert Muster does have the correct timetable as his PDF printable version ...

... on which the terminus is called Stapylton Road; which is correct - but everyone (including TfL's timetable-less publicity) calls it The Spires.

Even Traveline sticks to The Spires ...

... so a couple of muted cheers to TfL for showing some common sense in showing the name the people know. And there are spires on The Spires ...

... but not those spires! These spires ...

... which used to adorn the facade of Barnet Methodist Church; now, alas, no longer trading.

There are a few alternatives for those with a particular Wesleyan denominational desire ...

... but all ecclesastical tastes are catered for nearby.

The one thing you can be pretty sure of throughout the Capital is that there will be a bus service passing National Rail and Underground stations. The 383 cops 4 in its short length as we can see on this fbb map of the route.

Our first connection is with High Barnet at the end of one of the Northern Line branches.

We will take a closer look tomorrow.

But in the meantime, did you know that tams raan all the way from central London to Barnet? Well, fbb didn't until he spotted this picture on-line.

The rather blurry picture above is looking south from just beside Barnet (Anglican) Church and the same view today can be matched with the above.

The Friern Barnet History Society records the route and its history.

SERVICE 9. BARNET CHURCH - MOORGATE 

via Finchley Church End, East Finchley Station,

Archway Road, Archway Tavern, Holloway Road, Nag’s Head,

Highbury Station, Upper Street, Cross Street, Islington Angel,

Canal Bridge, City Road, Old Street

Basically, it zapped straight down the A1000 which regains its old identity as the A1 at Archway Road

• Introduced Thursday 24 September 1914

• Journey time 50 minutes, frequency every 8 minutes

• Joint service operated by both MET and LCC cars

• Curtailed at North Finchley on Tuesday 1 December 1914

• Last day of operation Saturday 5 March 1938

• Replaced by trolleybus route 609 

 Next Barnet bus blog : Thursday 5th November