Item5AACarrbridgeAffordableHousingCommitteeReport

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DEVEL­OP­MENT PROPOSED:

Demoli­tion of derel­ict hotel, togeth­er with the erec­tion of 10(No.) afford­able flats, and asso­ci­ated park­ing. at Stru­an House Hotel Car­rbridge High­land PH23 3AS

REF­ER­ENCE: 2021/0305/DET

APPLIC­ANT: Hous­ing Devel­op­ment Services

DATE CALLED-IN: 27 Septem­ber 2021

RECOM­MEND­A­TION: Approve, sub­ject to Con­di­tions and Developer Contribution

CASE OFFICER: Stephanie Wade, Plan­ning Officer

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CNPA Plan­ning Committee

Applic­a­tion Site

0 100 Metres

[Map Image]

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

SITE DESCRIP­TION, PRO­POS­AL AND HISTORY

Site Descrip­tion

1. The applic­a­tion site is the former Stru­an House Hotel loc­ated on the east­ern side of the B1953 with­in the vil­lage of Car­rbridge. On the oppos­ite side of the road is the Land­mark Forest Adven­ture Park Tour­ist Attrac­tion. Vehicu­lar access to the prop­erty is by an unadop­ted road, off the Main Street, on the north side. This road also provides vehicu­lar access to four oth­er properties.

2. The build­ing com­prises a tra­di­tion­al, 2 storey front­age, facing west to the pub­lic road, with mod­ern exten­sions to the rear (east). The build­ing is fin­ished with slate to the roof, white­washed wet harling to the walls, with tra­di­tion­al sash and case tim­ber framed win­dows to the older part and mod­ern case­ment win­dow types to the rear exten­sions. A low wall forms the road­side bound­ary. Adjoin­ing the rear exten­sions, to the east, is a house (“Aspen House”). This prop­erty bene­fits from sep­ar­ate access court­yard and park­ing area situ­ated imme­di­ately adja­cent to the hotel exten­sions. Bey­ond the garden area of Aspen House, is a rect­an­gu­lar area of ground which formed an inform­al park­ing area for the hotel. Fur­ther east and adja­cent to the park­ing area is a res­id­en­tial dwell­ing ​“Car­rwood”. Fur­ther res­id­en­tial dwell­ings fol­low the lin­ear pat­tern of the road net­work with­in the imme­di­ate area.

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:

http://​www​.eplan​ningcnpa​.co​.uk/​o​n​line-

applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=summary&keyVal=QZVWZFSI0CI00

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
PLANS
Plan — Loc­a­tion Plan	CBH-NOR-ZZ-ZZ-DR-A-900005 P01	26/07/21	27/09/21
Plan — Site Plan	CBH-NOR-ZZ-00-DR-A-90003 P08	18/03/22	21/03/22
Plan — Street Elevations	CBH-NOR-ZZ-ZZ-DR-A-00101 P05	14/01/22	01/04/22

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

Plan — Flat Types A and B Elev­a­tions	CBH-NOR-ZZ-ZZ-DR-A-00104 P07	31/03/22	01/04/22
Plan — Flat Types A and B Floor Plans	CBH-NOR-ZZ-ZZ-DR-A-00105 P02	09/09/21	27/09/21
Plan — Flat Type C Elevations	CBH-NOR-ZZ-ZZ-DR-A-00103 P04	16/03/22	16/03/22
Plan — Flat Type C Floor Plans	CBH-NOR-ZZ-ZZ-DR-A-00002 P03	11/01/22	01/04/22
Plan — Vehicle Swept Path	3727:111	01/09/21	05/11/21
Plan — Road Layout	3727:101 Rev.C	05/04/22	05/04/22
Plan — Fen­cing Elevations	CBH-NOR-ZZ-XX-DR-A-00107 P01	19/01/22	07/02/22
Plan — Land­scap­ing Plan	CBH-NOR-ZZ-DR-A-90004 P03	16/03/22	16/03/22

