Com­mit­tee report

Devel­op­ment proposed: Con­struc­tion of flood defence bund at Land 110M NE Of Scot­tish Water Dalwhinnie

Ref­er­ence: 2025/0143/DET

Applic­ant: Dal­whin­nie Flood Resi­li­ence Group

Date called-in: 23/06/2024

Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve sub­ject to conditions

Case officer: Kath­er­ine Don­nach­ie, Plan­ning Officer

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 2 of 34

This map has been pro­duced to aid in the stat­utory pro­cess of deal­ing with plan­ning applic­a­tions. The map is to help identi­fy the site and its sur­round­ings and to aid Plan­ning Officers, Com­mit­tee Mem­bers and the Pub­lic in the determ­in­a­tion of the pro­pos­al. Maps shown in the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Report can only be used for the pur­poses of the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee. Any oth­er use risks infringing Crown Copy­right and may lead to pro­sec­u­tion or civil pro­ceed­ings. Maps pro­duced with­in this Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Report can only be repro­duced with the express per­mis­sion of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity and oth­er Copy­right hold­ers. This per­mis­sion must be gran­ted in advance.

(Data source: CNPA Crown copy­right and data­base rights 2026. Ord­nance Sur­vey AC0000821) (OS licensed col­our ras­ter MM (NG): The rep­res­ent­a­tion of fea­tures or bound­ar­ies in which CNPA or oth­ers have an interest does not neces­sar­ily imply their true pos­i­tions. For fur­ther inform­a­tion please con­tact the appro­pri­ate authority.) (Built envir­on­ment CNP: CNPA @Crown copy­right and data­base rights 2023 OS 160040965)

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 3 of 34

Site descrip­tion, pro­pos­al and history

Site descrip­tion

1. The applic­a­tion site is loc­ated at Dal­whin­nie between a small hous­ing devel­op­ment at Tru­im View and the River Tru­im itself. There are oth­er res­id­en­tial prop­er­ties south of Tru­im View and adja­cent to the A889 road which lies to the west. The A9 lies to the far east on the oth­er side of the river, with slop­ing land in between. A Scot­tish Water treat­ment works lies to the south and there has been some dis­turb­ance of ground to facil­it­ate works in and around that facil­ity in the past. Fur­ther south there is an elec­tri­city sub­sta­tion and bey­ond that the Loch Ericht hotel.

2. The site is presently undu­lat­ing rough land with some tree cov­er. The river has been straightened his­tor­ic­ally in this area and is more braided in appear­ance down­stream fur­ther north. It is loc­ated with­in an area iden­ti­fied on SEPA’s flood maps as hav­ing a high like­li­hood of river flood­ing. Elec­tri­city lines cross the site.

3. The adja­cent River Tru­im is part of the River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion (SAC) des­ig­nated for its fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sels, Atlantic sal­mon, otter and sea lamprey interests. Part of the site runs through the SAC.

4. There are no lis­ted build­ings with­in the imme­di­ate vicinity.

Pro­pos­al

1. The draw­ings and doc­u­ments asso­ci­ated with this applic­a­tion are lis­ted below and are avail­able on the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity web­site unless noted oth­er­wise: https://​www​.eplan​ningcnpa​.co​.uk/​o​n​l​i​n​e​-​a​p​p​l​i​c​a​t​i​o​n​s​/​a​p​p​l​i​c​a​t​i​o​n​D​e​t​a​i​l​s​.​d​o​?​a​c​t​i​v​e​T​a​b​=​d​o​c​u​m​e​n​t​s​&​k​e​y​V​a​l​=​S​X​Y​5​4​O​S​I​0CP00

