Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021

PLAN­NING

1. Intro­duc­tion

1.1 The Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park is the main doc­u­ment which will influ­ence future built devel­op­ment in the Nation­al Park.

1.2 The plan­ning sys­tem is all about guid­ing new devel­op­ment – mak­ing sure we have enough land for devel­op­ment in the most appro­pri­ate loc­a­tions. This helps us to meet our needs for hous­ing, jobs and ser­vices at the same time as pro­tect­ing and enhan­cing our environment.

1.3 The plan­ning sys­tem in Scot­land is ​‘plan-led’. This means we must pre­pare a Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan set­ting out a strategy for future devel­op­ment. The Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan must include sites and pro­pos­als for devel­op­ment as well as the policies that are used to make decisions on applic­a­tions for plan­ning permission.

1.4 The Plan focuses on the five-year peri­od until 2025. How­ever, it also includes devel­op­ment pro­pos­als for the 10-year peri­od until 2030, as well as provid­ing a gen­er­al indic­a­tion of the likely scale and loc­a­tion of devel­op­ment as far as 20 years into the future.

1.5 The Plan focuses on built devel­op­ment and is one of a range of plans and strategies (see more detail in ​‘Links to oth­er strategies’ p9) that helps us man­age the devel­op­ment and use of land to deliv­er the four stat­utory aims of Scot­tish Nation­al Parks1:

• to con­serve and enhance the nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al her­it­age of the area;
• to pro­mote sus­tain­able use of the nat­ur­al resources of the area;
• to pro­mote under­stand­ing and enjoy­ment (includ­ing enjoy­ment in the form of recre­ation) of the spe­cial qual­it­ies of the area by the pub­lic; and
• to pro­mote sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic and social devel­op­ment of the area’s communities.

1.6 The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity (CNPA) must work to deliv­er these aims col­lect­ively. How­ever, if when car­ry­ing out any of our func­tions it appears to us that there is a con­flict between the first aim and any of the oth­ers, we must give great­er weight to the first aim2. This is a sus­tain­able devel­op­ment approach in which con­ser­va­tion of the nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al her­it­age under­pins the eco­nom­ic and recre­ation­al value of the Nation­al Park.

How to Use the Plan

1.7 The Plan has five sec­tions: Intro­duc­tion; Vis­ion; Spa­tial Strategy; Policies; and Com­munity Inform­a­tion. Each sec­tion provides import­ant inform­a­tion. Togeth­er, they explain the future devel­op­ment strategy for the Nation­al Park and out­line the policies and site alloc­a­tions that will be used to assess plan­ning applications.

1.8 The Policies sec­tion con­tains three gen­er­al types of policies:

• Park-wide policies that apply to all new devel­op­ments in the Nation­al Park;
• map-based policies that apply to devel­op­ments in spe­cif­ic areas; and
• top­ic-based policies that apply to spe­cif­ic types of devel­op­ment (e.g. hous­ing, eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment etc).

1.9 A num­ber of the policies are sup­por­ted by Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance which provides extra detail on the use and applic­a­tion of the policy. This Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance has the same weight in decision mak­ing as the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan itself.

1.10 The Com­munity Inform­a­tion sec­tion includes guid­ance for all of the defined set­tle­ments in the Nation­al Park. It iden­ti­fies sites that are appro­pri­ate for spe­cif­ic types of devel­op­ment as well as import­ant open spaces that should be pro­tec­ted from development.

1.11 If you are inter­ested in a par­tic­u­lar com­munity, or a site with­in a defined set­tle­ment, we recom­mend that you read the Com­munity Inform­a­tion sec­tion before refer­ring to any rel­ev­ant policies in the Policies section.

1.12 If you are inter­ested in a par­tic­u­lar sub­ject, or a site that is not with­in a defined set­tle­ment, we would recom­mend that you refer to the Policies sec­tion in the first instance.

1.13 It is import­ant to remem­ber that plan­ning applic­a­tions will be assessed against all rel­ev­ant parts of the Plan. If you are apply­ing for plan­ning per­mis­sion you should look at all of the policies and site alloc­a­tions that are rel­ev­ant to your pro­pos­al and make sure your devel­op­ment com­plies with them all.

Approach to Plan­ning in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park

1.14 In the Cairngorms Nation­al Park, more than in any oth­er part of Scot­land, there is a part­ner­ship approach to plan­ning. The CNPA and the five rel­ev­ant loc­al author­it­ies — Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil, Angus Coun­cil, Moray Coun­cil, Perth & Kinross Coun­cil and The High­land Coun­cil — all play a key role in mak­ing the plan­ning sys­tem work effectively.

1.15 The CNPA sets the plan­ning policy frame­work for the Nation­al Park. This is achieved through the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan and the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan. All plan­ning applic­a­tions in the Park are determ­ined in line with this policy framework.

1.16 How­ever, plan­ning applic­a­tions are sub­mit­ted in the first instance to the rel­ev­ant loc­al author­ity. The CNPA then ​‘calls in’ and determ­ines the most sig­ni­fic­ant plan­ning applic­a­tions for the Park (gen­er­ally around 10% of all applic­a­tions), leav­ing the remainder to be determ­ined by the loc­al authorities3.

Links to Oth­er Strategies

1.17 The Plan is not pro­duced in isol­a­tion. It is one of a num­ber of key strategies which togeth­er form the policy con­text for the man­age­ment of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park, as shown in Fig­ure 2 (see oppos­ite). It is influ­enced by, and in turn influ­ences, a range of oth­er documents.

1.18 One of the key doc­u­ments that guides the con­tent of the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan is the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan.

1.19 The Part­ner­ship Plan is the over­arch­ing man­age­ment plan for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park which is approved by Scot­tish Min­is­ters. It sets out the vis­ion and over-arch­ing strategy for man­aging the Nation­al Park, as well as identi­fy­ing pri­or­it­ies for action and an over­all stra­tegic policy framework.