SUP­PORT­ING DOCUMENTATION
Oth­er — Drain­age Impact Assessment	3727 Issue.1	08/09/21	27/09/21
Oth­er — Design Statement			27/09/21
Oth­er — Bat Activ­ity Survey	9741	05/10/21	08/10/21
Oth­er — Trans­port Statement	3727 Issue.1	04/02/22	07/02/22

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

1. The applic­a­tion site seeks plan­ning per­mis­sion for the demoli­tion of the former hotel build­ing, Aspen House, asso­ci­ated back land build­ings and hotel car park. The site would then be developed with the erec­tion of three blocks of flat­ted, res­id­en­tial accom­mod­a­tion com­pris­ing ten units with asso­ci­ated ser­vices. The new units look to util­ise the foot­print of the former hotel and exist­ing vehicu­lar access from the private lane lead­ing to Main Street (B9153). All units are pro­posed as afford­able hous­ing with two wheel­chair user units. The hous­ing accom­mod­a­tion sched­ule is as follows:

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

Num­ber of Units	Design Type	Type of Afford­able Hous­ing	Num­ber of Bedrooms
6	Types A and B Flats	Social rent	1
2	Type C Flats	Social rent	2
2	Type C Wheel­chair User Flats	Social rent	1

1. The main block of units, formed of Type A and B Flats, is loc­ated lin­ear to the Main Road. The two fur­ther blocks of Type C units are loc­ated fur­ther east with­in the site sep­ar­ated by the garden areas and vehicu­lar park­ing area. Vehicu­lar park­ing is pro­posed with­in a paved court off the access lane provid­ing 13 park­ing spaces. Each of the ground floor Type C, wheel­chair user flats, is served by a dis­abled park­ing space which has its own dir­ect access from the access lane to the north. A secure bike store is pro­posed to be erec­ted to the north of the paved court­yard which would provide stor­age for 10 bicycles. A vis­it­or bicycle stand for 6 bikes is pro­posed to be installed along the north of the site. Each flat has an alloc­ated private garden with­in the site which also provides indi­vidu­al refuse stor­age, with main refuse col­lec­tion points loc­ated adja­cent to the main road and access road.

2. The design of the ter­races includes a com­bin­a­tion pitched, roof ori­ent­a­tions, clad with slate. The walls are pro­posed to be fin­ished with white render and hori­zont­al clad­ding. Doors and win­dows are pro­posed to be dark grey in col­our. Heat­ing is pro­posed as quantum elec­tric heat­ing and photo­vol­ta­ic pan­els on roofs. The gar­dens are pro­posed to be bound by 1.8‑metre-high tim­ber fen­cing and the dry­stone wall along the street front­age is pro­posed to be retained.

3. The applic­a­tion is sup­por­ted by the fol­low­ing documents:

a) Drain­age Impact Assess­ment- The doc­u­ment con­firms that the pro­posed devel­op­ment will be con­nec­ted to the exist­ing Scot­tish Water Com­bined sew­er which is with­in the site to deal with foul sew­er­age. Regard­ing sur­face water, the pro­posed park­ing area is to be con­struc­ted of per­meable block pav­ing with dis­charge by way of infilt­ra­tion. Roof water is pro­posed to be col­lec­ted via gut­ter­ing and dis­charged to the per­meable block pav­ing, park­ing areas.

b) Bat Activ­ity Sur­vey- Con­firms that dur­ing the sur­vey­ing of the build­ing, a roost­ing bat recor­ded using the build­ing and small num­bers of bats were recor­ded for­aging and com­mut­ing past the site. The build­ing is assessed to host a trans­ition­al roost that may occa­sion­ally be used by bats. Due to the state of dis­repair, the build­ing is assessed as unlikely to be suit­able to host a mater­nity roost and not suit­able as a hiber­nacu­lum. The report out­lines mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures which include: the occur­rence of demoli­tion with­in winter months to avoid the pres­ence of roost­ing bats and the install­a­tion of bat boxes with­in the site. A European Pro­tec­ted Spe­cies licence for bats is not required to under­take the pro­posed works.

c) Trans­port State­ment- States that the devel­op­ment is read­ily access­ible by a range of sus­tain­able travel modes which provide a ser­vice suit­able for res­id­ents com­mut­ing to and from work in the sur­round­ing area. There are appro­pri­ate ped­es­tri­an facil­it­ies at

