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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Agenda Item 10 Appendix | 24/09/2021

AGENDA ITEM 10

APPENDIX I

MON­IT­OR­ING REPORT

PLAN­NING

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2015 Mon­it­or­ing Report for ²⁰¹⁵⁄₁₆ to ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁ Septem­ber 2021

Cairngorms NATION­AL PARK Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Con­tents

Intro­duc­tion 2 Con­text 2 Sum­mary of key points 2 Total Applic­a­tions 4 Policy Use 6 Main policies 6 Sub-policies 8 Policy I New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment 9 Policy 2 Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth 11 Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design 13 Policy 4 Nat­ur­al Her­it­age 15 Policy 5 Land­scape 17 Policy 6 The Sit­ing and Design of Digit­al Com­mu­nic­a­tions Equip­ment 19 Policy 7 Renew­able Energy 21 Policy 8 Sport and Recre­ation 23 Policy 9 Cul­tur­al Her­it­age 25 Policy 10 Resources 27 Policy 11 Developer Con­tri­bu­tions 29 Appeals 31 Alloc­ated Sites 32

Intro­duc­tion

The 2015 Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP) was adop­ted on 27^th March 2015. This mon­it­or­ing report provides an over­view of how the LDP was used dur­ing the peri­od 2015/2016 – 2020/2021, being the second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth year of its imple­ment­a­tion, by the Nation­al Park Author­ity and the Loc­al Author­it­ies whose area it cov­ers. It also con­siders how the LDP was used by DPEA and Loc­al Review Bod­ies for appeals.

Con­text

The 2015 LDP was the first devel­op­ment plan that covered the whole of the Nation­al Park, repla­cing the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Plan 2010 and the Perth & Kinross Coun­cil High­land Area Loc­al Plan 2000, which covered the part of Perth­shire added to the Park in 2010. The LDP set out policies and pro­pos­als for the devel­op­ment and use of land for a 5 – 10 year peri­od. It gave a broad indic­a­tion of the scale and loc­a­tion of growth up to year 20, as well as provid­ing the basis for the assess­ment of all plan­ning applications

made across the Nation­al Park dur­ing dur­ing the report­ing peri­od of ²⁰¹⁵⁄₁₆ to ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁.

The Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment believes that the plan­ning sys­tem is essen­tial to achiev­ing its cent­ral pur­pose of cre­at­ing a more suc­cess­ful coun­try, with oppor­tun­it­ies for all of Scot­land to flour­ish, through increas­ing sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic growth. This involves pro­mot­ing and facil­it­at­ing devel­op­ment in the most appro­pri­ate places while pro­tect­ing and enhan­cing the nat­ur­al and built envir­on­ment. The 2015 LDP, with its policies and sites alloc­ated for devel­op­ment, was the main tool to deliv­er that dur­ing the report­ing peri­od. It provided guid­ance to developers and investors, and allows loc­al com­munit­ies and the gen­er­al pub­lic to be involved in shap­ing the future of their area.

Sum­mary of key points

Over the mon­it­or­ing peri­od of I April 2015 to 31 March 2021:

• 2139 plan­ning applic­a­tions were sub­mit­ted for devel­op­ment with­in the Nation­al Park, of which 102 were sub­sequently with­drawn or found not to require plan­ning permission.
• Of the applic­a­tions determ­ined, 1948 were approved and 89 refused – an aver­age approv­al rate of around 91%.
• High­land and Aber­deen­shire areas had the highest num­ber of applic­a­tions, with Angus hav­ing the fewest.
• Dur­ing the mon­it­or­ing peri­od the Nation­al Park Author­ity called in and determ­ined around 7% of applications.
• The main policy most referred to in plan­ning reports is Policy 3 (Sus­tain­able Design).

• Sub-policies were not routinely recor­ded in plan­ning reports, how­ever the sub-policies mostly referred to were 1.7 (Alter­a­tions to exist­ing houses), 3.1 (Design State­ments), 3.4 (Alter­a­tions to the exist­ing build­ing stock) and 9.2 (Con­ser­va­tion Areas).

• The Park Author­ity has taken a more dir­ect role in applic­a­tions that trig­ger the policies that sup­port eco­nom­ic growth, nat­ur­al her­it­age and land­scape interests (Policies 2, 4 and 5) when com­pared to Loc­al Authorities.