1.20 Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment guid­ance states that Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plans for Nation­al Parks should be con­sist­ent with the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan. The Part­ner­ship Plan there­fore provides the stra­tegic con­text for the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan, and the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan will help to deliv­er a num­ber of the Part­ner­ship Plan’s policies and priorities.

2. Vis­ion

2.1 The Plan shares the long-term vis­ion for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park that is set out in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan: ​“An out­stand­ing Nation­al Park, enjoyed and val­ued by every­one, where nature and people thrive together.”

2.2 The Part­ner­ship Plan also sets out the fol­low­ing long-term out­comes for the Nation­al Park:

• Con­ser­va­tion – a spe­cial place for people and nature with nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al her­it­age enhanced
• Vis­it­or exper­i­ence – people enjoy­ing the Park through out­stand­ing vis­it­or and learn­ing experiences
• Rur­al devel­op­ment – a sus­tain­able eco­nomy sup­port­ing thriv­ing busi­nesses and communities

2.3 The Plan will help to deliv­er these long-term out­comes by mak­ing sure:

• the spe­cial qual­it­ies of the Park are pro­tec­ted from devel­op­ment that would sig­ni­fic­antly erode or harm them, and are enhanced by new devel­op­ment where possible;
• new devel­op­ment helps to rein­force the val­ued built her­it­age of the Park and the com­munit­ies with­in it;
• new or improved vis­it­or infra­struc­ture is sup­por­ted where appro­pri­ate and integ­rated with oth­er vis­it­or sites, ser­vices and communities;
• new devel­op­ment is well con­nec­ted to core paths and oth­er off-road routes, as well as cre­at­ing attract­ive places to live and visit;
• there is suf­fi­cient land for hous­ing to meet iden­ti­fied need and demand, includ­ing for inward migra­tion of workers;
• more afford­able hous­ing is provided to sup­port growth in the work­ing age pop­u­la­tion and help address the hous­ing pres­sures faced by young people;
• the neces­sary land and sup­port for busi­ness devel­op­ment and diver­si­fic­a­tion is provided;
• there are sites for future devel­op­ment that sup­port attract­ive, vibrant com­munit­ies and that min­im­ise the need to use energy; and
• there is clear guid­ance on where, when and how the best devel­op­ment will be supported.

3. Spa­tial Strategy

3.1 The set­tle­ments of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park are linked by a net­work of roads. The A9 trunk road runs along the west­ern and north­ern edges of the Park, link­ing areas to the south and north as well as con­nect­ing to the A86 and A96 trunk roads. The Perth to Inverness rail line also links com­munit­ies around the west­ern and north­ern edges of the Park as well as provid­ing con­nec­tions bey­ond to both the north and south. Pro­pos­als to dual the A9 from Perth to Inverness, along with pro­posed upgrades to the High­land Main Line, will strengthen and improve these connections.

3.2 The dualling of the A9 is one of Scotland’s largest infra­struc­ture pro­grammes, involving upgrad­ing 80 miles of road from single to dual car­riage­way between Perth and Inverness. The £3 bil­lion pro­gramme is being developed by Trans­port Scot­land and is designed to deliv­er eco­nom­ic growth through improved road safety and quick­er jour­ney times, as well as bet­ter links to ped­es­tri­an, cyc­ling and pub­lic trans­port facil­it­ies. The route is being delivered in elev­en sec­tions, sev­en of which are loc­ated entirely or partly in the Nation­al Park. It is cur­rently sched­uled for com­ple­tion in 2025. In addi­tion to the improve­ments to the road for vehicles, the upgrades to a par­al­lel route for non-motor­ised users, par­tic­u­larly cyc­lists and walk­ers, will make a sig­ni­fic­ant con­tri­bu­tion to func­tion­al trans­port on a safe off-road route between many of the com­munit­ies in the Nation­al Park.

3.3 In addi­tion, the A9 has been des­ig­nated an ​‘Elec­tric High­way’ as part of the Scot­tish Government’s vis­ion to phase out the need for new pet­rol and dies­el cars and vans by 2032. This is expec­ted to res­ult in the install­a­tion of elec­tric vehicle char­ging hubs with­in com­munit­ies along the A9 route to provide char­ging options for long dis­tance trav­el­lers as well as loc­al busi­nesses and residents.

3.4 Pro­pos­als to upgrade the High­land Main Line are also cur­rently being pre­pared to improve rail con­nec­tions between the north of Scot­land and the cent­ral belt. The long-term goal of this pro­ject is to achieve a fast­est jour­ney time of 2 hours and 45 minutes between Inverness and the cent­ral belt, with an aver­age jour­ney time of 3 hours, and to deliv­er an hourly ser­vice by 2019.

3.5 Once com­pleted these trans­port upgrades are likely to increase the access­ib­il­ity of some set­tle­ments with­in the Nation­al Park, includ­ing by link­ing them more effect­ively to key loc­a­tions out­with the Park such as Inverness and Perth. This is likely to increase the demand for devel­op­ment in some areas and could bring increased oppor­tun­it­ies for inward invest­ment with­in the Park.

3.6 There are clear oppor­tun­it­ies for growth and devel­op­ment with­in and around the exist­ing set­tle­ments of the Park, both to main­tain their status and to provide the new homes, busi­nesses and oth­er facil­it­ies that are needed to ensure their future sustainability.

3.7 Most of the land out­side the Park’s main set­tle­ments is farm­land, moor­land, forestry, wood­land and moun­tain that is val­ued for nature, recre­ation and land man­age­ment activ­it­ies. How­ever, with­in the main val­leys of the Nation­al Park, this land is also import­ant for rur­al hous­ing and for a wide range of busi­nesses. There are oppor­tun­it­ies for the devel­op­ment of afford­able hous­ing, new busi­ness and for the diver­si­fic­a­tion of exist­ing busi­nesses with­in these land­scapes. There are also oppor­tun­it­ies for devel­op­ment that enables sig­ni­fic­ant envir­on­ment­al bene­fits and enhancements.