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

the bound­ary of the site; bus stops loc­ated with­in 5 minutes walk­ing dis­tance; and the rail­way sta­tion with­in 20 minutes walk­ing from the site. There is no ded­ic­ated cycle pro­vi­sion with­in the exist­ing road net­work. The devel­op­ment is with­in walk­ing dis­tance of a wide range of loc­al amen­it­ies. Regard­ing park­ing pro­vi­sion, a new com­mun­al park­ing court is pro­posed provid­ing a total of 15 park­ing spaces which includes the 2 dis­abled spaces. Lock­able cycle stor­age is provided for 10 bicycles with an addi­tion­al space for 6 vis­it­or bicycles provided. A res­id­en­tial travel pack is pro­posed to be giv­en to all new res­id­ents with inform­a­tion relat­ing to sus­tain­able travel choices.

1. Dur­ing the pro­gres­sion of the applic­a­tion and in response to the com­ments from the ori­gin­al con­sulta­tion, revi­sions were made to the ori­gin­al scheme with adjust­ments to the refuse stor­age and col­lec­tion points, cycle stor­age and the relo­ca­tion of the most east­erly block of C flats, to provide a big­ger dis­tance between the build­ing and the res­id­en­tial prop­erty to the east.

2. Plans of the pro­pos­al can be viewed in Appendix 1.

His­tory

1. The site has remained vacant since 2006. In 2008, plan­ning per­mis­sion was gran­ted by the CNPA for the ​“con­ver­sion of, and alter­a­tions and exten­sion to, hotel to form 5 dwell­ing­houses” under applic­a­tion ref­er­ence 08/117/CP. It is under­stood that this per­mis­sion was nev­er implemented.

Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Appraisal

1. A Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al [HRA] has been under­taken to con­sider the effects of the pro­pos­al upon the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the European Sites as lis­ted with­in the doc­u­ment- attached at Appendix 2. The European sites poten­tially affected are col­lect­ively referred to as the Badenoch and Strath­spey caper­cail­lie Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Areas.

2. The doc­u­ment con­cludes that there will be no dir­ect or indir­ect effects on the hab­it­ats, their struc­tures or func­tion or sup­port­ing pro­cesses, due to the loc­a­tion of the pro­posed devel­op­ment on a brown­field site with­in a set­tle­ment, remote from the Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Areas. Regard­ing caper­cail­lie, there would not be any sig­ni­fic­ance dis­turb­ance of the spe­cies and as all the Con­ser­va­tion Object­ives will be met, there will not be an adverse effect on site integ­rity for any of the Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Areas.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN CONTEXT

Policies

Nation­al Policy	Scot­tish Plan­ning Policy 2014
Stra­tegic Policy	Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2017 — 2022
Loc­al Plan Policy	Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (2021)Those policies rel­ev­ant to the assess­ment of this applic­a­tion are marked with a cross
POLICY I	NEW HOUS­ING DEVELOPMENT	X
POLICY 2	SUP­PORT­ING ECO­NOM­IC GROWTH	X
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
POLICY 10	RESOURCES	X
POLICY 11	DEVELOPER CON­TRI­BU­TIONS	X

1. All new devel­op­ment pro­pos­als require to be assessed in rela­tion to policies con­tained in the adop­ted Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan. The full word­ing of policies can be found 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 forms part of 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.

Policy I	New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance (2015)	X
Policy 2	Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth Non-Stat­utory Guidance	X
Policy 3	Sus­tain­able Design Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance (2015)	X
Policy 4	Nat­ur­al Her­it­age Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance	X
Policy 5	Land­scape Non-Stat­utory Guidance	X
Policy 7	Renew­able Energy Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance
Policy 8	Sport and Recre­ation Non-Stat­utory Guidance
Policy 9	Cul­tur­al Her­it­age Non-Stat­utory Guidance
Policy 10	Resources Non-Stat­utory Guidance	X
Policy 11	Developer Con­tri­bu­tions Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance (2015)	X