• There were 21 val­id appeals against refus­al of plan­ning per­mis­sion; 20 referred to LDP policies in the decision notice, with 8 refer­ring to sub-policies.
• 7 appeals were against the Park Author­ity; 4 were allowed, 2 dis­missed, and I withdrawn.
• Of the 23 val­id appeals against Loc­al Author­ity decisions, 11 were allowed (per­mis­sion gran­ted) and 12 dis­missed (refus­al upheld).
• Policies I (new hous­ing devel­op­ment), 3 (sus­tain­able design), and 5 (land­scape) were the most com­monly referred to in appeal decisions.

Applic­a­tions

This sec­tion provides some gen­er­al stat­ist­ics about the num­ber of applic­a­tions received and determ­ined by the CNPA and the Loc­al Authorities.

Over the mon­it­or­ing peri­od of I April 2015 to 31 March 2021, 2139 plan­ning applic­a­tions were sub­mit­ted with­in the Nation­al Park, with 2042 going for­ward to determ­in­a­tion. High­land and Aber­deen­shire areas had the highest num­ber of applic­a­tions, with Angus hav­ing the few­est (Fig­ure 1).

119 applic­a­tions were not determ­ined, being with­drawn or found not to require plan­ning permission.

Dur­ing the mon­it­or­ing peri­od, 1948 applic­a­tions were approved and 89 refused (Fig­ure 2), an aver­age approv­al rate of around 95.6%. This fluc­tu­ated annu­ally dur­ing the mon­it­or­ing peri­od, with the low­est being around 90% in ²⁰¹⁷⁄₁₈ and the highest being around 99.2% in ²⁰²⁰⁄₂₁.

On aver­age, the Nation­al Park Author­ity determ­ined around 6.7% of applic­a­tions. The remainder were determ­ined by the Loc­al Author­it­ies. This fluc­tu­ated annu­ally dur­ing the mon­it­or­ing peri­od, with the low­est amount being determ­ined by the Park Author­ity being in ²⁰¹⁷⁄₁₈ at around 3%, with the highest being around 9.6% in ²⁰¹⁸⁄₁₉. Fig­ures 3 and 4 over­leaf show the year on year vari­ation in applic­a­tions determ­ined by the Park Author­ity com­pared to Loc­al Authorities.

Policy Use

This sec­tion provides inform­a­tion on how each policy and sub-policy was used dur­ing the mon­it­or­ing peri­od. Fig­ure 5 provides a sum­mary of this inform­a­tion for the policies, allow­ing easy com­par­is­ons to be made. The most com­monly used policy was Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design. This is unsur­pris­ing giv­en that the policy should apply to most forms of development.

Main policies

Fig­ures 6 and 7 over­leaf give an indic­a­tion of the types of applic­a­tions determ­ined by the Loc­al Author­it­ies and those called in by the Park Author­ity in rela­tion to main policy use. For example, as would be expec­ted giv­en the Park aims, the Park Author­ity has taken a more dir­ect role in applic­a­tions that trig­ger the policies that sup­port eco­nom­ic growth, nat­ur­al her­it­age and land­scape interests (Policies 2, 4 and 5) when com­pared to Loc­al Authorities.

Sub-policies

With the excep­tion of Policies 5 (Land­scape), 6 (Sit­ing and design of digit­al com­mu­nic­a­tions equip­ment) and 11 (Developer Con­tri­bu­tions), all policies have sub-polices that sit below them, each of which deal with dif­fer­ent aspects of the Policy’s con­cerns. Some sub-policies are rel­ev­ant to all aspects of a par­tic­u­lar devel­op­ment, for example sub-policy 3.1 Design State­ments could be applied to all applic­a­tions, while oth­ers would apply only in spe­cif­ic situ­ations, for example sub- policy 1.8 on Conversions.

Plan­ning reports have ten­ded to include inform­a­tion on when main policies have been used when determ­in­ing applic­a­tions. How­ever inform­a­tion on when sub- policies have been used has not been included in all plan­ning reports. It is there­fore not pos­sible to gain a fully rep­res­ent­at­ive pic­ture of how sub-policies have been used over the mon­it­or­ing peri­od, as the data is incom­plete*. Non­ethe­less inform­a­tion on the num­ber of times sub-policies were referred to in decision mak­ing is presen­ted in Table 1.