3.8 The Plan is there­fore based on an over­all devel­op­ment strategy which focuses most devel­op­ment to the main set­tle­ments of the Nation­al Park – Aviemore, Bal­later, Grant­own-on-Spey, Kin­gussie and New­ton­more. These set­tle­ments are referred to as ​‘stra­tegic settlements’.

3.9 The devel­op­ment strategy also includes the pro­vi­sion of a new set­tle­ment at An Camas Mòr. As a new com­munity of 1,500 homes and asso­ci­ated devel­op­ment, An Camas Mòr will make a sig­ni­fic­ant con­tri­bu­tion towards meet­ing the need for hous­ing and busi­ness devel­op­ment with­in the High­land Coun­cil area of the Park. Over time, An Camas Mòr will become a new stra­tegic set­tle­ment in its own right.

3.10 In addi­tion to the stra­tegic set­tle­ments, the devel­op­ment strategy also iden­ti­fies ​‘inter­me­di­ate set­tle­ments’ and ​‘rur­al set­tle­ments’. Inter­me­di­ate set­tle­ments will accom­mod­ate devel­op­ment to meet wider needs, albeit at a more mod­est scale than with­in the stra­tegic set­tle­ments, whilst devel­op­ment in rur­al set­tle­ments will primar­ily be aimed at meet­ing loc­al need.

3.11 Out­side of the defined set­tle­ments, the devel­op­ment strategy will enable small-scale expan­sion of exist­ing groups of build­ings in rur­al areas, deliv­ery of afford­able hous­ing and the devel­op­ment of new and diver­si­fied rur­al busi­nesses. For those who own sig­ni­fic­ant areas of land, the devel­op­ment strategy provides an oppor­tun­ity to plan in the long term for rur­al hous­ing, busi­ness devel­op­ment and envir­on­ment­al enhance­ments across their estates.

3.12 The devel­op­ment strategy is shown in Fig­ure 3 (p17).

4. Policies

Over­view

4.1 The policies in this sec­tion of the Plan provide a frame­work to man­age devel­op­ment. They form the basis for mak­ing decisions on plan­ning applic­a­tions in a way that will deliv­er the vis­ion and long-term object­ives of the Plan.

4.2 It is import­ant to remem­ber that plan­ning applic­a­tions will be assessed against all rel­ev­ant parts of the Plan. If you are apply­ing for plan­ning per­mis­sion you should look at all of the policies that are rel­ev­ant to your pro­pos­al and make sure your devel­op­ment com­plies with them all.

4.3 You should also refer to the Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance which provides extra detail on the use and applic­a­tion of some of the policies. This Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance has the same weight in decision mak­ing as the Plan policies. The policies provide clear cross ref­er­ences to rel­ev­ant Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance.

4.4 The plan­ning author­ity may require addi­tion­al inform­a­tion or sur­veys to ensure that suf­fi­cient and up to date inform­a­tion is avail­able to enable a timely decision to be taken on your pro­posed devel­op­ment. We would strongly advise you to seek pre-applic­a­tion advice to ensure any require­ments for addi­tion­al inform­a­tion are con­sidered before you sub­mit a plan­ning application.

Rela­tion­ship with the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan

4.5 The policies of the Plan will sup­port the deliv­ery of the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan. Fig­ures 4 and 5 (pp20-21) show the rela­tion­ship between the Plan policies and the Part­ner­ship Plan’s nine key pri­or­it­ies and over­all policy framework.

POLICY 1: NEW HOUS­ING DEVELOPMENT

1.1 Hous­ing deliv­ery in set­tle­ments Pro­pos­als for hous­ing will be sup­por­ted where they are loc­ated: a) on an iden­ti­fied alloc­ated site; or b) with­in an iden­ti­fied set­tle­ment bound­ary. All pro­pos­als for hous­ing will need to: a) meet the require­ments for the set­tle­ment as out­lined in the Com­munity Inform­a­tion sec­tion; and b) rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of the settlement.

1.2 Hous­ing devel­op­ment in exist­ing rur­al groups Pro­pos­als for new hous­ing devel­op­ment which adds to an exist­ing rur­al group (three or more build­ings where at least one of which is a dwell­ing house) will be con­sidered favour­ably where: a) they con­nect to, rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of the group, integ­rat­ing with the exist­ing built form and pat­tern of exist­ing devel­op­ment; and b) do not add more than one third to the exist­ing num­ber of build­ings in the group with­in the Plan peri­od (based on the size of the group on the date of Plan adoption).

1.3 Oth­er hous­ing in the coun­tryside Pro­pos­als will be sup­por­ted where they rein­force the exist­ing pat­tern of devel­op­ment, and: a) are neces­sary for or improve the oper­a­tion­al and eco­nom­ic viab­il­ity of an act­ive busi­ness which has a loc­a­tion­al require­ment dir­ectly linked to the coun­tryside; or b) are on a rur­al brown­field site.

1.4 Design­ing for afford­ab­il­ity and spe­cial­ist needs Res­id­en­tial devel­op­ment will be required to provide a mix of dwell­ing types and sizes to help secure a bal­anced hous­ing stock, with an emphas­is on smal­ler dwellings.

