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Formal Board Paper 1 Annex 1.6 - Landscape

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Form­al Board Paper 1 Annex 1.6 13 March 2026

Paper 1

Annex 1.6

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Sus­tain­able places

Sched­ule 6: Landscape

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan: Evid­ence Report March 2026

(Image of a land­scape with a bridge and people on bicycles)

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Sched­ule 6: Landscape

March 2026

Sched­ule contents

  • Require­ments addressed in this sched­ule 2
  • Links to evid­ence 3
  • Sum­mary of evid­ence 5
  • Policy con­text 5
    • Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 5
    • Legis­la­tion and nation­al doc­u­ments 7
    • Nation­al Park Author­ity doc­u­ments 8
    • Loc­al author­ity doc­u­ments 10
    • Com­munity action plans 10
  • Baseline 12
    • This sec­tion provides baseline inform­a­tion on the fol­low­ing matters:
      • Spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park 13
      • Nation­al Scen­ic Areas 17
      • Cairngorms Nation­al Park land­scape char­ac­ter assess­ment 19
      • Wild land 20
      • Rel­at­ive wild­ness 22
      • Dark skies 27
      • Private roads and ways 29
      • Wind energy 30
      • Digit­al infra­struc­ture – mobile cov­er­age 33
  • Evid­ence gaps 33
  • Sum­mary of stake­hold­er engage­ment 34
  • Sum­mary of implic­a­tions for Pro­posed Plan 35
  • State­ments of agree­ment 36
  • State­ments of dis­pute 37

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Require­ments addressed in this schedule

Table 1 Inform­a­tion required by the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 1997, as amended (CNPA003), regard­ing the issue addressed in this schedule.

Sec­tionRequire­ment
Sec­tion 15(5)The prin­cip­al [phys­ic­al], [cul­tur­al], eco­nom­ic, social, built her­it­age and [envir­on­ment­al] char­ac­ter­ist­ics of the district.
Sec­tion 15(5)(f)Any change which the plan­ning author­ity think may occur in rela­tion to any of the mat­ters men­tioned in para­graphs (a) to (eb).
Sec­tion 16(2)(a)to take into account—
i. The Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work and
ii. Any loc­al out­comes improve­ment plan (with­in the mean­ing of sec­tion 6 of the Com­munity Empower­ment (Scot­land) Act 2015) for the part of their dis­trict to which the loc­al devel­op­ment plan relates,
iii. Any registered loc­al place plan (see sched­ule 19) that is for the part of their dis­trict to which the loc­al devel­op­ment plan relates.
Sec­tion 16(2)(b)Are to have regard to such inform­a­tion and con­sid­er­a­tions as may be prescribed.
Sec­tion 16(2)©May have regard to such oth­er inform­a­tion and con­sid­er­a­tions as appear to them to be relevant.
Sec­tion 16B(3)(a)The evid­ence report is to set out the plan­ning authority’s view on the mat­ters lis­ted in sec­tion 15(5) for land in the part of the authority’s dis­trict to which the loc­al devel­op­ment plan will relate,
Sec­tion 16B(3)(e)Include such oth­er mat­ters as are prescribed.
Sec­tion 16B(4)©The evid­ence report is also to include a state­ment on the extent to which the views expressed under para­graphs (a) and (b) have been taken into account in the report.
Sec­tion 264AIn the exer­cise, with respect to any land in a Nation­al Park, of any power under the plan­ning Acts, spe­cial atten­tion shall be paid to the desirab­il­ity of exer­cising the power con­sist­ently with the Nation­al Park Plan as adop­ted under sec­tion 12(7)(a) of the Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 (asp 10).