*Under report­ing may be due to the way the sub-policies have been numbered in the LDP 2015. The 2021 LDP seeks to address this by hier­arch­ic­ally num­ber­ing each sub-policy, which is hoped to encour­age bet­ter record­ing of sub-policy use.

	Policy 1: new hous­ing devel­op­ment	Policy 2: sup­port­ing eco­nom­ic growth	Policy 3: sus­tain­able design	Policy 4: nat­ur­al her­it­age	Policy 7: renew­able energy	Policy 8: sport and recre­ation	Policy 9: cul­tur­al her­it­age	Policy 10: resources
Per­cent­age of times main policy only referred to in decisions	31%	21%	45%	21%	25%	19%	19%	11%
Per­cent­age of times sub-policies referred to in decisions	17%	7%	20%	9%	1%	1%	7%	4%

Table 1: Pro­por­tion of applic­a­tions dur­ing April 2015 – March 2021 where sub-policies have been referred to in plan­ning reports, and where the main policy has been referred to (note not all reports included inform­a­tion on when sub policies were used, so the data presen­ted below is unlikely to be fully rep­res­ent­at­ive of sub-policy use).

Policy I New Hous­ing Development

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 optim­um use of resources, integ­rates with ser­vices and facil­it­ies, and pro­motes the highest stand­ards in design and envir­on­ment­al quality.

The 2015 LDP aimed to enable and act­ively sup­port the deliv­ery of new hous­ing that is afford­able and meets com­munity needs, in turn sup­port­ing and grow­ing the economy.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 844 times in total. CNPA used the policy 41 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 803 times (Fig­ures 8 and 9). It was referred to in around 36% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 42% that were refused. Fig­ure 10 shows this inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 2 Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth

Sus­tain­able growth in the eco­nomy of the Park is at the heart of sup­port­ing our com­munit­ies, help­ing them become and remain vibrant and attract­ive places for people to live and work.

The 2105 LDP had an import­ant role to play in address­ing the eco­nom­ic, social and envir­on­ment­al issues facing towns, set­tle­ments and rur­al areas with­in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park and facil­it­at­ing suc­cess­ful eco­nom­ic growth in the future.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 564 times in total. CNPA used the policy 69 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 495 times (Fig­ures II and 12). It was referred to in around 38% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 37% that were refused. Fig­ure 13 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design

The dis­tinct­ive char­ac­ter and iden­tity of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park’s nat­ur­al and built her­it­age and set­tle­ments con­trib­ute to the qual­it­ies that make it spe­cial. The con­tri­bu­tion that built devel­op­ment makes to our sense of place and qual­ity of life is import­ant to those who live and work in and vis­it the Park. Good design is key to achiev­ing devel­op­ment fit for a Nation­al Park.

The policy aimed to ensure that all devel­op­ment, not just the expens­ive or icon­ic, deliv­ers high stand­ards of design and con­trib­utes to the sense of place.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2020, the policy was used 1651 times in total. CNPA used the policy 112 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 1539 times (Fig­ures 14 and 15). It was referred to in around 82% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 66% that were refused. Fig­ure 16 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 4 Nat­ur­al Heritage

The range and qual­ity of nat­ur­al her­it­age in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park is unique in the UK and is inter­na­tion­ally val­ued. A res­ult of nat­ur­al pro­cesses and land man­age­ment, many of the spe­cial hab­it­ats and spe­cies of the Cairngorms need act­ive man­age­ment to con­tin­ue to thrive. The unique nat­ur­al her­it­age under­pins all four aims of the Park, and the spe­cial qual­it­ies cre­ated as a res­ult are val­ued by res­id­ents, vis­it­ors and those who care about the Park. Safe­guard­ing hab­it­ats and spe­cies is key to the long-term suc­cess of the Park. The policy will ensure that devel­op­ment con­serves and enhances the out­stand­ing nat­ur­al her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park. It offers the neces­sary level of pro­tec­tion from adverse devel­op­ment and enables enhance­ment. Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 666 times in total. CNPA used the policy 109 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 557 times (Fig­ures 17 and 18). It was referred to in around 54% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 61% that were refused. Fig­ure 19 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 5 Landscape

The land­scapes of the Cairngorms are one of the Nation­al Park’s most valu­able assets, under­pin­ning its char­ac­ter, des­ig­na­tion and the appeal of the area as a place to vis­it, live and invest. The exper­i­ence of large scale wild­ness in the Nation­al Park is par­tic­u­larly dis­tinct­ive in UK terms.