1.5 Afford­able hous­ing Devel­op­ments con­sist­ing of four or more dwell­ings should include pro­vi­sion for afford­able hous­ing amount­ing to: a) 45% of the total num­ber of dwell­ings on the devel­op­ment site in the set­tle­ments of Aviemore, Bal­later, Blair Atholl and Brae­mar; b) 25% of the total num­ber of dwell­ings on the devel­op­ment site in all oth­er areas of the Nation­al Park. Pro­pos­als for few­er than four mar­ket dwell­ings will also be required to make a con­tri­bu­tion towards afford­able hous­ing. This will be a mon­et­ary pay­ment towards meet­ing hous­ing need in the loc­al com­munity. Developers seek­ing to nego­ti­ate a reduc­tion in afford­able hous­ing pro­vi­sion must demon­strate through a Viab­il­ity Assess­ment that the require­ments make an oth­er­wise com­mer­cially viable pro­pos­al unviable.

1.6 Afford­able hous­ing excep­tion sites Devel­op­ment of 100% afford­able hous­ing sites will be sup­por­ted in loc­a­tions that would not nor­mally be used for hous­ing only where: i) it is jus­ti­fied by evid­ence of unmet loc­al need at that loc­a­tion and; ii) the hous­ing is designed to address that need. Any plan­ning applic­a­tions for such hous­ing must be accom­pan­ied by evid­ence of the unmet loc­al need at that loc­a­tion such as com­munity needs assess­ments, hous­ing needs and demand assess­ments or oth­er rel­ev­ant inform­a­tion avail­able at the time of the application.

In excep­tion­al cases where the deliv­ery of 100% afford­able hous­ing is not viable, a lim­ited amount of open mar­ket hous­ing may be sup­por­ted to cross-sub­sid­ise the afford­able hous­ing provid­ing evid­ence shows that: a) the whole devel­op­ment com­prises a min­im­um of two afford­able houses; and b) the open mar­ket ele­ment is the min­im­um required to provide the neces­sary sub­sidy to facil­it­ate the devel­op­ment of the afford­able ele­ment; and c) the afford­able hous­ing could not be delivered without the input of the sub­sidy provided by the open mar­ket ele­ment of the proposal.

1.7 Alter­a­tions to exist­ing houses Pro­pos­als will be sup­por­ted where: a) the appear­ance and char­ac­ter of the dwell­ing and the sur­round­ing area is pro­tec­ted or enhanced; and b) appro­pri­ate and pro­por­tion­ate pro­vi­sion of private garden is main­tained; and c) adequate off street park­ing and vehicu­lar access to the prop­erty is maintained.

1.8 Con­ver­sions Con­ver­sion of exist­ing tra­di­tion­al and ver­nacu­lar build­ings to hous­ing will be sup­por­ted where: a) it is demon­strated that the build­ing is cap­able of the pro­posed con­ver­sion works; and b) it main­tains the style and char­ac­ter of the ori­gin­al build­ing in terms of form, scale, mater­i­als and detail­ing, where they con­trib­ute pos­it­ively to the con­text and set­ting of the area.

1.9 Replace­ment houses Pro­pos­als to replace exist­ing hous­ing stock will be sup­por­ted where the new house incor­por­ates the foot­print of the ori­gin­al, unless an altern­at­ive adja­cent site would min­im­ise any neg­at­ive envir­on­ment­al, land­scape or amen­ity effects of the development.

1.10 Hous­ing for gypsies, trav­el­lers and trav­el­ling show people Pro­pos­als for the devel­op­ment of sites for gypsies, trav­el­lers and trav­el­ling show people will be favour­ably con­sidered where the need and loc­a­tion have been iden­ti­fied in the rel­ev­ant Loc­al Author­ity Hous­ing Strategy.

What the Policy Aims to Do

4.6 Main­tain­ing high-qual­ity places where com­munit­ies can be sus­tain­able and thrive is key to the long-term suc­cess of the Nation­al Park. This should be under­taken in a way that makes the best use of resources, is com­pat­ible with the unique nat­ur­al her­it­age and land­scape qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park, integ­rates with ser­vices and facil­it­ies, and pro­motes the highest stand­ards in design and envir­on­ment­al quality.

4.7 We want to enable and act­ively sup­port the deliv­ery of new hous­ing which is afford­able and meets com­munity needs, in turn sup­port­ing and grow­ing the eco­nomy. While most growth is focused in major set­tle­ments all com­munit­ies should have some options for new hous­ing and every­one should be able to see what those oppor­tun­it­ies are in the next 5 – 20 years.

4.8 While the loc­al author­ity Hous­ing Need and Demand Assess­ments (HNDAs) reveal hous­ing need and demand in the wider hous­ing mar­ket areas which cov­er the Park, they do not set any form­al hous­ing sup­ply tar­gets for the Park. How­ever, in order to sup­port sus­tain­able rur­al com­munit­ies, it is import­ant to plan for more hous­ing in the Park. This needs to be a real­ist­ic assump­tion of what can be delivered whilst ensur­ing a gen­er­ous sup­ply of land is avail­able to ensure that new hous­ing is delivered.

4.9 We have there­fore iden­ti­fied Hous­ing Sup­ply Tar­gets and Hous­ing Land Require­ments for the Nation­al Park up to the year 2030 (10 years from the anti­cip­ated date of ​‘adop­tion’ which is 2020 — when the Plan has been fully agreed and comes into full force). The total Hous­ing Land Require­ment over this term, which is based on a gen­er­os­ity level of 10% above the Hous­ing Sup­ply Tar­get, is 819 units (see Tables I and 2). The HNDA pro­cess has not iden­ti­fied any need to alloc­ate land in the Nation­al Park for gypsy, trav­el­ler or trav­el­ling show people accom­mod­a­tion. In the event that this situ­ation should change dur­ing the life­time of the plan any new devel­op­ment would be assessed under Policy 1.10.

4.10 Indic­at­ive Hous­ing Sup­ply Tar­gets and Hous­ing Land Require­ments have also been iden­ti­fied for the peri­od from 2030 to 2039 in line with Scot­tish Plan­ning Policy require­ments. These only provide an indic­a­tion of the amount of hous­ing that may be needed dur­ing this time peri­od, as the tar­gets and require­ments for this peri­od will be reviewed through future Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plans.