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Links to evidence

Inter­na­tion­al documents

  • CNPA690 — IUCN Man­age­ment Cat­egor­ies of Pro­tec­ted Areas

Legis­la­tion

  • CNPA003 — Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 1997
  • CNPA004 — Nation­al Park (Scot­land) Act 2000
  • CNPA634 — Nat­ur­al Envir­on­ment (Scot­land) Bill as passed

Nation­al documents

  • CNPA008 — Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4
  • CNPA015 — Scotland’s Land­scape Charter
  • CNPA648 — Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 Explan­at­ory Note Novem­ber 2022

Key agency documents

  • CNPA017 — Cairngorms Spe­cial Land­scape Qualities
  • CNPA018 — Nation­al Scen­ic Areas
  • CNPA021 — Wild Land Areas
  • CNPA022 — Map­ping of Scotland’s Wild­ness and Wild Land: Non-tech­nic­al Descrip­tion of the Methodology
  • CNPA603 — Spe­cial Land­scape Qual­it­ies — Guid­ance on assess­ing effects

Nation­al Park Author­ity documents

  • CNPA010 — Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022
  • CNPA016 — Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021
  • CNPA019 — Cairngorms Land­scape Toolkit
  • CNPA024 — Map­ping hill tracks in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park
  • CNPA020 — Cairngorms Land­scape Char­ac­ter Assessment
  • CNPA026 — Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Inter­act­ive Map Engage­ment Report
  • CNPA027 — Cairngorms Youth Action Team Place Stand­ard Tool Engage­ment Report
  • CNPA028 — Cairngorms Nation­al Park Gypsy / Trav­el­ler Engage­ment Report 2024
  • CNPA528 — Her­it­age Hori­zons – Cairngorms 2030
  • CNPA681 — Kin­gussie High School High­er Crim­in­o­logy Stu­dents Place Stand­ard Tool Engage­ment 2024

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  • CNPA682 — Kin­gussie High School S1 Geo­graphy Stu­dents Place Stand­ard Tool Engage­ment 2024
  • CNPA683 — Kin­gussie High School S3 Geo­graphy Stu­dents Place Stand­ard Tool Engage­ment 2024
  • CNPA833 — Cairngorms Loc­al devel­op­ment plan place stand­ard tool engage­ment with Kin­gussie High School Youth For­um 2025
  • CNPA834 — Loc­al devel­op­ment plan place stand­ard tool engage­ment with the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Juni­or Rangers 2025
  • CNPA1104 — Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan engage­ment — gami­fic­a­tion approach 2025
  • CNPA1105 — Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan engage­ment – Plan­ning Power with Cairngorms 2030
  • CNPA1346 — Top­ic: Land­scape — engage­ment version

Loc­al author­ity documents

  • CNPA638 — 2024 – 2027 High­land Out­come Improve­ment Plan
  • CNPA636 — Aber­deen­shire Loc­al Out­comes Improve­ment Plan 2017 – 2027 (web­site)
  • CNPA637 — Angus Com­munity Plan 2022 – 2030
  • CNPA639 — Moray Loc­al Out­comes Improve­ment Plan v2
  • CNPA640 — Perth and Kinross Com­munity Plan (Loc­al Out­comes Improve­ment Plan) 2022 — 2032
  • CNPA1091 – 2024 – 2027 High­land Out­come Improve­ment Plan – Deliv­ery Plan

Com­munity action plans

  • CNPA011 — Com­munity action plans
  • CNPA065 – Grant­own-on-Spey Com­munity Action Plan: Look­ing to 2030
  • CNPA121 — Brae­mar Com­munity Action Plan 2017
  • CNPA122 — Car­rbridge Com­munity Action Plan: Look­ing to 2030
  • CNPA125 — Dal­whin­nie Com­munity Action Plan: Look­ing for­ward to 2030
  • CNPA131 — Nethy Bridge Com­munity Action Plan: Look­ing to 2030
  • CNPA132 — New­ton­more Com­munity Action Plan: Look­ing to 2030
  • CNPA133 — Strath­don Com­munity Action Plan: Look­ing to 2030
  • CNPA331 — Dul­nain Bridge Com­munity Action Plan: Look­ing to 2030

Data sources

  • CNPA023 — Cairngorms Dark Sky Park

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  • CNPA174 — Cellmapper
  • CNPA649 — Dorenell Wind Farm Exten­sion and Biod­iversity Enhance­ment Plan
  • CNPA650 — Bal­nespick Wind Farm
  • CNPA930 – Onshore Wind­farm Proposals

Con­sulta­tion material

  • CNPA604 — Top­ic Land­scape — Inter­im Con­sulta­tion — NatureScot Comments
  • CNPA1340 — Evid­ence report engage­ment responses

Sum­mary of evidence

Policy Con­text

Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4

Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (CNPA008) recog­nises Scotland’s rich her­it­age, cul­ture and out­stand­ing envir­on­ment as nation­al assets which sup­port our eco­nomy, iden­tity, health and wellbeing.

