CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Form­al Board Paper | 13^th Novem­ber 2020

FOR DECISION

Title: SUB­MIS­SION OF CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK LOC­AL DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN TO SCOT­TISH MINISTERS

Pre­pared by: DAN HAR­RIS, PLAN­NING MAN­AGER & GAV­IN MILES, HEAD OF PLAN­NING AND COMMUNITIES

Pur­pose of Report

To approve the mod­i­fied LDP as the ver­sion the CNPA wish to see adop­ted and agree to sub­mit to Scot­tish Min­is­ters in accord­ance with sec­tion 19(12) of the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 1997.

Recom­mend­a­tion

That the Board approve:

a) the modi­fic­a­tions pro­posed to the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan as a res­ult of the Exam­in­a­tion of the Plan and Report­ers’ Recom­mend­a­tions and pub­lic­a­tion of the pro­posed Plan (as modified);

b) the pub­lic­a­tion of notices and noti­fic­a­tion of those who made rep­res­ent­a­tions on the pro­posed Plan of the CNPA’s inten­tion to Adopt the Plan (as mod­i­fied) with a view to adopt­ing the Plan in early 2021.

c) the sub­mis­sion of the modi­fic­a­tions, pro­posed Plan (as mod­i­fied), Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al Record, SEA Envir­on­ment­al Report, and copy of advert­ise­ment of Notice of Inten­tion to Adopt the Plan to Scot­tish Min­is­ters by 26 Novem­ber 2020.

Back­ground

1. The Pro­posed Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP) was pub­lished for a con­sulta­tion peri­od which ran for 10 weeks from Janu­ary to April 2019. Dur­ing that peri­od, the Author­ity received a total of 288 rep­res­ent­a­tions from 207 indi­vidu­als and organ­isa­tions. All unre­solved rep­res­ent­a­tions were grouped into 12 broad Issues. The Nation­al Park Author­ity sum­mar­ised and respon­ded to these issues in the doc­u­ment known as a Sched­ule 4.

2. The Pro­posed LDP along with the Sched­ule 4 doc­u­ment and all oth­er sup­port­ing inform­a­tion was sub­mit­ted to Scot­tish Min­is­ters on Septem­ber 20^th 2019 and the exam­in­a­tion of unre­solved rep­res­ent­a­tions by Report­ers from Dir­ect­or­ate for Plan­ning and Envir­on­ment­al Appeals began on Decem­ber 30^th 2019. All mat­ters were dealt through writ­ten rep­res­ent­a­tions and no oral ses­sions were held. The Exam­in­a­tion Report and the Report­ers’ list of recom­men­ded changes was pub­lished on the 26^th August 2020. The exam­in­a­tion report is avail­able at: https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​w​p​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​/​u​p​l​o​a​d​s​/​2​0​2​0​/​0​8​/​R​e​p​o​r​t​-​o​f​-​e​x​a​m​i​n​a​t​i​o​n​-​d​a​t​e​d​-​2​4​-​A​u​g​u​s​t​-​2​0​2​0​_​7​0​4​6​3​7.pdf

3. The Nation­al Park Author­ity must now make the recom­men­ded changes to the Pro­posed Plan and sub­mit to Scot­tish Min­is­ters to request per­mis­sion to adopt it.

Sum­mary of Recom­men­ded Changes

1. The Report­ers have recom­men­ded 147 changes in total. Most of the changes are minor, set­ting out lim­ited changes to policy word­ing and sup­port­ing text which, for the most part, helps cla­ri­fy the inten­tions of the Plan. A sig­ni­fic­ant pro­por­tion of changes are also based on sug­ges­tions by the CNPA in response to unre­solved rep­res­ent­a­tions and were set out in the Sched­ule 4 doc­u­ment that was sub­mit­ted for exam­in­a­tion. Fur­ther changes were agreed between the Report­ers and the CNPA as a res­ult of requests for fur­ther information.

2. This sec­tion provides a sum­mary of the main points and recom­men­ded changes arising from the Exam­in­a­tion. Annex I is a revised ver­sion of the LDP with changes made and a full list of changes may be found in Annex 2 and 3.