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 4 of 34

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
Plan — Site Location	160343⁄9 100 Rev A	14/04/25	07/11/25
Plan — Sec­tion Plan	160343⁄9 106	29/05/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund: Sheet 1 of 4	160343⁄9 101 Rev C	15/04/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund: Sheet 2 of 4	160343⁄9 102 Rev A	15/04/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund: Sheet 3 of 4	160343⁄9 103 Rev B	15/04/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund: Sheet 4 of 4	160343⁄9 104 Rev B	15/04/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund With Aer­i­al Imagery — Sheet 1 of 4	160343⁄9 111	03/11/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund With Aer­i­al Imagery — Sheet 2 of 4	160343⁄9 112	03/11/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund With Aer­i­al Imagery — Sheet 3 of 4	160343⁄9 113	03/11/25	07/11/25
Plan — Pro­posed Flood Defence Bund With Aer­i­al Imagery — Sheet 4 of 4	160343⁄9 114	03/11/25	07/11/25
Oth­er — Flood Risk Assess­ment — River Tru­im at Dalwhinnie		01/01/24	23/06/25
Oth­er — Flood Mit­ig­a­tion and Adapt­a­tion Measures	CL Pro­ject 027	01/04/25	23/06/25
Oth­er — Tech­nic­al Memo		01/03/24	29/07/25
Oth­er — Exten­ded Phase 1 Hab­it­at And Pro­tec­ted Spe­cies Sur­vey and Assess­ment Report		29/10/25	07/11/25

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 5 of 34

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
Oth­er — Dal­whin­nie Flood Mit­ig­a­tion — Sup­ple­ment­ary Sup­port­ing Statement		03/11/25	07/11/25
Oth­er — Agent Let­ter to Flood Team			29/07/25
Oth­er — Agent Let­ter to Roads Team			29/07/25
Oth­er — Agent Let­ter to Plan­ning Team			29/07/25
Oth­er — Dal­whin­nie Addendum with FRA		01/01/26	19/01/26
Oth­er — Addendum dif­fer­ence at WWTW			19/01/26

*Where no spe­cif­ic day of month has been provided on the plan, the sys­tem defaults to the 1^st of the month.

1. The pro­posed devel­op­ment seeks full plan­ning per­mis­sion to form a flood defence bund and flood relief chan­nel between hous­ing at Tru­im View and the River Tru­im. There is an exist­ing bund com­pris­ing gravel embank­ment and wall in this area run­ning along the west of the site. It is under­stood this was con­struc­ted many years ago but is no longer main­tained by the High­land Coun­cil and is not provid­ing the required level of pro­tec­tion for flood events. This fea­ture, which is dis­crete in the land­scape, will be retained as exist­ing with the new devel­op­ment cre­ated fur­ther east.

2. The pro­posed bund will be approx­im­ately 1 to 1.5 metres high and 5 metres wide at its base and will run from just north of Tru­im View to the rear of the water treat­ment works. The north­ern sec­tion will cross over an exist­ing track lead­ing to drain­age infra­struc­ture with ramped access main­tained over this. The bund runs south along the rear of Tru­im View, on the oppos­ite side of the access road to this hous­ing. It stops for a short sec­tion at the rear of 4 Tru­im View where there is exist­ing small knoll fea­ture, then con­tin­ues south­wards for a short sec­tion to run along the rear of oth­er prop­er­ties Glen­isla, Glen­loch­sie and Tru­im Bank. A fur­ther bund will be formed to the east of the afore­men­tioned knoll to then run south to the water treat­ment works.

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 6 of 34

1. In terms of con­struc­tion, the applic­ants have advised that due to gran­u­lar soils here they would need to do sheet pil­ing which would need to be very deep. So instead, they pro­pose to dig a trench along the line of the bund and line it with a clay liner to act as an imper­meable bar­ri­er to flow below the bund and to mit­ig­ate any seep­age. The height of the bund is designed to be 300mm high­er than the max­im­um mod­elled water level for a 1 in 200 year event. There will be boulders on the river side toe of the bund to cre­ate a stable scour res­ist­ant face.

2. A drain­age / flood relief trench is pro­posed between the bund and the river which will fol­low and enhance exist­ing depres­sions in the land­scape. This will mit­ig­ate flows by provid­ing a con­trolled path­way redir­ect­ing water to the flood plain bey­ond, along with provid­ing stor­age. It will vary in depth from 0.5 to 0.8 metres and will be around 0.6 metres wide. There will be no works with­in the river itself.

