191115ApprovedPCMinutesV10

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

APPROVED MINUTES OF THE PLAN­NING COM­MIT­TEE held at Albert Hall, Bal­later on 15^th Novem­ber 2019 at 11am

Mem­bers Present Elean­or Mack­in­tosh (Con­vener) Peter Argyle (Deputy Con­vener) Geva Black­ett Car­o­lyn Cad­dick Deirdre Fal­con­er Pippa Had­ley Janet Hunter John Kirk John Lath­am Anne Rae Macdonald

Douglas McAdam Xan­der McDade Wil­lie McK­enna lan McLar­en Dr Fiona McLean Wil­li­am Mun­ro Dr Gaen­er Rodger Derek Ross Judith Webb

In Attend­ance: Grant Moir, Chief Exec­ut­ive Mur­ray Fer­guson, Dir­ect­or of Rur­al Devel­op­ment & Plan­ning Gav­in Miles, Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies Kath­er­ine Don­nach­ie, Plan­ning Officer, Devel­op­ment Man­age­ment Ed Swales, Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer Rob­bie Cal­vert, Gradu­ate Plan­ner Alix Hark­ness, Clerk to the Board

Apo­lo­gies: Peter Fer­guson, Harp­er & MacLeod LLP

Agenda Items 1 & 2: Wel­come & Apologies

1. The Con­vener wel­comed all present.

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

Agenda Item 3: Minutes & Mat­ters Arising from the Pre­vi­ous Meeting

1. The minutes of the pre­vi­ous meet­ing, 11^th Octo­ber 2019, held at the Com­munity Hall, Boat of Garten were approved with no amendments.

2. The Con­vener repor­ted on the pro­gress from the Actions Points arising from minutes:

   • At Para 7i) – In Hand – Amend­ment to Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders to be made and updated Stand­ing orders to be pub­lished on Cor­por­ate web­site. Amend­ment to be rat­i­fied by the Board at their meet­ing in Decem­ber 2019 first.

3. Action Point arising: None.

Agenda Item 4: Declar­a­tion of Interest by Mem­bers on Items Appear­ing on the Agenda

1. Item 6 — Wil­li­am Mun­ro Dir­ect Interest: son and daugh­ter in law have plan­ning per­mis­sion to build a house on the Dulicht Court part of the site.

2. Item 6 — Pippa Had­ley Indir­ect Interest: As a High­land Coun­cil Coun­cil­lor but has had no involve­ment with the application.

3. Item 6 — Car­o­lyn Cad­dick Indir­ect Interest: As a High­land Coun­cil Coun­cil­lor but has had no involve­ment with the application.

Agenda Item 5: FOR INFORM­A­TION A9 Sec­tion Dalraddy to Slo­chd Update

1. Gav­in Miles, Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies provided an oral update on A9 Dualling: Dalraddy to Slo­chd sec­tion. He made the fol­low­ing points: a) CNPA are con­tinu­ing to object to the pro­pos­als and pre­par­ing for the exam­in­a­tion. Gav­in Miles and Peter Fer­guson will attend the pre-exam­in­a­tion hear­ing on 3^rd Decem­ber 2019 which will set out the pro­cess. b) The CNPA remain of the opin­ion that the NMU pro­vi­sion asso­ci­ated with this sec­tion of the A9 will be inad­equate and should be addressed as part of that pro­ject. c) Officers are pleased that Trans­port Scot­land are lead­ing sep­ar­ate work that the CNPA are sup­port­ing to invest­ig­ate an altern­at­ive Non-Motor­ised Route (NMU) between Aviemore and Car­rbridge. Trans­port Scot­land are unable to commit

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

1. that the deliv­ery of such a route so there is cur­rently not cer­tainty about such a route’s delivery.

The Com­mit­tee noted the update.

1. Action: i. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies to provide updates from the inquiry as and when they happen.

Agenda Item 6: Applic­a­tion for Detailed Plan­ning Per­mis­sion (2019/0275/DET) Erec­tion of 13 res­id­en­tial units (8 cot­tage flats, 4 semi-detached houses, I bun­ga­low (afford­able homes), At Land 150M NW Of Beachen Court, Grant­own on Spey Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve Sub­ject to Conditions

1. Wil­li­am Mun­ro left the room.

2. The Con­vener informed Mem­bers that the Nic­ola Drum­mond, Colin Arm­strong, High­land Hous­ing Alli­ance (Agent) and Gus Jones on behalf of Dr Gor­don Bul­loch (Object­or) were present to give a present­a­tion to the Committee.

3. Kath­er­ine Don­nach­ie, Plan­ning Officer presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

4. Nic­ola Drum­mond and Colin Arm­strong (Agent and Archi­tect) were invited to address the Com­mit­tee. Ms Drum­mond gave a presentation.

5. The Com­mit­tee were invited to ask points of clar­ity. The fol­low­ing was raised: a) Could it be con­firmed that the increase from 1 ³⁄₄ storey to 2 storey would provide a more pos­it­ive exper­i­ence for the future occu­pants of the homes? Colin Arm­strong agreed that it would as they would not have restric­ted stand­ing space. b) With regards to the hours of oper­a­tion of con­struc­tion could this be lim­ited and agreed with the developer as part of the tender pro­cess? Colin Arm­strong agreed that poten­tially it could in order to give the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee comfort.