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

CON­SULTA­TIONS

Sum­mary of the main issues raised by consultees

1. NatureScot agrees with the con­clu­sions of the HRA that the pro­pos­al is unlikely to res­ult in an adverse effect to any European des­ig­nated sites. They agree with the reas­ons out­lined in Annex I of the HRA, that there is unlikely to be an adverse effect on the integ­rity of the five SPAs as a res­ult of this pro­pos­al. All the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the SPAs will con­tin­ue to be met, and it is highly likely that the future res­id­ents of the devel­op­ment will con­tin­ue to util­ise the extens­ive net­work of exist­ing recre­ation­al routes through these woods. There is no reas­on to believe that this small increase in the pop­u­la­tion of Car­rbridge will res­ult in a change in recre­ation­al beha­viour or a sig­ni­fic­ant increase in recre­ation­al dis­turb­ance to caper­cail­lie using the sur­round­ing area.

2. Scot­tish Water has no objec­tion to the pro­pos­al. They con­firm that the devel­op­ment would be fed from Aviemore Water Treat­ment Works although capa­city will have to be reviewed once per­mis­sion is gran­ted for the scheme. Regard­ing wastewa­ter, the devel­op­ment would be ser­viced by Car­rbridge Waste Water Treat­ment Works and again capa­city would be reviewed once plan­ning per­mis­sion is granted.

3. High­land Coun­cil Trans­port Plan­ning Team ori­gin­ally reques­ted the sub­mis­sion of fur­ther inform­a­tion to inform their assess­ment of the scheme. Fol­low­ing receipt of addi­tion­al inform­a­tion, the Team removed their hold­ing objec­tion and had the fol­low­ing comments:

a) Trans­port State­ment- The doc­u­ment was reques­ted to provide an assess­ment of the qual­ity and access­ib­il­ity of walk­ing routes to loc­al ser­vices for people with mobil­ity issues. The Team note that the doc­u­ment fails to address the fun­da­ment­al fault in the ped­es­tri­an route to the vil­lage which is the absence of a foot­way out­side Kin­chyle House. The Plan­ning Team require a plan­ning con­di­tion for a new buil­dout to be provided along the length of Kin­chyle House to ensure there is a con­tinu­ous ped­es­tri­an route to the bus stop/​ser­vices in the vil­lage. The design of the build out must be approved by the Trans­port Plan­ning Team.

b) Cycle Park­ing- The Team con­firms the vis­it­or cycle park­ing is accept­able. The Team con­siders the resident’s cycle park­ing shed to be under­sized to accom­mod­ate 10 bicycles and there­fore object.

c) Car Park­ing- the devel­op­ment has enough car park­ing spaces to meet Coun­cil standards.

d) Refuse and recyc­ling- The lay­out has been amended to provide 4 refuse col­lec­tion points at the back of the foot­way on the B9153 and a six-bin col­lec­tion point on the private track close to the junc­tion with the pub­lic road. The Team have dis­cussed the lay­out with the Waste Man­age­ment Team, and they are sat­is­fied that the refuse col­lec­tion points are acceptable.

1. High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team has no objec­tions to the scheme sub­ject to the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion requir­ing the sub­mis­sion and agree­ment of a final­ised drain­age inform­a­tion assess­ment. The Team notes that from SEPA’s flood map­ping, the pro­pos­al lies out­with any indic­ated plu­vi­al flood­ing dur­ing a I

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

in 200-year return peri­od storm event, although note there may be a resid­ual flood risk. The FRM Team wel­comes the applicant’s state­ment that the site would be designed to pass any plu­vi­al flood­ing and the Team has no objec­tion on the grounds of flood risk.

1. The Team notes the pro­posed drain­age arrange­ments of con­nect­ing to the pub­lic sew­er, how­ever, the drain­age design appears to be based on an assumed infilt­ra­tion rate, which itself is based on a desktop study and an intrus­ive invest­ig­a­tion, 250m away. Should the actu­al infilt­ra­tion rate be lower than expec­ted, the FRM Team does not rule out that a minor or a major site lay­out change may be required to accom­mod­ate accept­able altern­at­ive drain­age pro­pos­als. A final­ised drain­age strategy should there­fore be provided, which can be dealt with by plan­ning condition.