4.11 In order to meet the over­all Hous­ing Land Require­ment, the Plan alloc­ates a range of hous­ing sites that are effect­ive or expec­ted to become effect­ive dur­ing the Plan peri­od. Alloc­a­tions have been made to meet the Hous­ing Land Require­ment in full in all loc­al author­ity areas except Moray and Perth & Kinross. In these areas, oth­er sites with exist­ing plan­ning con­sents, as well as wind­fall devel­op­ments, are expec­ted to con­trib­ute towards meet­ing the full require­ment. Appendix 1 (p214) provides a table show­ing the con­tri­bu­tion that the Plan’s hous­ing alloc­a­tions are expec­ted to make towards meet­ing the Hous­ing Land Requirement.

4.12 The hous­ing policies will enable good qual­ity hous­ing devel­op­ment that meets the needs of com­munit­ies and sup­ports eco­nom­ic and com­munity devel­op­ment. They will allow the right amount of growth, in the right place, meet­ing the demands of all sec­tions of our com­munit­ies in a sus­tain­able way, while allow­ing choice and incre­ment­al growth to meet loc­al demand.

4.13 The policies par­tic­u­larly aim to sup­port the growth of the work­ing age pop­u­la­tion. It is cur­rently hard for many people that work with­in the Nation­al Park to access hous­ing on the open mar­ket as aver­age incomes are rel­at­ively low and house prices are high. Many busi­nesses in the Nation­al Park report prob­lems with recruit­ing and retain­ing staff because of high hous­ing costs. The policies there­fore aim to increase the amount of afford­able hous­ing provided in new devel­op­ments, as well as ensur­ing a bet­ter mix of house types and sizes with­in the open mar­ket ele­ment of new devel­op­ments. As a con­sequence, more new hous­ing should be access­ible to people work­ing with­in the Nation­al Park. This, in turn, should sup­port the eco­nomy and help loc­al busi­nesses to recruit and retain staff.

4.14 Pro­pos­als for staff accom­mod­a­tion asso­ci­ated with spe­cif­ic busi­nesses will be sup­por­ted where they meet the policies of the Plan.

4.15 Con­sid­er­a­tion also needs to be giv­en to the aging and dis­abled pop­u­la­tion of the Nation­al Park. Pro­pos­als should demon­strate how they will sup­port the deliv­ery of spe­cial­ist hous­ing, such as access­ible or extra-care hous­ing. This may form part of the afford­able hous­ing require­ment, for example where a spe­cial­ist prop­erty is needed by a hous­ing association.

Rela­tion­ship with the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan

4.16 This hous­ing policy will con­trib­ute to the Part­ner­ship Plan’s long-term Rur­al Devel­op­ment out­come and is con­sist­ent with its Rur­al Devel­op­ment policy frame­work. It will spe­cific­ally sup­port Part­ner­ship Plan Policy 3.1, which aims to main­tain or grow the work­ing age pop­u­la­tion of the Park, and Pri­or­ity 7, which is aimed at: a) redu­cing the pro­por­tion of second homes in new devel­op­ments by ensur­ing that new hous­ing devel­op­ment is tar­geted at meet­ing loc­al needs as far as pos­sible; b) max­im­ising the pro­por­tion of new hous­ing that is afford­able in per­petu­ity; c) identi­fy­ing sites in the next Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan where the afford­able hous­ing con­tri­bu­tion will be more than the nor­mal nation­al max­im­um of 25% because of acute afford­ab­il­ity pres­sures and the short­age of sup­ply; d) using the next Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan to man­age the nature of new open mar­ket hous­ing so it is bet­ter tar­geted towards loc­al needs (e.g. by seek­ing a great­er mix of house types and sizes, with an emphas­is towards smal­ler homes in new devel­op­ments); e) apply­ing flex­ible plan­ning policies to pro­mote major­ity afford­able hous­ing devel­op­ments and encour­age the use of innov­at­ive deliv­ery mod­els to max­im­ise the num­ber of afford­able homes that are built; f) tar­get­ing pub­lic sec­tor fund­ing towards the Nation­al Park and to sites with the greatest poten­tial for deliv­er­ing afford­able housing.

Apply­ing the Policy

4.17 The policy will be used to approve appro­pri­ate hous­ing devel­op­ment which sup­ports sus­tain­able com­munit­ies. All new devel­op­ment should rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of its sur­round­ings. The policy will be used in con­junc­tion with oth­er polices to ensure devel­op­ment is well designed, and does not have any adverse impact on the fea­tures of nat­ur­al or cul­tur­al her­it­age import­ant to the Nation­al Park.

4.18 All applic­ants should demon­strate how their devel­op­ment sup­ports the sus­tain­ab­il­ity of the loc­al com­munity. Devel­op­ments will need to care­fully reflect or com­ple­ment the scale, mater­i­als and details of exist­ing development.

4.19 All hous­ing devel­op­ments must make a con­tri­bu­tion towards the pro­vi­sion of afford­able hous­ing to meet the needs of com­munit­ies in the Park. The policy will be used to ensure as many afford­able houses are built in the Nation­al Park as pos­sible, to address the ongo­ing issue of lack of sup­ply of the right type of hous­ing to meet com­munity needs.

4.20 Evid­ence shows that whilst afford­ab­il­ity pres­sures vary over time, the set­tle­ments of Aviemore, Bal­later, Brae­mar and Blair Atholl have con­sist­ently exper­i­enced the highest house price to income ratios. They also have amongst the highest levels of second home own­er­ship, which tends to exacer­bate afford­ab­il­ity pres­sures and lim­its the amount of hous­ing that is avail­able to people work­ing with­in the Nation­al Park. The afford­able hous­ing policy there­fore has a spa­tial ele­ment through which a high­er con­tri­bu­tion will be required in these areas (see Fig­ure 6, p29).

