Full steam ahead for Golders Green eruv as appeal hits target

The new Golders Green eruv intended to cater for strictly Orthodox families is set to go live in January after it reached its £250,000 appeal target.

A 48-hour campaign last week has secured the necessary support to underwrite the rest of its construction.

An eruv converts a public area into private space under Jewish law, allowing observant Jews on Shabbat to carry, among other things, house keys, tissues, medication or babies, and to use buggies or walking sticks.

The new Shabbat boundary is being overseen by Rabbi Shraga Feivel Zimmerman, the spiritual head of the Federation of Synagogues.

Although the area is covered by the existing North-West London Eruv, which is supervised by the London Beth Din, most Charedi families are thought not to have used it because their rabbis follow a more stringent application of Jewish law.

The Golders Green Eruv will be bounded mostly by existing main roads; however, where there is a gap, this will be marked by pairs of poles linked by thin wire representing symbolic gateways.

But one feature of this eruv is that will also have a number of green “boxes” similar to cabinets housing electricity meters, which will be stationed at the side of the road; these will contain barriers which will be stretched across the road for a short time once a year to symbolically seal off the road.

Rabbi Zimmerman has told Barnet Council, which gave planning permission, that the design should “satisfy the views of all of those who do wish to make use of an eruv facility in Golders Green”.

The initiative has attracted the support of some rabbis associated with the Union of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations.

With the eruv due to be up and running in a matter of weeks, it remains to be seen if any will now hold out against it.