including Beech Bottom Dyke and Sandridge Road Wastes
Your opinion counts, so please join us. £10 per year will help to protect, preserve and enhance the Heath for all.
Membership provides you with:
Find out more at Joining FoBH
The Friends of Bernards Heath have teamed up with the Civic Society and Trees of St Albans to plant a tree in celebration of local author Kate Bretherton.
Join us: the tree and shrubs will be planted at 11:00am on Wednesday 18 November 2026 on Bernards Heath Upper Field. Local school children and the Mayor/Deputy are due to attend, and everyone is welcome.
Kate’s book, Remarkable Trees of St Albans, has done much to champion the trees of our District. It includes a section on the Heath, the place where she lived when she first moved to St Albans. We are pleased to mark her contribution than by adding a tree to Bernards Heath.
We’ll be planting a hornbeam along with some alder buckthorn shrubs on the south side of the Upper Field. The hornbeam is a tree of our local ancient woodlands and was once used to make the gunpowder for the Second Battle of St Albans — fought right here on the Heath. It’s also a gift to wildlife, offering early nectar for pollinators, leaves for caterpillars and seeds for birds, while the alder buckthorn will help our local yellow Brimstone butterflies.
The project is being crowdfunded, and we’ve made a great start. If you’d like to contribute, please visit the GoFundMe page: A tree to celebrate the achievements of Kate Bretherton.
The planting has been approved by Trees and Woodlands, and the tree will be planted and staked by John O’Connor.
A fitting tribute to a remarkable champion of our trees — and a lasting boost to the beauty and wildlife of the Heath for everyone to enjoy.
We want to make sure you continue to receive important local information from Bernard’s Heath.
Several email providers are either closing email services or making changes that may affect your account. If your email address ends in any of the following, please update your contact details with us as soon as possible.
Confirmed closures or service changes:
If you have one of these emails, please check with your provider for details
This will help us keep our records up to date and ensure you continue to receive Neighbourhood Watch updates and important local information.
Thank you for your help and support.
On the evening of Tuesday 15th September, we were delighted to welcome volunteers from GoodGym St Albans to Bernard’s Heath.
GoodGym is a community of runners, walkers and cyclists who combine getting fit with doing good for their local area. This time, we were the lucky beneficiaries!
The team rolled up their sleeves and got stuck into the task, discovering some huge logs on the Heath and putting them to good use!
A big thank you to GoodGym St Albans for their hard work and enthusiasm. You can read their full report here.
If your group would like to help out on the Heath, do get in touch — there’s always plenty to do!
With the UK under Extreme Fire Risk, the sale of disposable bbq’s has been temporarily banned.
Members of the public have also been urged not to light an open fire of any kind and dispose of cigarettes carefully.
Please also dispose of litter sensibly, as the bright sun can be magnified by glass (even shards) and start fires in these tinder-dry conditions.
A support arm on the over head beam for the main set of swings was broken last week (Tuesday 14th of July). Sadly, we are still awaiting news on repairs.
While we appreciate everyone enjoying the facilities, please do take care not to exceed weight limits and only use swings one-at-a-time!
As part of the largest change in the way Hertfordshire is governed since 1974, Bernards Heath will become part of a new parish council covering the, currently unparished, central area of St Albans.
The Government’s reforms will see Hertfordshire’s 11 councils will be reduced to four. St Albans will become part of the the new “West Unitary Authority” along with Dacorum. The new system is supposed to be in place by April 2028.
BBC News Story: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5ye8l5eq8qo
The Bernards Heath area will continue to have three councillors in the new parish, with elections expected in May 2027. You can find out more on the council website: https://www.stalbans.gov.uk/CGR-final-recs
Essential work in St Albans will help keep residents connected to safe and reliable gas supplies for cooking and heating.
The scheme involves replacing more than 4,200 metres of ageing gas mains with traffic management in place throughout.
Works will run for six months with the use of temporary traffic lights throughout.
Gas pipes buried deep under roads in St Albans are due to be replaced by engineers from Cadent – the UKs largest gas distribution network.
The project is taking place in Sandridge Road, Upper Culver Road, Spencer Gate, Seymour Road, Watson Avenue, Sandpit Lane, Lancaster Road, Marshall Avenue, and Battlefield Road over the next six months with 4,240 metres of gas main pipelines being replaced with tough new pipes which will last for decades, future-proofing the local network.
The council will close the road accessing the Pioneer Club and Heathlands School in the week before Easter. This is for resurfacing works to *finally* tackle the large potholes.
Our team have been hard at work on the Harpenden Road/Townsend Drive side of the heath. Laurels have been cleared, creating more light into the undergrowth. A giant lump of flint was obstructing one of the paths. The team put in a mighty effort and managed to dig it up.
In the process, interesting fun-guys uncovered some interesting Fungi. The orange coloured fungi may be a rare fungus called Sarcoscypha austriaca or it could be a more common fungus called Aleuria aurantia common name is Orange peel fungus.
Members are invited to join us for our AGM on Saturday 7th March 2026 10.30am at The Jolly Sailor Pub, Stonecross, AL1 4AA.
Non-members are welcome to contribute, but will not be entitled to vote.
Please join to share your voice and hear news of the upcoming Local Government Reorganisation.