4.21 It is recog­nised that a mix of ten­ures and sizes of unit is the key to achiev­ing the best form of devel­op­ment to meet loc­al need. In apply­ing the policy, pro­pos­als will be assessed to meas­ure the range of ten­ures in a vari­ety of sizes, depend­ing on site, demand and mar­ket con­di­tions. This mix could include: social ren­ted hous­ing provided through pub­lic sub­sidy; low cost home own­er­ship and/​or rent options provided through pub­lic sub­sidy or the developer; afford­able private ren­ted hous­ing; and ser­viced plots for the loc­al market.

4.22 Afford­able dwell­ings will be required to be of a mod­est size that is com­men­sur­ate to the needs of the house­hold that will occupy them.

4.23 If a developer con­siders that the level of afford­able hous­ing being sought will render an oth­er­wise com­mer­cially viable pro­pos­al to be unvi­able, they must demon­strate this by provid­ing a Viab­il­ity Assess­ment to the Author­ity. This assess­ment must be veri­fied by a Dis­trict Valu­er to enable the Author­ity to review the level of con­tri­bu­tion required. The developer must demon­strate through an ​‘open book’ con­fid­en­tial basis that the afford­able hous­ing require­ment makes the devel­op­ment com­mer­cially unviable.

4.24 Hous­ing devel­op­ment should max­im­ise oppor­tun­it­ies for infill, con­ver­sion, small-scale devel­op­ment, and the redevel­op­ment or reuse of derel­ict and under­used land.

4.25 For cases involving the replace­ment of an exist­ing house, if you do not pro­pose to sal­vage and reuse mater­i­als from the ori­gin­al build­ing you must provide a reasoned jus­ti­fic­a­tion. All pro­pos­als to replace an exist­ing house must ensure the ori­gin­al dwell­ing is demol­ished or becomes ancil­lary to the new dwell­ing. Any pro­pos­al that will res­ult in the loss of a lis­ted build­ing or unlis­ted build­ing with­in a con­ser­va­tion area that makes a pos­it­ive con­tri­bu­tion to its char­ac­ter will need to com­ply with Policy 9.

POLICY 2: SUP­PORT­ING ECO­NOM­IC GROWTH

2.1 Town Centres First Pro­pos­als for high foot­fall gen­er­at­ing devel­op­ments, includ­ing retail, com­mer­cial, leis­ure, offices and com­munity facil­it­ies, will be sup­por­ted where they are loc­ated in a way which uses a sequen­tial approach to site selec­tion: a) with­in an iden­ti­fied town centre; b) with­in iden­ti­fied set­tle­ment bound­ar­ies; c) out­with set­tle­ments where the devel­op­ment sup­ports the eco­nom­ic vital­ity and viab­il­ity of that com­munity. Devel­op­ments should have no adverse impact on neigh­bour­ing prop­er­ties and should sup­port the vibrancy, vital­ity and viab­il­ity of exist­ing town centres or set­tle­ments. Excep­tions to this should demon­strate social or com­munity need for the pro­pos­al. The poten­tial cumu­lat­ive impact of sim­il­ar pro­pos­als will also be taken into account.

2.2 Tour­ist accom­mod­a­tion Pro­pos­als for tour­ist related accom­mod­a­tion, oth­er than dwell­ings built to res­id­en­tial stand­ards, will be sup­por­ted where they: a) have no adverse envir­on­ment­al or amen­ity impacts on the site or neigh­bour­ing areas; and b) con­trib­ute to/​support the pro­vi­sion of a wide range of vis­it­or accom­mod­a­tion options includ­ing low cost accom­mod­a­tion; and c) sup­port or con­trib­ute to a year-round economy.

2.3 Oth­er tour­ism and leis­ure devel­op­ments Devel­op­ment which enhances form­al and inform­al recre­ation and leis­ure facil­it­ies; tour­ism and leis­ure-based busi­ness activ­it­ies and attrac­tions; and improved oppor­tun­it­ies for respons­ible out­door access will be sup­por­ted where: a) it has no adverse envir­on­ment­al or amen­ity impacts on the site or neigh­bour­ing areas; and b) it makes a pos­it­ive con­tri­bu­tion to the exper­i­ence of vis­it­ors; and c) it sup­ports or con­trib­utes to a year-round economy.

2.4 Oth­er eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment Pro­pos­als which sup­port or extend the eco­nomy, or which enhance the range and qual­ity of eco­nom­ic oppor­tun­it­ies or facil­it­ies, will be con­sidered favour­ably where they: a) have no adverse envir­on­ment­al or amen­ity impacts on the site or neigh­bour­ing areas; and b) are compatible/​complementary with exist­ing busi­ness activ­ity in the area; and c) sup­port the vital­ity and viab­il­ity of the loc­al eco­nomy. Devel­op­ments that con­trib­ute to the pro­vi­sion of an iden­ti­fied loc­al eco­nom­ic need, such as the pro­vi­sion of small busi­ness units, or con­trib­ute to the deliv­ery of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Eco­nom­ic Action Plan, will be par­tic­u­larly encouraged.

2.5 Pro­tect­ing exist­ing eco­nom­ic activ­ity Pro­pos­als for the altern­at­ive use of alloc­ated eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment or tour­ism sites and non-alloc­ated sites or build­ings cur­rently in, or last used for, eco­nom­ic, employ­ment or tour­ism pur­poses will only be sup­por­ted where: a) it is sat­is­fact­or­ily demon­strated that it is not prac­tic­al for fin­an­cial or oth­er reas­ons to sus­tain the exist­ing or last eco­nom­ic, employ­ment or tour­ism use; or b) the site or build­ings are unsuit­able for the busi­ness needs and impact adversely on the built or nat­ur­al envir­on­ment, loc­al char­ac­ter or neigh­bour­ing properties.