3. The applic­ants have explained that the bund is designed as pass­ive earth­works with low main­ten­ance require­ments. It is inten­ded that both the bund and chan­nel will be micro sited to ensure min­im­al envir­on­ment­al impacts, with the chan­nel inten­ded to be designed to cre­ate addi­tion­al hab­it­at diversity.

4. The applic­ants have sub­mit­ted a num­ber of sup­port­ing doc­u­ments as follows:

5. Flood Mit­ig­a­tion and Adap­tion Doc­u­ment – this explains why flood defences are needed, with more flood­ing pre­dicted now due to cli­mate change, includ­ing on the west side of the A889 so present­ing increased flood risk. It also explains why the dir­ect defence option was con­sidered to be the most appro­pri­ate, and that fol­low­ing ini­tial Kaya Con­sult­ing pro­pos­als, it was decided to max­im­ise the dis­tance between the river and the bund to reduce any poten­tial for upstream and down­stream effects.

6. Flood Risk Assess­ment (FRA) – com­mis­sioned by the Dal­whin­nie Flood Resi­li­ence Group to con­sider the cur­rent risk of flood­ing and flood mit­ig­a­tion options. It notes that old maps showed the Tru­im used to be more

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 7 of 34

mean­der­ing sug­gest­ing it was straightened in the past, per­haps to pro­tect the road or prop­er­ties, with the changes in meanders sug­gest­ing it is a dynam­ic river. It explains the mod­el­ling illus­trates that, as flows increase, water is pre­dicted to exceed the gravel bank adja­cent to Tru­im View and spill west flood­ing these prop­er­ties. The mod­el­ling also pre­dicts that this will exceed the left bank of the river by the sub­sta­tion, spill­ing onto the A889 and prop­er­ties bey­ond. The vari­ous options con­sidered are explained, such as stor­ing water in upper reaches of the river and nat­ur­al flood man­age­ment, with oppor­tun­it­ies con­sidered to be lim­ited due to the steep nature of the topo­graphy. Prop­erty level pro­tec­tion was con­sidered to only pro­tect to fairly shal­low levels such as 0.5 metres, whilst flood warn­ing sys­tems are not a pro­tec­tion meas­ure but rather a warn­ing meas­ure with the pos­sib­il­ity of link­ing a scheme to the SSE gauging sta­tion if they were involved. The FRA also explains why dredging is not an option in envir­on­ment­al terms and in rela­tion to impacts on riverb­anks and down­stream infrastructure.

1. Tech­nic­al Memo by Kaya Con­sult­ing – this includes fur­ther flood­ing inform­a­tion and explains that con­struc­tion of a bund would res­ult in changes to flood depths and velo­cit­ies with­in the mod­elled reach area, redu­cing flood depths with­in the built-up area of Dal­whin­nie and increas­ing depths mar­gin­ally in oth­er areas as a res­ult. These impacts would not extend upstream of the ser­vice sta­tion or down­stream of the dis­til­lery, with no prop­er­ties on the right hand side of the river (look­ing down­stream) to impact upon.

2. Addi­tion­al inform­a­tion on flood risk – this has been provided to address points raised by the tech­nic­al con­sul­tees and includes explan­at­ory let­ters and an addendum to the FRA provid­ing the addi­tion­al inform­a­tion sought in rela­tion to dif­fer­ent ranges of flood events.

3. Sup­ple­ment­ary Sup­port­ing State­ment – this explains the his­tory of the devel­op­ment of the Dal­whin­nie Flood Resi­li­ence Group and how the group has worked with loc­al stake­hold­ers and the com­munity to devel­op these pro­pos­als. It also out­lines their aspir­a­tion that the defences be form­ally adopted.