The iden­ti­fic­a­tion and pro­tec­tion of nation­ally import­ant land­scape assets are provided in Policy 4 Nat­ur­al Places with the intent to pro­tect, restore and enhance land­scapes and to ensure they are man­aged in a sus­tain­able way. The pro­tec­tion Policy 4 affords applies to both Nation­al Parks and the Nation­al Scen­ic Areas that sit with­in them.

Policy 4 c) has two stages of the policy test for man­aging change from devel­op­ment pro­pos­als and has a high level of pro­tec­tion, where devel­op­ment will only be sup­por­ted where:

  • The object­ives of des­ig­na­tion and the over­all integ­rity of the areas will not be com­prom­ised: or
  • Any sig­ni­fic­ant adverse effects on the qual­it­ies for which the area has been des­ig­nated are clearly out­weighed by social, envir­on­ment­al or eco­nom­ic bene­fits of nation­al importance.

Wild lands Areas (as iden­ti­fied on NatureScot’s 2014 map­ping) are afforded some pro­tec­tion with­in Policy 4. As a pro­tec­ted land­scape and not a des­ig­na­tion in stat­ute, the level of pro­tec­tion is less than the Nation­al Park or Nation­al Scen­ic Areas and applies strictly to the defined bound­ary as indic­ated in Policy 4(g). With­in the Wild Land Area, the level of pro­tec­tion applies only in so far as the assess­ment of renew­able energy devel­op­ments can illus­trate that they sup­port meet­ing defined tar­gets for

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gen­er­a­tion or small-scale devel­op­ment linked to croft­ing or fra­gile com­munit­ies. Buf­fer zones around wild land will not be applied, and effects of devel­op­ment out with wild land areas will not be a sig­ni­fic­ant con­sid­er­a­tion in the determ­in­a­tion of devel­op­ment proposals.

Policy 11 Energy requires Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plans to real­ise the areas full poten­tial for elec­tri­city and heat from renew­able, low car­bon and zero emis­sion resources by identi­fy­ing a range of oppor­tun­it­ies for energy devel­op­ment. This is to encour­age, pro­mote and facil­it­ate all forms of renew­able devel­op­ment onshore. The excep­tion to the Nation­al Park (and Nation­al Scen­ic Areas in Policy 11b) is that wind farms pro­posed in these des­ig­na­tions will not be supported¹.

Policy 14 Design, qual­ity and place gives a strong steer of the import­ance of a design-led approach to encour­age, pro­mote, and facil­it­ate well designed and suc­cess­ful places. This requires Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plans to be place-based and cre­ated in line with the Place Prin­ciple adop­ted by the Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment illus­trat­ing com­mit­ment to a col­lab­or­at­ive design and inclus­ive approach with loc­al communities.

Accord­ing to Policy 14 the spa­tial strategy of loc­al devel­op­ment plans should be under­pinned by the six qual­it­ies of suc­cess­ful places and provide clear expect­a­tions for design, qual­ity and place tak­ing account of the loc­al con­text, char­ac­ter­ist­ics, and con­nectiv­ity of the areas. The pro­duc­tion of detailed design guid­ance, using formats such as devel­op­ment brief and mas­ter­plans, are expec­ted and encour­aged. Use of the Place Stand­ard Tool is expec­ted in the pre­par­a­tion of the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan and design guid­ance and to engage with com­munit­ies and oth­er stake­hold­ers. Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 sees the con­nec­tion of this Policy with all oth­er policies in the Frame­work, impart­ing a strong steer on the import­ance of sit­ing and design to deliv­er sus­tain­able growth, even in the con­tact of the glob­al cli­mate crises and just trans­ition to net zero. This would draw on inform­a­tion gathered through approaches includ­ing Place Stand­ard assessments.