What the Policy Aims to Do

4.26 The policy aims to enable and encour­age appro­pri­ate eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment with­in the Nation­al Park that con­trib­utes to the sus­tain­able growth of its eco­nomy. Eco­nom­ic growth is cent­ral in sus­tain­ing the long-term vital­ity and viab­il­ity of the Nation­al Park’s towns and com­munit­ies and retain­ing young people in this rur­al area.

4.27 This policy pro­motes sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic growth which meets the needs of com­munit­ies and pro­motes the Nation­al Park as a place to invest. The eco­nomy of the Nation­al Park is based on a num­ber of sec­tors includ­ing land man­age­ment, recre­ation and food and drink, how­ever tour­ism is the most sig­ni­fic­ant sec­tor. These sec­tors are import­ant for the sus­tain­ab­il­ity of the Nation­al Park’s eco­nomy and oppor­tun­it­ies to sup­port, enhance and diver­si­fy them are encouraged.

4.28 This policy aims to sup­port new and exist­ing busi­nesses by cre­at­ing a flex­ible frame­work which allows the best eco­nom­ic devel­op­ments to thrive and prosper. It also encour­ages oth­er oppor­tun­it­ies which under­pin, diver­si­fy and bene­fit the eco­nomy and ensure it can grow. It aims to pro­mote the Nation­al Park as a good place to invest whilst pro­tect­ing the spe­cial qual­it­ies that make it so attractive.

Rela­tion­ship with the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan

4.29 This Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth policy will con­trib­ute to the Part­ner­ship Plan’s long-term Rur­al Devel­op­ment out­come and is con­sist­ent with its Rur­al Devel­op­ment policy frame­work. It will spe­cific­ally sup­port Part­ner­ship Plan Pri­or­ity 9 and Policy 3.1, which is aimed at: a) sup­port­ing the diver­si­fic­a­tion of exist­ing land-based busi­nesses; b) encour­aging growth of busi­ness sec­tors that draw on the spe­cial qual­it­ies of the Park such as sus­tain­able tour­ism and food and drink; c) broad­en­ing the eco­nom­ic base of the Park into sec­tors such as cre­at­ive indus­tries, renew­able energy, and mak­ing stronger links with high­er and fur­ther edu­ca­tion; d) increased pro­vi­sion for busi­ness land where there is an iden­ti­fied need and demand; and e) sup­port­ing the use of land for small busi­ness, par­tic­u­larly with­in settlements.

Apply­ing the Policy

4.30 The policy will be used to sup­port appro­pri­ate eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment which encour­ages sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic growth whilst pro­tect­ing com­munit­ies from inap­pro­pri­ate devel­op­ment and help­ing to keep them vibrant and sus­tain­able. All pro­pos­als must be appro­pri­ate and com­pat­ible with their sur­round­ings, and con­trib­ute to sup­port­ing a year-round eco­nomy. This policy will be used in con­junc­tion with oth­er policies in the Plan to ensure devel­op­ment is well designed, and does not have any adverse impact on the fea­tures of nat­ur­al or cul­tur­al her­it­age import­ant to the Nation­al Park.

4.31 Town Centres First Pro­pos­als for high foot­fall gen­er­at­ing uses includ­ing retail, com­mer­cial, leis­ure, offices and com­munity facil­it­ies should be dir­ec­ted to town centres in the first instance. How­ever, this approach is not inten­ded to divert essen­tial ser­vices away from rur­al areas. Where there is no iden­ti­fied town centre, pro­pos­als should be loc­ated with­in the set­tle­ment bound­ary in the first instance.

4.32 Where a devel­op­ment is pro­posed out­with a town centre (where applic­able) or set­tle­ment bound­ary, jus­ti­fic­a­tion should be provided explain­ing why the pro­pos­al requires the loc­a­tion selec­ted and a state­ment demon­strat­ing that the sequen­tial approach to site selec­tion has been followed.

4.33 Pro­pos­als should demon­strate how they con­trib­ute to and sup­port the loc­al com­munity and eco­nomy and that they will have no adverse impacts on neigh­bours or sur­round­ing land uses. An assess­ment of the impact on nearby town centres or a Retail Impact Assess­ment may be required depend­ing on the scale of the development.

4.34 Tour­ist accom­mod­a­tion Ensur­ing the pro­vi­sion of a wide range of vis­it­or accom­mod­a­tion is cent­ral in attract­ing vis­it­ors and enabling people from all socio-eco­nom­ic groups to vis­it and exper­i­ence the Nation­al Park.

4.35 Pro­pos­als for cus­tom-built tour­ist accom­mod­a­tion will be sup­por­ted where they are on an alloc­ated tour­ism site or in oth­er loc­a­tions where they con­trib­ute to the pro­vi­sion of a wider range of accom­mod­a­tion options with­in the Nation­al Park. Low cost tour­ism accom­mod­a­tion pro­pos­als includ­ing camp­ing, group accom­mod­a­tion and accom­mod­a­tion that caters for a range of vis­it­or needs are par­tic­u­larly encour­aged where they have no adverse impact on their surroundings.

4.36 Pro­pos­als for huts will be con­sidered on their mer­its against rel­ev­ant policies of the Plan.

4.37 Pro­pos­als for new houses that will be used solely for tour­ism pur­poses, which oth­er­wise meet res­id­en­tial stand­ards, will be assessed under the hous­ing policy and will be sub­ject to developer oblig­a­tions for res­id­en­tial purposes.