6. Dr Gus Jones on behalf of Dr Gor­don Bul­loch (Object­or) was invited to address the Com­mit­tee. He gave a presentation.

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

1. The Plan­ning Officer was invited to come back on points raised dur­ing the present­a­tions. She made the fol­low­ing points: a) The plan­ning con­di­tions imposed on past plan­ning per­mis­sions on the site have been com­plied with. b) The change to 2 storey designs is con­sidered appro­pri­ate to the lay­out of the site.

2. The Con­vener thanked the speakers.

3. The Com­mit­tee agreed to approve the applic­a­tion sub­ject to the con­di­tions detailed in the report.

4. Action Point arising: None.

Agenda Item 7: Applic­a­tion for Detailed Plan­ning Per­mis­sion (2019/0289/DET) Upgrade of exist­ing private way for forestry and agri­cul­ture use in ret­ro­spect (Track B — 2 of 2) At Upper Crag­gan, Glen­beg Road, Grant­own on Spey, High­land, PH26 3NT Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve Sub­ject to Conditions

1. Wil­li­am Mun­ro returned to the meeting.

2. The Con­vener informed Mem­bers that the Gus Jones (Object­or) were present to address the Committee.

3. Edward Swales, Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

4. The Com­mit­tee were invited to ask the Officer points of clar­ity. The fol­low­ing was raised: a) The Con­vener asked if the issue of this being a ret­ro­spect­ive applic­a­tion was that it had not been sub­mit­ted through the pri­or noti­fic­a­tion pro­cess? The Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer con­firmed that the work had been under­taken without pri­or noti­fic­a­tion. b) Could it be cla­ri­fied if the track runs through a des­ig­nated ancient wood­land? The Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that it ran across an area iden­ti­fied as ancient wood­land invent­ory but that this was not a des­ig­na­tion. c) Sug­ges­tion made that appro­pri­ate seed­ing of the tracks should be required. Officers agreed to ensure this. d) A mem­ber sug­ges­ted that the track was long estab­lished and may been in place for at least the past 60 years? The Head of Plan­ning and Com­munit­ies confirmed

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

that there was not a con­struc­ted track until recently so while the route may have been driv­en by vehicles, there was no evid­ence of track construction.

1. Tessa Jones (Object­or) was invited to address the Com­mit­tee. She gave a present­a­tion. The Com­mit­tee were invited to ask any points of cla­ri­fic­a­tion to the speak­er. The fol­low­ing point was raised: a) Was there a par­tic­u­lar aspect that was miss­ing? Ms Jones advised that look­ing at the plans the pro­posed 3m width of the track was by scale how­ever this was not clear through­out the officer’s report. She went on to explain that in the oth­er track reports the width of the track was spe­cified and also the cent­ral veget­a­tion strip for the drainage.

2. The Com­mit­tee were invited to dis­cuss the report, the fol­low­ing points were raised: a) The Con­vener asked how enforce­able would it be? The Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that they were sat­is­fied that plans were clear and there­fore con­fid­ent that the details approved could be enforced. b) A Mem­ber com­men­ted that the widths of the track includ­ing the veget­a­tion strip were detailed in the pro­posed plans and acknow­ledged the work by Officers get­ting it to that stage.

3. The Com­mit­tee agreed to approve the applic­a­tion as per the Officer’s recom­mend­a­tion sub­ject to the con­di­tions stated in the report.

4. Action Point arising: None.

Agenda Item 8: Applic­a­tion for Detailed Plan­ning Per­mis­sion (2019/0293/DET) Upgrade of private way — track A (ret­ro­spect­ive) At Land 350M SE Of Lower Gaich, Dul­nain Bridge Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve Sub­ject to Conditions

1. The Con­vener informed Mem­bers that the Gus Jones (Object­or) were present to address the Committee.

2. Edward Swales, Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

3. The Com­mit­tee were invited to ask the Officer points of clar­ity. The fol­low­ing was raised: a) Could it be explained how a driv­en line versus a track was defined? Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer explained that the Item 7’s track had been an upgrade to a long estab­lished line link­ing dif­fer­ent farm­land areas via a wood­land strip

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

where­as this applic­a­tion was for the upgrade of a less obvi­ous a line over rough­er ground.

1. Tessa Jones (Object­or) was invited to address the Com­mit­tee. She gave a presentation.

2. The Con­vener thanked the speaker.

3. The Officer was invited to come back on points raised dur­ing the present­a­tions. He made the fol­low­ing points: a) Through­out the devel­op­ment, stone facing on the burn cross­ing points put in to ensure no sed­i­ment would seep into the river and to ensure this a fur­ther plan was being reques­ted by the CNPA Con­ser­va­tion team. b) A mem­ber asked if SNH had been fur­ther con­sul­ted in light of these mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures. The Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that SNH did not object to the pro­pos­al so were not con­sul­ted further.