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 8 of 34

1. Exten­ded Phase 1 Hab­it­at and Pro­tec­ted Spe­cies Sur­vey and Assess­ment Report – this sets out that the site is primar­ily poor semi-improved grass­land with tall ruder­al veget­a­tion of low eco­lo­gic­al value and scattered trees. To com­pensate for loss of grass­land, it is recom­men­ded that nat­ive spe­cies rich wild­flower mixes are sown at suit­able loc­a­tions and that trees are retained where pos­sible with fur­ther river­side plant­ing of water tol­er­ant nat­ive trees to slow water flow in the flood plain.

2. The sur­vey con­sidered that there is neg­li­gible bat roost poten­tial in trees; low impact to amphi­bi­ans, rep­tiles and small mam­mals; and low to neg­li­gible poten­tial for impacts on badger, beaver, red squir­rel, pine marten, wild­cat, otter or water vole. A single otter spraint was recor­ded in the area. Detailed recom­mend­a­tions for mit­ig­a­tion and enhance­ment are out­lined, includ­ing: pro­vi­sion of Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment Man­age­ment Plan; plant­ing of trees and shrubs; enhan­cing grass­land; pre-con­struc­tion otter sur­vey and recom­mend­a­tions for redu­cing poten­tial dis­turb­ance; brief­ing of work­ers and meas­ures to avoid mam­mal entrap­ment; care to check for amphi­bi­ans, rep­tiles, small mam­mals and nest­ing birds; and install­a­tion of bat and bird boxes.

His­tory

1. There are no plan­ning applic­a­tions on the site itself, but there have been some applic­a­tions in the vicin­ity as follows:

2. 05/00163/REMBS (approv­al of reserved mat­ters) — Erec­tion of four dwell­ings at Land Adja­cent to Vil­lage Hall approved by the High­land Coun­cil. (This the Tru­im View development).

3. Devel­op­ments at the waste-water treat­ment works to the south are as fol­lows, all approved by the High­land Coun­cil: a) 07/00333/FULBS — Install­a­tion of pump sump, sand fil­ter and lime­stone con­tact­or. b) 18/05596/FUL — Erec­tion of new water treat­ment works com­pris­ing two treat­ment build­ings, hard stand­ings & site landscaping.

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 9 of 34

c) 21/04075/FUL Con­struc­tion of new Water Treat­ment Works (Amend­ment to 18/05596/FUL) — this involved a slightly big­ger site to accom­mod­ate some addi­tion­al infrastructure.

1. Devel­op­ments on the oppos­ite (south-east) side of the river are as fol­lows, all approved by the High­land Coun­cil: a) 2018/05623/FUL — Install­a­tion of private access track to ser­vice pub­lic water sup­ply bore­holes with loc­al land­scap­ing and cham­ber cov­ers at Land 275M East Of Waste Water Treat­ment Works Dal­whin­nie. b) 2018/01364/­FUL- Form­a­tion of access track, sink­ing of 4No. bore­holes, ground re-pro­fil­ing, fen­cing at land 275M East Of Waste Water Treat­ment Works Dalwhinnie.

Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Appraisal

1. A Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al (HRA) has been under­taken to con­sider the poten­tial effects of the devel­op­ment upon the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of European sites. The HRA doc­u­ment is attached as Appendix 2. The European site in this case is the River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion (SAC) des­ig­nated for its Atlantic sal­mon, fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sels (FWPM), sea lamprey and otter interests.

2. The HRA notes whilst there are no in-chan­nel works, the pro­pos­al involves con­struc­tion of flood defence bunds next to the River Tru­im, togeth­er with a drain­age ditch which may be a route for con­struc­tion phase mobil­ised sed­i­ment or pol­lu­tion to enter the water­course. It is con­sidered that there are likely sig­ni­fic­ant effects upon the interests of the River Spey SAC in terms of short-term effects on otter from con­struc­tion activ­ity includ­ing poten­tial for dis­turb­ance of any holts or rest­ing sites, and indir­ect impacts through poten­tial change in water qual­ity and impacts on prey spe­cies. There is also poten­tial for oper­a­tion­al phase loss of hab­it­at as the pro­posed drain­age ditch crosses into ter­restri­al hab­it­at with­in the SAC.