Hous­ing

a) Report­ers were sup­port­ive of the CNPA’s approach to deliv­er­ing hous­ing, espe­cially afford­able hous­ing and were sat­is­fied that our evid­ence base sup­por­ted our policy decisions.

b) Report­ers agreed with the CNPA’s approach to cal­cu­lat­ing the Hous­ing Sup­ply Tar­gets (HST) and Hous­ing Land Require­ment (HLR), which sets out a 10% gen­er­os­ity level.

c) Minor changes are recom­men­ded to the HST based on up-dated com­ple­tions data. The new HST was cal­cu­lated by the CNPA and agreed by the report­er. The new HST is presen­ted in Table 1. To sum­mar­ise it has res­ul­ted in a slightly high­er HST in the Aber­deen­shire area and a slightly lower HST in the High­land area of the Nation­al Park. The Perth and Kinross area HST remains the same over­all, but with a slightly altered AH/MH mix. These changes only affect the 2020 – 24 peri­od of the Plan. No change was pro­posed for the Moray area HST.

Loc­al Author­ity	\multicolumn{3}{c	}{2020 – 2024}	\multicolumn{3}{c	}{2025 – 2029}	\multicolumn{3}{c	}{2030 – 2039 (Indic­at­ive target)}
	Mar­ket	Afford­able	Total	Mar­ket	Afford­able	Total	Mar­ket	Afford­able	Total
Aber­deen­shire	40	35	75	26	23	49	47	38	85
Angus	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
High­land	144	165	309	118	100	218	236	200	436
Moray	18	10	28	14	7	21	22	13	35
Perth & Kinross	13	14	27	9	7	16	18	14	32
Total	215	224	439	167	137	304	323	265	588

a) Report­ers were sat­is­fied that the CNPA has con­sidered loc­al need.

b) Report­er sup­por­ted the 45% Afford­able Hous­ing Require­ment in Aviemore, Bal­later, Brae­mar and Blair Atholl.

c) Report­er drew on policies with­in the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan to sup­port our pos­i­tion on the HST, HLR and afford­able hous­ing policy.

d) Report­ers agreed that the CNPA has done everything it can with­in the con­text of the LDP regard­ing Second Homes. Only a change in primary legis­la­tion would allow it to do more.

e) Report­ers did not agree with Policy 1.11 and our alloc­a­tion of long-term sites at North Aviemore. CNPA has been dir­ec­ted to delete the policy and sites LTH1 and LTH2. The Reporter’s rationale for this is that they did not think the policy or sites were required at this time as they cal­cu­lated that a five-year land sup­ply can still be met even if the An Camas Mór con­sent lapses and the devel­op­ment does not happen.

Eco­nom­ic Development

a) No sig­ni­fic­ant changes to this area of the Plan.

b) Report­er requires the Strath­spey Rail­way to be iden­ti­fied on Fig­ure 7, which iden­ti­fies import­ant eco­nom­ic sites with­in the Nation­al Park.

c) The term ​‘social impacts’ under policy 2.2 is being changed to ​‘amen­ity impacts’ as Report­ers feel this is less vague.

d) Report­ers recom­mend that a defin­i­tion of a ​‘hut’ to be added to glossary.

Design and Placemaking

a) No sig­ni­fic­ant changes to this area of the Plan.

b) Report­er recom­mends that a new cri­terion be added to policy 3.3: ​“pro­mote good health and well-being”.

Nat­ur­al Heritage

a) No sig­ni­fic­ant changes to this area of the Plan.

b) Main change is to amend ref­er­ences to Natura sites etc. to refer to ​“European Sites” and change oth­er word­ing to reflect leav­ing EU and the uncer­tain­ties therein.

c) Policy 4.3 on wood­lands changed in a num­ber of places. Main change reflects the Report­ers’ opin­ion that not all ancient wood­lands are on the AWI, so the policy is broadened to include these wood­lands. The policy to pro­tect wood­lands has there­fore been strengthened by the Reporters.