2. High­land Coun­cil Envir­on­ment­al Health Officer was con­sul­ted on the applic­a­tion but did not provide any comments.

3. High­land Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land Team con­firms that due to the age of the exist­ing build­ing to be demol­ished, there may be asbes­tos con­tain­ing mater­i­al with­in the fab­ric of the build­ing. In addi­tion, depend­ing on the heat­ing type, there may be a fuel tank and asso­ci­ated boil­er house which could have caused con­tam­in­a­tion over years of use. The Team there­fore recom­mends the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion for the sub­mis­sion of a scheme to deal with poten­tial con­tam­in­a­tion and site investigation.

4. High­land Coun­cil Hous­ing Officer con­firms that the derel­ict Hotel has been a blight on Car­rbridge High Street for a con­sid­er­able amount of time. It sits in a loc­a­tion where there is high demand for afford­able hous­ing and this devel­op­ment would deliv­er 10 much needed homes in the com­munity. It is incum­bent on the Coun­cil to make the best use of develop­able sites in areas such as the Cairngorms Nation­al Park where land sup­ply is lim­ited. This pro­posed devel­op­ment makes the best use of the avail­able area in terms of dens­ity and cre­ates a new act­ive front­age on the vil­lage streets­cape bring­ing bene­fits to the vil­lage in terms of improved aes­thet­ics. The use of brown­field sites such as this is envir­on­ment­ally respons­ible. As well as repur­pos­ing an exist­ing site, there is min­im­al dis­rup­tion in terms of the pro­vi­sion of util­it­ies. The site is sus­tain­ably loc­ated in the vil­lage with ease of access to loc­al ser­vices for future occu­pants. The pro­posed devel­op­ment is con­tained with­in the High­land Council’s stra­tegic invest­ment plan for afford­able hous­ing delivery.

5. High­land Coun­cil Cor­por­ate Address Gaz­etteer Ser­vice wish to inform the applic­ant that the street nam­ing and num­ber­ing pro­cess can be found on the High­land Coun­cil website.

6. CNPA Eco­logy Officer con­siders that the pro­pos­al will have a neg­li­gible impact on eco­logy, res­ult­ing in the loss of a small num­ber of trees asso­ci­ated with a garden, and the loss of a derel­ict build­ing which cur­rently has low value as a bat roost (single pip­istrelle only con­firmed to be using the build­ing). The Officer notes that there is an oppor­tun­ity for the SUDs to provide biod­iversity value- i.e. rain gar­dens as opposed to using only per­meable pav­ing. The Officer wel­comes the sub­mis­sion of the land­scape plan which includes plant­ing of nat­ive tree spe­cies such as row­an and cherry provid­ing wild­life and amen­ity value. The Officer also wel­comes the pro­vi­sion of swift bricks with­in the elev­a­tions of the build­ings. Details of extern­al light­ing and a bat species

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

pro­tec­tion plan to include meas­ures as detailed in the bat report are recom­men­ded as plan­ning conditions.

1. CNPA Land­scape Officer notes that, in gen­er­al, the pro­pos­al is unlikely to res­ult in sig­ni­fic­ant adverse land­scape and visu­al effects. The Officer appre­ci­ates that the exist­ing build­ing is in a very poor con­di­tion although ref­er­ences the dis­tinct­ive archi­tec­ture which con­trib­utes to the land­scape char­ac­ter of Car­rbridge. The pro­posed build­ing facing the B1953 would appear fairly plain in design and thus would not con­trib­ute the same archi­tec­tur­al qual­it­ies as the exist­ing hotel. This is a shame but, non­ethe­less, the pro­pos­al does include some wel­come ele­ments that would relate to its set­ting, such as the pro­posed slate roof, the road­side dry­stone wall, and the roof height being slightly lower than the adja­cent Cran­nich House.