3. With regard to fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sel, NatureScot has advised that whilst a FWPM sur­vey was not car­ried out it is very unlikely that there would be any this far up the catch­ment so no likely sig­ni­fic­ant effects are pre­dicted. This is

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 10 of 34

also con­sidered to be the case for sea lamprey. In terms of Atlantic sal­mon, it is con­sidered that there may be short term effects dur­ing con­struc­tion through release of sed­i­ment mobil­ised from riverb­anks that could smoth­er Atlantic sal­mon spawn­ing gravels down­stream from the site as well as poten­tial impacts from any fuel spills. NatureScot has also advised that there may be poten­tial impacts on sal­mon hab­it­ats as a res­ult of the bunds lim­it­ing the flood plain and con­strain­ing the water­course which may res­ult in uncer­tain changes in the force of the water with­in the watercourse.

1. The HRA has con­cluded that these likely sig­ni­fic­ant effects can be sat­is­fact­or­ily addressed by suit­able mit­ig­a­tion. This mit­ig­a­tion includes pre­con­struc­tion pro­tec­ted spe­cies sur­veys togeth­er with pro­duc­tion and imple­ment­a­tion of an otter spe­cies pro­tec­tion plan identi­fy­ing appro­pri­ate mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures if there is evid­ence of pro­tec­ted spe­cies; tim­ing of works to avoid Atlantic sal­mon spawn­ing sea­son; and sub­mis­sion of pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion plan. Poten­tial impacts arising from any loc­al­ised changes to force of flow in the river are not con­sidered to impact on the integ­rity of the des­ig­nated site because of the restric­ted length of river affected, the lim­ited impacts on water stor­age capa­city in the flood­plain due to the pro­posed works being set back from the river, and the fact that the river is already mobile espe­cially down­stream whereby there should not be a change in geomorphology.

2. On this basis, it is con­cluded that the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the des­ig­nated sites will be met and there will not be an adverse effect on site integ­rity of the des­ig­nated sites. NatureScot have con­firmed agree­ment with these conclusions.

Devel­op­ment plan context

Policies

Nation­al policy	Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4) Scot­land 2045 (Policies rel­ev­ant to the assess­ment of this applic­a­tion are marked with a cross (x))
Policy 1 Tack­ling the cli­mate and nature crises	X
Policy 2 Cli­mate mit­ig­a­tion and adaptation	X

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 11 of 34

Policy 3 Biod­iversity	X
Policy 4 Nat­ur­al places	X
Policy 5 Soils	X
Policy 6 Forestry, wood­land and trees	X
Policy 7 His­tor­ic assets and places	X
Policy 8 Green belts
Policy 9 Brown­field, vacant and derel­ict land, and empty buildings	X
Policy 11 Energy
Policy 12 Zero waste
Policy 13 Sus­tain­able transport	X
Policy 14 Design, qual­ity and place	X
Policy 15 Loc­al liv­ing and 20 minute neighbourhoods
Policy 16 Qual­ity homes
Policy 17 Rur­al homes
Policy 18 Infra­struc­ture first	X
Policy 19 Heat­ing and cooling
Policy 20 Blue and green infrastructure	X
Policy 21 Play, recre­ation and sport
Policy 22 Flood risk and water management	X
Policy 23 Health and safety	X
Policy 24 Digit­al infrastructure
Policy 25 Com­munity wealth building	X
Policy 26 Busi­ness and industry
Policy 27 City, town, loc­al and com­mer­cial centres
Policy 28 Retail
Policy 29 Rur­al development
Policy 30 Tourism
Policy 31 Cul­ture and creativity
Policy 32 Aquaculture
Policy 33 Minerals