4.38 Oth­er tour­ism and leis­ure devel­op­ments The Nation­al Park con­tains a num­ber of major tour­ist attrac­tions which make an import­ant con­tri­bu­tion to its eco­nomy. Pro­pos­als to enhance, expand or diver­si­fy these attrac­tions will be encour­aged where they are on an alloc­ated tour­ism site or in oth­er loc­a­tions where they are com­pat­ible with the exist­ing oper­a­tion of the busi­ness and make a pos­it­ive con­tri­bu­tion to the loc­al and wider eco­nomy. Where large devel­op­ments are pro­posed, improve­ments to infra­struc­ture to sup­port that devel­op­ment and the wider eco­nomy should always be con­sidered together.

4.39 There are three ski centres in the Nation­al Park and these play an import­ant role in the loc­al eco­nomy. They face chal­lenges and pres­sures in con­tinu­ing to provide the mod­ern infra­struc­ture and facil­it­ies that vis­it­ors expect, as well as respond­ing to cli­mate change and con­sid­er­ing ways of increas­ing sum­mer vis­its and rev­en­ues. The Plan will sup­port appro­pri­ate devel­op­ment and enhance­ment of these facil­it­ies. Plan­ning applic­a­tions in these loc­a­tions should be sup­por­ted by a mas­ter­plan or sim­il­ar doc­u­ment which out­lines the longer term devel­op­ment strategy for the centre and explains how the pro­pos­al fits with­in this.

4.40 Pro­pos­als to cre­ate, expand or enhance inform­al vis­it­or infra­struc­ture such as paths and stra­tegic routes will be sup­por­ted where they con­trib­ute to encour­aging act­ive travel and have no adverse envir­on­ment­al impacts.

4.41 Oth­er eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment Pro­pos­als for oth­er types of eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment will be sup­por­ted where they sup­port the eco­nomy of the Nation­al Park by:

• adding to or extend­ing the range of eco­nom­ic oppor­tun­it­ies or facil­it­ies in a community;
• improv­ing the qual­ity or range of exist­ing facil­it­ies; or
• con­trib­ut­ing to cre­at­ing a year-round economy.

4.42 Pro­pos­als must be com­pat­ible or com­ple­ment­ary to exist­ing busi­nesses in the area and it should be demon­strated how this will be achieved. Pro­pos­als must also sup­port the vital­ity and viab­il­ity of the loc­al and wider economy.

4.43 All eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment pro­pos­als In appro­pri­ate cases the Nation­al Park Author­ity may require applic­ants to pre­pare and sub­mit an assess­ment of the net eco­nom­ic impact of their pro­pos­al, to help inform the Authority’s con­clu­sions on the over­all impacts of the devel­op­ment. Per­mis­sion will only be gran­ted where it is demon­strated that a pro­pos­al sup­ports and pro­motes sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment. The level of inform­a­tion required should be pro­por­tion­ate and rel­ev­ant to the scale and nature of the pro­pos­al. This may include inform­a­tion on mat­ters such as the num­ber of jobs to be cre­ated, hours of work­ing, trans­port require­ments, envir­on­ment­al effects, noise levels and the lay­out and design of build­ings. For example, a Retail Impact Assess­ment may be required to sup­port a new retail busi­ness pro­pos­al or a busi­ness plan for an eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment proposal.

4.44 Pro­tect­ing exist­ing eco­nom­ic activ­ity There is a pre­sump­tion against any pro­pos­als that would res­ult in the loss of an exist­ing eco­nom­ic, employ­ment or tour­ism site or business.

4.45 Any pro­pos­als for the change of use of an exist­ing eco­nom­ic, employ­ment or tour­ism facil­ity or site will only be con­sidered accept­able where it is sat­is­fact­or­ily demon­strated that the busi­ness and/​or premises:

• is not suit­able for anoth­er eco­nom­ic, employ­ment or tour­ism use;
• is no longer needed or the premises is no longer suit­able for the needs of the business;
• is not prac­tic­ally or eco­nom­ic­ally viable;
• will not have an adverse impact on the loc­al economy.

4.46 A state­ment with sup­port­ing evid­ence must be sub­mit­ted demon­strat­ing how the change of use meets these criteria.

POLICY 3: DESIGN AND PLACEMAKING

3.1 Place­mak­ing All devel­op­ments must meet the six qual­it­ies of suc­cess­ful places, which in accord­ance with Scot­tish Plan­ning Policy para­graphs 41 to 46, are to be: i. dis­tinct­ive; ii. safe and pleas­ant; iii. wel­com­ing; iv. adapt­able; v. resource effi­cient; and vi. easy to move around and beyond.

3.2 Major devel­op­ments Major devel­op­ments of 50 or more homes, or 2 hec­tares or more of employ­ment, retail or mixed use devel­op­ment, will need to be sup­por­ted by a mas­ter­plan or devel­op­ment brief. Where a site is alloc­ated, this require­ment will be out­lined in the Com­munity Inform­a­tion sec­tion of the Plan. Mas­ter­plans and devel­op­ment briefs must demon­strate how the devel­op­ment meets the six qual­it­ies of suc­cess­ful places.

3.3 Sus­tain­able Design All devel­op­ment pro­pos­als must also be designed to: a) min­im­ise the effects of the devel­op­ment on cli­mate change in terms of sit­ing and con­struc­tion and, once com­plete, achieve at least the min­im­um stand­ard in com­pli­ance with the Build­ing Stand­ards Tech­nic­al Hand­book; b) be sym­path­et­ic to the tra­di­tion­al pat­tern and char­ac­ter of the sur­round­ing area, loc­al ver­nacu­lar and loc­al dis­tinct­ive­ness, whilst encour­aging innov­a­tion in design and use of mater­i­als; c) use mater­i­als and land­scap­ing that will com­ple­ment the set­ting of devel­op­ment; d) make sus­tain­able use of resources, includ­ing the min­im­isa­tion of energy, waste and water usage,