Fryent Country Park together with Barn Hill Open Space is a large park situated in the north of the London Borough of Brent. It covers 103 hectares (254 acres) of rolling fields and small woods.

Significant features

Barn Hill in the south-west of the park is a wooded hill that rises to 86m. A fish pond is found at the top of the Hill. Numerous other ponds can be seen in the rest of the park. Gotfords Hill (63m) known as “Telly Tubby Hill” by the local children for its grassed rounded top and Beane Hill (65m) are other high points in the park. Parallel to Fryent Way is an ancient track known as Hell Lane or Eldestrete which may date back to Saxon times or earlier.

Wildlife

The woodland comprises french oak, hornbeam, elm, ash and some fruit trees which also occur in the hedges along with blackthorn. The park is considered the best surviving example of Middlesex countryside in the Brent basin and has a population of the nationally rare plant the narrow-leaved bitter-cress (Cardamine impatiens

Cardamine impatiens

Cardamine impatiens or Narrow-leaved Bittercress is a plant species of the genus Cardamine belonging to the family Brassicaceae. It is a slender, biennial herb, that produces sterile leaves in the first year, one to several flowering stems during the next. Its leaves are pinnate with several pairs...

).

History

Barn Hill called Bardonhill in 1547 was landscaped by Humphry Repton

Humphry Repton

Humphry Repton was the last great English landscape designer of the eighteenth century, often regarded as the successor to Capability Brown; he also sowed the seeds of the more intricate and eclectic styles of the 19th century...

 in 1792 as part of a local landowner’s country park. The Fryent Park hay meadows are small remnants of two manors one originally in the ownership of King Edward the Confessor.

Access

The park is bisected by the A4140 Fryent Way that links Kingsbury

Kingsbury

Kingsbury is an area in the London Borough of Brent, northwest London. The name Kingsbury means "The King's Manor".-History:Kingsbury was historically a small parish in the Hundred of Gore and county of Middlesex. Until the nineteenth century it was largely rural with only scattered settlements....

 with Wembley

Wembley

Wembley is an area of northwest London, England, and part of the London Borough of Brent. It is home to the famous Wembley Stadium and Wembley Arena...

. A car park is available half way down this road. The nearest underground is at Kingsbury Station

Kingsbury tube station

Kingsbury tube station is a London Underground station in northwest London, England. Although now only served by deep-level tube trains, the section of line serving the station is built to surface gauge and trains to that larger LU loading gauge occasionally pass through.-History:It was opened on...

 on the Jubilee Line

Jubilee Line

The Jubilee line is a line on the London Underground , in the United Kingdom. It was built in two major sections—initially to Charing Cross, in central London, and later extended, in 1999, to Stratford, in east London. The later stations are larger and have special safety features, both aspects...

. The PR2 bus terminates a short distance from the park. The Capital Ring

Capital Ring

The Capital Ring is a strategic walking route that is being promoted by London's 33 local councils, led by the City of London Corporation in partnership with the Greater London Authority and its functional body for regional transport, Transport for London, through which much of the funding is...

 footpath crosses the site.
However, the road Fryent Way, linking Kingsbury Circle and Salmon Street lacks a much needed bus service to transport residents and students alike around the area. The Barn Hill Open Area, or at least the summit of it, is nearer Wembley Park Station.

Awards

Fryent Country Park was awarded a Green Flag Award

Green Flag Award

The Green Flag Award is the benchmark national standard for parks and green spaces in the United Kingdom. The scheme was set up in 1996 to recognise and reward green spaces in England and Wales that met the laid down high standards...

 in 2010/2011 for being a well managed park or open space. The Green Flag Award® scheme is the benchmark national standard for parks and green spaces in England and Wales. It is also a Local Nature Reserve

Local Nature Reserve

Local nature reserve or LNR is a designation for nature reserves in the United Kingdom. The designation has its origin in the recommendations of the Wild Life Conservation Special Committee which established the framework for nature conservation in the United Kingdom and suggested a national suite...

.

External links

Further details about wild life in the park can be found at: http://www.london.gov.uk/wildweb/PublicSiteViewFull.do?pictureno=1&siteid=7053 [Accessed 3 August 2007].

The local management plan is at: http://www.brent.gov.uk/parks.nsf/24878f4b00d4f0f68025663c006c7944/a00ed001d12cea3480256baa0054e6fd/$FILE/MPFCP.doc

Barn Hill Conservation Group’s website is at: http://www.bhcg.ik.com/ while their 2007 management programme can be seen at: http://www.brent.gov.uk/parks.nsf/24878f4b00d4f0f68025663c006c7944/a00ed001d12cea3480256baa0054e6fd/$FILE/BHCGPROGSpringSummer2007.pdf