2. The Officer wel­comes the inclu­sion of the dry-stone wall but states that 450mm in height is too low to be effect­ive as a wall, robust in its dry­stone con­struc­tion and it is advised that it is altered to at least 800mm high. Regard­ing the revised land­scap­ing scheme, the Officer wel­comes the addi­tion­al plant­ing of broadleaf trees (16) which would have some pos­it­ive land­scape effects and would help to break up the hard edges and sur­faces. Plan­ning con­di­tions are recom­men­ded for details of pro­posed plant­ing and land­scape man­age­ment and main­ten­ance, adjust­ment to dry­stone wall height and exter­i­or light­ing details.

3. CNPA Out­door Access Officer has no com­ments to make in respect of mat­ters per­tain­ing to stat­utory access rights.

4. Car­rbridge and Vicin­ity Com­munity Coun­cil sup­port the devel­op­ment, although have addi­tion­al com­ments on the scheme. They note a couple of the pro­posed flats are to be suit­able for dis­abled res­id­ents. This is warmly wel­comed, but please be aware that the pave­ments in Car­rbridge at the site and par­tic­u­larly trav­el­ling fur­ther north into the vil­lage centre, nar­row down to barely a foot wide, there is also a lack of dropped kerbs. Any­one in a wheel­chair or with mobil­ity issues would have great dif­fi­culty access­ing loc­al ser­vices such as the shop/​post office. If pos­sible, could this be addressed by way of con­di­tion or leg­al agree­ment to have the pave­ments widened to accom­mod­ate wheel­chair users? Res­id­ents more dir­ectly affected by the devel­op­ment have expressed con­cern at prox­im­ity to their prop­er­ties and con­cern at the loss of day­light and sun­light. The Com­munity Council’s full com­ments can be viewed at Appendix 3.

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS

1. The applic­a­tion was advert­ised when first sub­mit­ted. A total of four let­ters of pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tion have been received includ­ing from neigh­bour­ing res­id­ents to the applic­a­tion site. Two let­ters have been received in sup­port, one let­ter offer­ing gen­er­al com­ments and one let­ter rais­ing objec­tion to the scheme. Full cop­ies of all responses can be found at Appendix 4.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

1. The let­ters of sup­port note that:

a) Cur­rent pro­pos­al is well con­ceived, of an appro­pri­ate style, mass­ing, and dens­ity for the site.

b) Pro­pos­al offers a solu­tion to the 15-year increas­ing eye­sore of the hotel.

1. The gen­er­al com­ments received cover:

a) Quer­ies regard­ing the poten­tial mess arising from demoli­tion activities.

b) Con­cern regard­ing rodent num­bers presently at the site.

c) Rais­ing aware­ness of water some­times found on the hotel drive which was raised with Scot­tish Water previously.

1. One let­ter of objec­tion has been received from the nearest res­id­en­tial neigh­bour to the east of the site, of the prop­erty known as Car­rwood. Con­cern is raised over the fol­low­ing points:

a) Con­cern regard­ing the most east­erly build­ing and the impact on neigh­bour­ing amenity.

b) Con­cern regard­ing pos­i­tion of flats to Carrwood.

c) Pro­posed over­look­ing of Car­rwood from 2 win­dows of the flats.

d) Height and sit­ing of the build­ing will impact sun­light to prin­cip­al rooms of Carrwood.

e) Remov­al of estab­lished veget­a­tion and trees on site will impact wildlife.

f) Pro­pos­al would increase traffic flow on private road.

g) Con­cern regard­ing vis­ib­il­ity from access road onto Main Road.

1. Fol­low­ing the con­sulta­tion pro­cess, the scheme has sub­sequently been revised to seek to address con­cerns raised. This is described fur­ther in para­graph 8.

APPRAIS­AL

1. The main plan­ning con­sid­er­a­tions are the prin­ciple of devel­op­ment; the impact upon the land­scape, lay­out, and design; the envir­on­ment­al impacts; access and ser­vi­cing and developer contributions.

Prin­ciple of Development

1. The prin­ciple of redevel­op­ing the site to provide hous­ing was ori­gin­ally estab­lished under the pre­vi­ous applic­a­tion in accord­ance with policy pro­vi­sion at that time. The loss of hotel accom­mod­a­tion with­in the Nation­al Park is not an uncom­mon one, with sim­il­ar schemes being under­taken, although all must be judged on a case-by-case basis.