Land­scape

a) No sig­ni­fic­ant changes to this area of the Plan.

b) No changes to policy 5.1 but Report­ers recom­mend adding a ref­er­ence to wild land areas to the sup­port­ing text.

c) The new Policy 5.2 on hill tracks was sup­por­ted, but Report­ers require a minor change to cla­ri­fy that any new tracks must be essen­tial for land man­age­ment pur­poses; should not adversely affect any of the spe­cial qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park includ­ing wild­ness; and that remov­al of exist­ing tracks should only be con­sidered where appro­pri­ate. The policy has there­fore been strengthened by the Reporters.

Set­tle­ments and Sites

a) Aviemore — Report­ers do not believe there is much dif­fer­ence in identi­fy­ing An Camas Mór as Stra­tegic Set­tle­ment or Stra­tegic Con­sent so has not recom­mend a change in that regard.

b) Aviemore — Report­ers recom­mend adding An Camas Mór’s set­tle­ment object­ives, as found in the cur­rent LDP, into the site inform­a­tion in the new LDP.

c) Grant­own-on-Spey – Report­ers recom­mend draw­ing a more accur­ate line on the Set­tle­ment Map to rep­res­ent the Strath­spey Rail­way extension.

d) Grant­own-on-Spey – Report­er recom­mends an addi­tion to the site inform­a­tion for EDI to state that it has lim­ited devel­op­ment space due to need for land to accom­mod­ate new rail infrastructure.

e) Grant­own-on-Spey – Report­ers require new com­munity alloc­a­tion for site that has con­sent for allot­ments on Mossie Road.

f) Kin­gussie — Bound­ary of EDI to be expan­ded to encom­pass neigh­bour­ing busi­nesses which take access from Mar­ket Lane.

g) Bal­later — The prin­ciple of HI was sup­por­ted by Report­ers. How­ever, a change was recom­men­ded to estim­ated deliv­ery rate to match Aber­deen­shire Council’s latest Hous­ing Land Audit; this is slightly high­er than was pub­lished in the Pro­posed Plan. The site’s bound­ary remains as proposed.

h) Brae­mar — Over­all the scale of devel­op­ment agreed to be appro­pri­ate. How­ever, the Report­ers are dir­ect­ing the CNPA to delete H5 North Brae­mar. The Report­ers argue that there is already suf­fi­cient effect­ive hous­ing land in the Aber­deen­shire part of the Park to meet the HST and HLR.

i) Carr-Bridge — bound­ary and site info for HI: Carr Road to be amended to reflect the recent plan­ning con­sent (2019/0120/DET).

j) Kin­craig — HI remains as pro­posed with an addi­tion­al site require­ment about flooding.

k) Kin­craig – ED2, which the former A9 works com­pound is recom­men­ded to be deleted due to its land­scape impact and because the Report­ers were not con­vinced that it’s the right loc­a­tion for eco­nom­ic development.

l) Nethy­bridge – Report­ers agree that the former H1 site (as iden­ti­fied in the 2015 LDP) should be deleted as proposed.

m) Blair Atholl – new hous­ing site to be added to cov­er the con­sent for 8 units at Land North of Old Orch­ard (2019/0263/DET).

Implic­a­tions

1. The recom­mend­a­tions con­tained in Exam­in­a­tion Reports are largely bind­ing and plan­ning author­it­ies may depart from the recom­mend­a­tions only in spe­cif­ic defined cir­cum­stances. These are set out in Reg­u­la­tion 2 of the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Grounds for declin­ing to fol­low recom­mend­a­tions) (Scot­land) Reg­u­la­tions 2009 and Sec­tion 19(11) of the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 1997. The cir­cum­stances where author­it­ies may depart from recom­mend­a­tions are where the recommendation(s):

a) would have the effect of mak­ing the LDP incon­sist­ent with the Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work, or with any Stra­tegic Devel­op­ment Plan or Nation­al Park Plan for the same area;

b) is incom­pat­ible with Part IVA of the Con­ser­va­tion (Nat­ur­al Hab­it­ats etc.) Reg­u­la­tions 1994;

c) would not be accept­able hav­ing regard to an envir­on­ment­al assess­ment car­ried out by the plan­ning author­ity on the plan fol­low­ing modi­fic­a­tion in response to recommendations;

d) are based on con­clu­sions that could not reas­on­ably have been reached based on the evid­ence con­sidered at the Examination.