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 12 of 34

Stra­tegic policy	Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022 – 2027
Loc­al plan policy	Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (2021) (Policies rel­ev­ant to the assess­ment of this applic­a­tion are marked with a cross (x))
Policy 1	New hous­ing development
Policy 2	Sup­port­ing eco­nom­ic growth
Policy 3	Design and placemaking	X
Policy 4	Nat­ur­al heritage	X
Policy 5	Land­scape	X
Policy 6	The sit­ing and design of digit­al com­mu­nic­a­tions equipment
Policy 7	Renew­able energy
Policy 8	Open space, sport and recreation
Policy 9	Cul­tur­al heritage	X
Policy 10	Resources	X
Policy 11	Developer oblig­a­tions

1. All new devel­op­ment pro­pos­als require to be assessed in rela­tion to policies con­tained in the adop­ted Devel­op­ment Plan which com­prises Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4) and the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 (LDP). The full word­ing of policies can be found at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/national-planning-framework‑4/documents/ and at: https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​w​p​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​/​u​p​l​o​a​d​s​/​2​0​2​1​/​0​3​/​C​N​P​A​-​L​D​P​-​2​0​2​1​-​w​e​b.pdf

Plan­ning guidance

1. Sup­ple­ment­ary guid­ance also sup­ports the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan and provides more details about how to com­ply with the policies. Guid­ance that is rel­ev­ant to this applic­a­tion is marked with a cross (x).

Policy 1	Hous­ing sup­ple­ment­ary guidance
Policy 2	Sup­port­ing eco­nom­ic growth non-stat­utory guidance	X
Policy 3	Design and place­mak­ing non-stat­utory guidance	X

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 13 of 34

Policy 4	Nat­ur­al her­it­age non-stat­utory guid­ance	X
Policy 5	Land­scape non-stat­utory guidance	X
Policy 7	Renew­able energy non-stat­utory guidance
Policy 8	Open space, sport and recre­ation non-stat­utory guidance
Policy 9	Cul­tur­al her­it­age non-stat­utory guidance	X
Policy 10	Resources non-stat­utory guidance	X
Policy 11	Developer oblig­a­tions sup­ple­ment­ary guidance

Con­sulta­tions

1. A sum­mary of the main issues raised by con­sul­tees now follows:

2. SEPA was con­sul­ted as the site lies with­in an area of flood risk. They noted that they are gen­er­ally sup­port­ive of actions to man­age flood risk provid­ing this does not res­ult in increased risk for oth­ers as required by NPF4 Policy 22. They ini­tially lodged a hold­ing objec­tion due to lack of inform­a­tion to demon­strate that there would be no increased flood risk else­where or a need for future flood pro­tec­tion schemes.

3. Fur­ther inform­a­tion ini­tially provided by the applic­ant did not address all of SEPA’s con­cerns, how­ever on receipt of an addendum to the FRA in Janu­ary 2026 (which included mod­el­ling at impacts at the wastewa­ter treat­ment works) SEPA have with­drawn their objec­tions. They advise that this has sat­is­fact­or­ily demon­strated that the pro­posed flood defence bund would not have a sig­ni­fic­ant det­ri­ment­al impact on flood risk to sur­round­ing recept­ors and that the risk to prop­er­ties when over­topped would not res­ult in increased flood levels. Out­with the area of bene­fit there are some areas at increased risk of flood­ing, but this is mostly lim­ited to the water­course itself and areas imme­di­ately adja­cent where there are no receptors.

4. SEPA have high­lighted that giv­en the inform­al nature of this flood defence bund, their flood maps will not be updated to take account of it. Addi­tion­ally, the defences will not be taken into account when determ­in­ing plan­ning applic­a­tions, and any Flood Risk Assess­ments for future devel­op­ment will need to take account of flood risk in the absence of the pro­tec­tion offered by

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Cairngorms Nation­al Park Authority Item 5 Plan­ning Committee 13 March 2026 Page 14 of 34

the bund. They have also noted that whilst the flood level in the area of bene­fit is gen­er­ally reduced, when the capa­city of the bund is exceeded it may be that water is held in the area for longer. They there­fore recom­mend that this is con­sidered with­in the design and con­struc­tion of the bund. Also, any breach of defence should be con­sidered with­in any main­ten­ance arrange­ments. These mat­ters can be included as an inform­at­ive to any consent