4. The Com­mit­tee were invited to dis­cuss the report, the fol­low­ing points were raised: a) With ref­er­ence to para­graph 7 of the report, it appeared that two neg­at­ives equalled a pos­it­ive? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that this was a typ­ing error. b) With regards to the use of the track and the asso­ci­ated impact of the vehicles going through the forest, how fre­quent would they need to be used to cre­ate sig­ni­fic­ant dam­age. Mon­it­or­ing & enforce­ment officer advised that the track does was a dead end so would only be used by estate vehicles for routine work. No sig­ni­fic­ant dam­age was expec­ted. c) Could reas­sur­ance be provided to con­firm that the con­di­tions would safe­guard the SAC? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies con­firmed that the stone facing at fords would min­im­ise dam­age to banks at those loc­a­tions and pre­vent dam­age to the SAC.

5. The Com­mit­tee agreed to approve the applic­a­tion as per the Officer’s recom­mend­a­tion sub­ject to the con­di­tions stated in the report.

6. Action Point arising: None.

Agenda Item 9: Applic­a­tion for Detailed Plan­ning Per­mis­sion (2019/0286/DET) Works to Cor­rie Cuiach track (ret­ro­spect­ive) At Phoines Lodge, New­ton­more Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve Sub­ject to Conditions

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

1. Edward Swales, Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

2. The fol­low­ing points of cla­ri­fic­a­tion were raised: a) The Con­vener admit­ted her con­fu­sion over what is allow­able work on tracks and what was not? Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer advised that once it com­plies with SNH guidelines it would be less of an impact. b) Could it be explained why the track needed to be made big­ger and what was its pur­pose? Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer explained that it leads on to an argo track fur­ther along, and that the applic­ants jus­ti­fic­a­tion for widen­ing was that more fre­quent use by heavy vehicles required it. c) A Mem­ber poin­ted out that in the state­ment wild fire fight­ing fire engine access was men­tioned. Was the track in an area that had seen wild­fires pre­vi­ously? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that CNPA officers were only aware of estate-man­aged muir­burn in that area. d) Could the Com­mit­tee be reminded what tools were at the Authority’s dis­pos­al if the con­di­tions were not met? Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer con­firmed that CNPA could take fur­ther enforce­ment action on breach of con­di­tions if plan­ning per­mis­sion was gran­ted. He advised that the estate had cooper­ated with CNPA staff once the ini­tial breach had been identified.

3. The Com­mit­tee agreed to approve the applic­a­tion as per the Officer’s recom­mend­a­tion sub­ject to the con­di­tions stated in the report.

4. Action Point arising: None.

Agenda Item 10: Any Oth­er Business

1. The Con­vener explained that nor­mally for applic­a­tions of a ret­ro­spect­ive nature, applic­ants would receive a let­ter from the Con­vener on behalf of the Com­mit­tee advising of their dis­ap­point­ment of the ret­ro­spect­ive nature of the application(s). The Com­mit­tee dis­cussed this and the fol­low­ing com­ments and obser­va­tions were made: Com­ment made that it was not appro­pri­ate on this occa­sion. a) Sug­ges­tion made to write an art­icle or let­ter into the estates magazine stat­ing b) that if they were in doubt to approach the CNPA to ask for assist­ance. The Con­vener advised that this had been done before and there was some ambi­gu­ity as to what would be classed as main­ten­ance. c) Was there an oppor­tun­ity when shar­ing the res­ults of the aer­i­al and digit­al map­ping with Estates that the con­ver­sa­tion on this could be factored into this? d) Was there a sys­tem­at­ic way of know­ing what was going on? Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer advised that the Phoines Lodge track had been spot­ted by

APPROVED COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES e) f) the aer­i­al and digit­al map­ping done by the intern. The 2018 image showed a wider track. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that although tracks had been mapped across the Nation­al Park, the CNPA will con­tin­ue to rely on the pub­lic to report new tracks. Com­ment made that the sup­port­ing state­ment needs clar­ity as it was appar­ent that there was con­fu­sion with what was deemed as per­mit­ted devel­op­ment rights with the High­land Coun­cil. A Mem­ber who sits on the Cairngorms Upland Action Group advised that at a recent meet­ing when dis­cuss­ing the intern­ship and map­ping work com­pleted they had sup­por­ted the view to dis­sem­in­ate the find­ings more widely and that it would be use­ful to share with the emer­gency services.

1. Peter Argyle left the room briefly for 5 mins.

2. The Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies provided the fol­low­ing updates a) The enforce­ment notice that had been served on the Glen Clova track had been appealed and the CNPA were now provid­ing evid­ence on it to the Dir­ect­or­ate for Plan­ning and Envir­on­ment­al Appeals. b) There were no fur­ther details sur­round­ing costs and start date asso­ci­ated with the LDP exam­in­a­tion but officers hoped to have some news before the next Com­mit­tee meeting.

3. Action Points arising: None.

Agenda Item 11: Date of Next Meeting

1. Fri­day 13^th Decem­ber 2019 in Com­munity Hall, Boat of Garten.

2. The pub­lic busi­ness of the meet­ing con­cluded at 12.30.