1. None of the Report­ers recom­mend­a­tions have been iden­ti­fied as meet­ing any of these cri­ter­ia and there­fore the CNPA is bound by them. None of the modi­fic­a­tions to the LDP mean sub­stant­ive changes to the con­tent or con­clu­sions of the Stra­tegic Envir­on­ment­al Assess­ment (SEA) or Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al (HRA) of the LDP.

Next Steps

1. Once the Board approve the mod­i­fied LDP for sub­mis­sion, the CNPA must pub­lish a notice in one or more loc­al news­pa­pers stating:

a) that the author­ity pro­pose to adopt the Pro­posed Plan;

b) wheth­er the plan has been mod­i­fied fol­low­ing the Exam­in­a­tion; and

c) where and when the plan (as mod­i­fied if appro­pri­ate) and the modi­fic­a­tions (if any) may be inspected.

1. The CNPA must make cop­ies of the mod­i­fied LDP avail­able to inspect at the plan­ning office and in all pub­lic lib­rar­ies and on the inter­net (clearly, pre­cau­tions around Cov­id-19 mean that access to pub­lic inspec­tion loc­a­tions is more lim­ited and access via the inter­net is the easi­est way for most people to view); and

2. The CNPA must noti­fy those who made rep­res­ent­a­tions on the Pro­posed Plan pri­or to the Exam­in­a­tion that the Pro­posed Plan has been pub­lished in the form in which the author­ity pro­pose to adopt it, and where and when it can be viewed.

3. By the 26^th Novem­ber, the CNPA must sub­mit the mod­i­fied LDP to Scot­tish Min­is­ters, along­side the fol­low­ing sup­port­ing documentation:

I. the modi­fic­a­tions made fol­low­ing receipt of the Exam­in­a­tion Report;

II. a state­ment set­ting out any recom­men­ded modi­fic­a­tions that the author­ity has not made and the explan­a­tion for this (by ref­er­ence to the grounds lis­ted above);

III. the Report of the Examination;

IV. the advert­ise­ment of their inten­tion to adopt the plan; and

V. any envir­on­ment­al assess­ment car­ried out into the Pro­posed Plan as modified.

1. 28 days after the Plan has been sub­mit­ted to Min­is­ters, the CNPA may adopt the plan unless dir­ec­ted not to by the Scot­tish Min­is­ters. Scot­tish Min­is­ters have a default power under the 1997 Act (sec­tion 20) to dir­ect the plan­ning author­ity to con­sider modi­fy­ing a LDP, or for Scot­tish Min­is­ters to approve the plan them­selves. Min­is­ters expect they will rarely use this power, how­ever it should be noted that they did dir­ect the CNPA to make a change to the cur­rent Plan 2015.

Recom­mend­a­tion

That the Board approve:

a) the modi­fic­a­tions pro­posed to the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan as a res­ult of the Exam­in­a­tion of the Plan and Report­ers’ Recom­mend­a­tions and pub­lic­a­tion of the pro­posed Plan (as modified);

b) the pub­lic­a­tion of notices and noti­fic­a­tion of those who made rep­res­ent­a­tions on the pro­posed Plan of the CNPA’s inten­tion to Adopt the Plan (as mod­i­fied) with a view to adopt­ing the Plan in early 2021.

c) the sub­mis­sion of the modi­fic­a­tions, pro­posed Plan (as mod­i­fied), Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al Record, SEA Envir­on­ment­al Report, and copy of advert­ise­ment of Notice of Inten­tion to Adopt the Plan to Scot­tish Min­is­ters by 26 Novem­ber 2020.

Dan Har­ris Gav­in Miles Novem­ber 2020 danharris@​cairngorms.​co.​uk gavinmiles@​cairngorms.​co.​uk

Annexes

1. Mod­i­fied LDP
2. Exam­in­a­tion Report
3. Report­ers Recom­mend­a­tions by Issue