Oth­er policies which raise new or par­tic­u­larly sig­ni­fic­ant issues dir­ect­ing change with­in the Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work are:

Sig­ni­fic­ant expan­sion of the exist­ing wood­land resource in the Nation­al Park is pro­posed. Policy 6 Forestry, Wood­land and trees seeks to pro­tect and expand forests, wood­land and trees and ensure their sus­tain­able man­age­ment. This policy requires the

¹ See Sched­ule 9: Energy for detailed con­sid­er­a­tion of these matters.

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pro­duc­tion of an up-to-date Forest and Wood­land Strategy. Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 cites both Policies 4 and 6 as being key con­nec­tions and which should influ­ence the sit­ing and design of the forestry and wood­land pro­pos­als recog­nising and respond­ing to the spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park².

Policy 21 Play Recre­ation and Sport place a require­ment in the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan to identi­fy sites for sports, play and out­door recre­ation for people of all ages. This is par­tic­u­larly sali­ent in a Nation­al Park where one of the 4 dis­tinct aims is to pro­mote the under­stand­ing and enjoy­ment of the spe­cial qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park, includ­ing enjoy­ment in the form of recre­ation. The exist­ing man­age­ment and devel­op­ment of new facil­it­ies and spaces should be based on an under­stand­ing of the needs and demand in the com­munity and informed by the plan­ning author­it­ies Play Suf­fi­ciency Assess­ment and Open Space Strategy. For the pur­poses of the Open Space Strategy, Nation­al Parks are not con­sidered to be a plan­ning author­ity and there­fore are not required to do this. In any event open space assess­ment inform­a­tion is not required to inform the evid­ence report but is required for the new Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan. The Nation­al Park are required to pro­duce an audit of play suf­fi­ciency, which will be developed in con­sulta­tion with the rel­ev­ant loc­al authorities.

Linked to this Policy 20 b) con­siders the Open Space Strategy to be an appro­pri­ate means for the design of blue and green infra­struc­ture to take account of exist­ing pro­vi­sion and new require­ments and net­work con­nec­tions for well-designed and integ­rated infra­struc­ture. In the pre­par­a­tion and pub­lish­ing of an Open Space Strategy, Nation­al Parks are not con­sidered to be a plan­ning author­ity and as such are not required to pro­duce one³.

There are no spe­cif­ic policies address­ing the devel­op­ment of private roads and ways with­in Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4.

Legis­la­tion and nation­al documents

Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000)

The Nation­al Park has four dis­tinct aims as set out in The Nation­al Parks (Scot­land) Act 2000 (CNPA004). As out­lined in Sched­ule 1: Plan out­comes, these will be amended by the Nat­ur­al Envir­on­ment Scot­land (Scot­land) Bill (CNPA634) once enacted. These are, as to be amended by the Nat­ur­al Envir­on­ment (Scot­land) Bill:

² See Sched­ule 5: Nat­ur­al her­it­age for detailed con­sid­er­a­tion of these mat­ters. ³ See Sched­ule 17: Play, recre­ation and sport for detailed con­sid­er­a­tion of mat­ters related to Policies 20 and 21.

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  • To con­serve and enhance the area’s nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al heritage.
  • To pro­mote sus­tain­able man­age­ment and use of the area’s nat­ur­al resources.
  • To pro­mote pub­lic under­stand­ing and enjoy­ment of the area’s nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al heritage.
  • To pro­mote sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic, social and cul­tur­al devel­op­ment of the area’s communities.

All of the aims are rel­ev­ant to the mat­ters dis­cussed in this sched­ule. The aims are all to be pur­sued col­lect­ively. How­ever, if there is con­flict between the first aim and any of the oth­ers, great­er weight is giv­en to the first aim (as set out in Sec­tion 9(6) of the 2000 Act).