The policy sought to con­serve and enhance the diverse and spec­tac­u­lar land­scapes of the Nation­al Park by ensur­ing that only devel­op­ment which con­serves and enhances the spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies of the Park will be sup­por­ted. It sup­por­ted devel­op­ment that con­trib­uted to land­scape enhance­ment and pro­tects against devel­op­ment that would erode val­ued land­scape qualities.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 671 times in total. CNPA used it 113 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 558 times (Fig­ures 20 and 21). It was referred to in around 56% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 60% that were refused. Fig­ure 22 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 6 The Sit­ing and Design of Digit­al Com­mu­nic­a­tions Equipment

The policy is inten­ded to sup­port world class digit­al tech­no­logy through the pro­vi­sion of the most up to date net­works to serve homes and busi­ness premises, whilst ensur­ing that all such infra­struc­ture install­a­tions are sited and designed to keep envir­on­ment­al impacts to a minimum.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 88 times in total. CNPA used the policy three times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 85 times (Fig­ures 23 and 24). It was referred to in around 3% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 1% that were refused. Fig­ure 25 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 7 Renew­able Energy

The Nation­al Park has an abund­ance of nat­ur­al resources which provide options to gen­er­ate renew­able energy. This includes energy from bio­mass, hydro, sol­ar, heat pumps, anaer­obic diges­tion, energy from waste and some wind energy.

The policy aimed to enable appro­pri­ate renew­able energy gen­er­a­tion by har­ness­ing the Park’s nat­ur­al resources in a way which achieves the col­lect­ive deliv­ery of the four aims of the Park. It set a frame­work to har­ness this energy poten­tial, allow­ing the Nation­al Park to play its part in address­ing the issues of cli­mate change and fuel poverty.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 62 times in total. CNPA used the policy 15 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 47 times (Fig­ures 26 and 27). It was referred to in around 6% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 13% that were refused. Fig­ure 28 shows this inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 8 Sport and Recreation

The Nation­al Park offers out­stand­ing oppor­tun­it­ies for form­al and inform­al recre­ation, from sports pitches and sports centres to ski centres, golf courses and moun­tain bike centres, and a net­work of paths that links com­munit­ies to the coun­tryside. There are also many oth­er pub­lic and amen­ity open spaces, ran­ging from pub­lic parks, land­scap­ing schemes with­in large-scale devel­op­ments, com­munity sports hubs and form­al equipped play areas.

The policy aimed to ensure the needs of loc­al com­munit­ies and vis­it­ors for recre­ation­al space and facil­it­ies are accom­mod­ated, and exist­ing facil­it­ies pro­tec­ted. This included inform­al and form­al recre­ation provision.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 110 times in total. CNPA used the policy 28 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 82 times (Fig­ures 29 and 30). It was referred to in around 13% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 9% that were refused. Fig­ure 31 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 9 Cul­tur­al Heritage

The cul­tur­al her­it­age of the Cairngorms ranges from archae­olo­gic­al remains to inter­na­tion­ally sig­ni­fic­ant lis­ted build­ings, import­ant archi­tec­tur­al and his­tor­ic town­scapes, his­tor­ic gar­dens and land­scapes, to ancient routes through the Nation­al Park. All of these provide a clear link to the his­tory of this part of Scot­land and the part it played over time to cre­ate the Nation­al Park and com­munit­ies we know and value today.

The policy aimed to con­serve and enhance the rich cul­tur­al her­it­age of the Nation­al Park. It had a key role in ensur­ing all devel­op­ment made an appro­pri­ate con­tri­bu­tion to the con­ser­va­tion and enhance­ment of cul­tur­al her­it­age in the Nation­al Park.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, it was used 512 times in total. CNPA used the policy 27 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 481 times (Fig­ures 32 and 3Figure 3). It was referred to in around 25% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 11% that were refused. Fig­ure 34 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 10 Resources

Redu­cing our con­sump­tion and pro­tect­ing our lim­ited resources is integ­ral to con­serving what is import­ant about the Park, and help­ing our com­munit­ies adapt to more sus­tain­able way of liv­ing. The policy aimed to reduce the over­all resource use foot­print of the Nation­al Park. It sought to pro­tect resources, while facil­it­at­ing appro­pri­ate devel­op­ment in ways that cre­ate a net pos­it­ive out­come. It com­ple­men­ted legis­lat­ive oblig­a­tions bey­ond the require­ments of plan­ning law, and allowed suf­fi­cient flex­ib­il­ity to adapt to changes and devel­op­ments in tech­no­logy and research asso­ci­ated with the pro­tec­tion and exploit­a­tion of resources.

Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 503 times in total. CNPA used the policy 83 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 420 times (Fig­ures 35 and 36). It was referred to in around 42% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 37% that were refused. Fig­ure 37 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Policy 11 Developer Contributions

New devel­op­ments can have an impact on facil­it­ies, ser­vices and infra­struc­ture out­with the devel­op­ment site. It is import­ant that these impacts are addressed as part of the devel­op­ment, so that com­munit­ies are not dis­ad­vant­aged as a res­ult. Developer con­tri­bu­tions can help to over­come prob­lems in grant­ing plan­ning per­mis­sion by redu­cing, elim­in­at­ing or com­pens­at­ing for some neg­at­ive impacts arising from the pro­posed development.

The policy aimed to ensure the deliv­ery of a range of improve­ments that may be needed as a res­ult of new devel­op­ment, while ensur­ing that con­tri­bu­tions are at an appro­pri­ate level that main­tains viab­il­ity for the developer. Dur­ing the peri­od April 2015 to March 2021, the policy was used 181 times in total. CNPA used the policy 22 times and Loc­al Author­it­ies used it 159 times (Fig­ures 38 and 39). It was referred to in around 12% of decisions to approve applic­a­tions and around 22% that were refused. Fig­ure 40 shows the inform­a­tion geographically.

Appeals

Where avail­able, inform­a­tion was gathered on the num­ber of appeals made to Plan­ning and Envir­on­ment­al Appeals Divi­sion of Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment and the Loc­al Review Bod­ies of Loc­al Author­it­ies dur­ing the mon­it­or­ing peri­od. Records of 34 appeals were found. Of these, there were 21 appeals were against refus­al of plan­ning per­mis­sion. 20 referred to LDP policies in the decision notice, with 8 refer­ring to sub-policies. The policies and sub-policies referred to are shown in Table 2. Policies I (new hous­ing devel­op­ment) and 3 (sus­tain­able design) were the most com­monly referred to in appeal decisions. There were 7 appeals were against a decision by the Park Author­ity. Of these; 4 were allowed (plan­ning per­mis­sion gran­ted), 2 dis­missed (refus­al upheld), and I with­drawn. There were 23 val­id appeals against Loc­al Author­ity decisions, of which 12 were allowed (per­mis­sion gran­ted) and 11 dis­missed (refus­al upheld).

2015 LDP policy use, 2015⁄16 to 2020⁄21	Num­ber of times referred to in appeal decisions
Policy I New hous­ing development	12
Policy 1.6 Afford­able hous­ing provided using cross sub­sidy from oth­er housing	1
Policy 1.7 Alter­a­tions to exist­ing houses	2
Policy 2 Sup­port­ing eco­nom­ic growth	4
Policy 2.2 Tour­ism and leis­ure development	4
Policy 3 Sus­tain­able design	15
Policy 3.1 Design statements	2
Policy 4 Nat­ur­al Heritage	6
Policy 4.3 Oth­er import­ant nat­ur­al and earth her­it­age sites and interests	3
Policy 4.4 Pro­tec­ted species	3
Policy 4.5 Oth­er biodiversity	2
Policy 4.6 All development	1
Policy 5 Landscape	6
Policy 8.1 New development	1
Policy 9 Cul­tur­al heritage	2
Policy 9.1 Nation­al designations	1
Policy 10 Resources	2
Policy II Developer contributions	2

Table 2: Policies referred to in appeal decision notice.

Alloc­ated Sites

Detailed mon­it­or­ing on the status of the LDP’s alloc­ated sites is repor­ted in the Plan’s Action Pro­gramme. There­fore, for site inform­a­tion, the Action Pro­gramme should be referred to – avail­able via the link on https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​p​l​a​n​ning- devel­op­ment/ldp-2021/.