Scot­tish Land­scape Charter

The Charter (CNPA015) sets out a vis­ion on the import­ance of Scotland’s land­scapes. With regard to devel­op­ment it recom­mends that developers ​‘meet best prac­tice stand­ards, and ensure new devel­op­ment enhances land­scapes and town­scapes, and res­ults in high qual­ity sur­round­ings’ and:

  • Ensure that the sit­ing, design and use of mater­i­als in new devel­op­ment are in keep­ing with, or con­trib­ute pos­it­ively to, the loc­al town­scape and landscape.
  • Seek views from the com­munity on devel­op­ment pro­pos­als at an early stage, and look to incor­por­ate their aspir­a­tions for their loc­al landscape.
  • Design the land­scape with future cli­mate change in mind, while provid­ing green­space and max­im­ising oppor­tun­it­ies for walk­ing and cycling.
  • Ensure that your organ­isa­tion has access to land­scape expert­ise which, for new devel­op­ment, will deliv­er integ­rated design, imple­ment­a­tion and man­age­ment that is sens­it­ive to the landscape.

This approach is sup­por­ted by the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (CNPA008) and may inform the pre­par­a­tion of the Pro­posed Plan, par­tic­u­larly through pro­mot­ing good design, ensur­ing that devel­op­ment does not adversely affect the Spe­cial Land­scape Qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park (see page 13), and incor­por­at­ing com­munity views into the draft­ing of place based information.

Nation­al Park Author­ity documents

Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022

The Part­ner­ship Plan (CNPA010) sets out the vis­ion and over­arch­ing strategy for man­aging the Nation­al Park and provides the stra­tegic con­text for the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan. The Part­ner­ship Plan seeks to strike the right bal­ance to ensure that

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the Nation­al Park strives for both nature and people in the future. The land­scapes of the Nation­al Park are the fun­da­ment­al way people (com­munit­ies and vis­it­ors alike) exper­i­ence all that the Cairngorms has to offer, its nature, cul­ture and settlements.

The Nation­al Park also has a sig­ni­fic­ant role to play in deliv­er­ing the policy ambi­tions of Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment and is pur­su­ing sev­er­al ambi­tious pro­jects like Her­it­age Hori­zons: Cairngorms 2030. Across these pro­jects Her­it­age Hori­zons will bring about trans­form­a­tion­al change in the Cairngorms, bene­fit­ing people’s health and well­being, deliv­er­ing on pro­pos­als to tackle cli­mate change and enhan­cing nature across the Nation­al Park. Whilst all the pro­jects are rel­ev­ant to the appre­ci­ation of the land­scapes in the Nation­al Park, in par­tic­u­lar two pro­jects have dir­ect or sig­ni­fic­ant implications:

  • Land­scape and Communities
  • Effect­ive Com­munity engage­ment and outreach

With­in the Part­ner­ship Plan, Policy A4 seeks to con­serve and enhance the spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park. With­in this the Part­ner­ship Plan places a par­tic­u­lar emphas­is on the con­ser­va­tion and enhance­ment of the spe­cial qual­it­ies of wild­ness and dark skies. Wood­land expan­sion is sup­por­ted where it max­im­ises oppor­tun­it­ies for long-term enhance­ment of the spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies through good design. Policy A4 also seeks to enhance the oppor­tun­it­ies for com­munit­ies and vis­it­ors alike to enjoy and exper­i­ence the land­scapes of the Nation­al Park. In open moor­land, Policy A4 applies a pre­sump­tion against new con­struc­ted tracks. Where there is agree­ment for their pro­vi­sion, new tracks are to be con­struc­ted to a high standard.

Wild Land Areas with­in the Nation­al Park are iden­ti­fied as a spe­cial land­scape qual­ity of the Nation­al Park and as such have a high­er level of pro­tec­tion than that afforded by Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4Policy 4(g). Areas bey­ond the wild land bound­ary, but still with­in the Nation­al Park and which still retain high scores of wild­ness and con­trib­ute sig­ni­fic­antly to the exper­i­ence of the wild­ness spe­cial land­scape qual­ity will also be giv­en a high­er level of pro­tec­tion than that afforded by Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4Policy 4(g).

Pro­pos­als for con­struc­ted private roads and ways in the upland land­scapes of the Nation­al Park are cur­rently con­sidered against Part­ner­ship Plan Policy A4 (f) and Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Policy 5.2. The inclu­sion of a