2. Policy 2.5: Pro­tect­ing Exist­ing Eco­nom­ic Activ­ity of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 allows for the altern­at­ive use of tour­ism sites cur­rently in, or last used for eco­nom­ic, employ­ment or tour­ism pur­poses 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

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

b) The site or build­ings are unsuit­able for the busi­ness needs and impact adversely on the built and nat­ur­al envir­on­ment, loc­al char­ac­ter, or neigh­bour­ing properties.

1. The Stru­an House Hotel, although once a pop­u­lar and well used busi­ness, has remained vacant and derel­ict from use for over 15 years fall­ing into a state of dis­repair. It is under­stood that the busi­ness closed due to fall­ing into fin­an­cial dif­fi­culties and that man­age­ment of the hotel had also changed on sev­er­al occa­sions pri­or to this. Dur­ing this peri­od, the prop­erty was offered for sale and no forth­com­ing bids were received from any pur­chasers wish­ing to retain its ori­gin­al use. The prop­erty has not con­trib­uted to the loc­al eco­nomy for a sig­ni­fic­ant amount of time and there­fore its loss is not con­sidered to have any adverse impact on the tour­ist accom­mod­a­tion sup­ply with­in the area, nor on the wider eco­nomy. The build­ing in its cur­rent state, has affected the loc­al char­ac­ter of the area for a con­sid­er­able amount of time. In addi­tion, it is noted that there is sup­port from the Com­munity Coun­cil and pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tions for the redevel­op­ment of the site. On this basis, the pro­posed loss of the busi­ness use of the site is accept­able and in accord­ance with Policy 2: Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

2. Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 provides sup­port for new hous­ing devel­op­ment where it is loc­ated with­in an iden­ti­fied set­tle­ment bound­ary, sub­ject to that devel­op­ment meet­ing the require­ments for the set­tle­ment and rein­for­cing and enhan­cing the char­ac­ter of the settlement.

3. The set­tle­ment object­ives for Car­rbridge as out­lined with­in the 2021 Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan, includes the fol­low­ing objectives:

a) Sup­port the deliv­ery of hous­ing that meets loc­al needs, par­tic­u­larly afford­able and mid-mar­ket housing,

b) Sup­port pro­pos­als for the redevel­op­ment of the Stru­an House Hotel for uses that bene­fit the community.

1. The devel­op­ment is put for­ward for con­sid­er­a­tion by the High­land Coun­cil to provide 10 afford­able flats in a cent­ral loc­a­tion with­in Car­rbridge, mak­ing use of a brown­field site. In accord­ance with policy 1.4, the pro­pos­al includes a mix of dwell­ing sizes to help secure a bal­anced hous­ing stock for the area by provid­ing a range of smal­ler units of 1- and 2‑bedroom units. The pro­pos­al also accords with Policy 1.5, which seeks the pro­vi­sion of afford­able hous­ing with­in devel­op­ment schemes of at least 25% of the devel­op­ment. In this case, the pro­pos­al looks to provide 100% afford­able hous­ing which is wel­comed. The prin­ciple of hous­ing on this site, meet­ing a loc­al need for afford­able hous­ing to bene­fit the com­munity is accept­able and accords with Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment, sub­ject to com­pli­ance with oth­er rel­ev­ant Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan policies.

Land­scape Impacts, Lay­out and Design

1. Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 pre­sumes against devel­op­ment which does not con­serve and enhance the land­scape char­ac­ter and spe­cial qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park and in par­tic­u­lar the set­ting of the pro­posed devel­op­ment. Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment and Policy 3:

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seek to rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of the exist­ing set­tle­ment and encour­age new devel­op­ment to be sym­path­et­ic to the tra­di­tion­al pat­tern and char­ac­ter of the area, whilst encour­aging innov­at­ive design and finishes.

1. The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Land­scape Officer con­siders that the pro­pos­al is unlikely to res­ult in sig­ni­fic­ant adverse land­scape and visu­al effects. The pro­posed build­ing although sim­pler in design than the former hotel build­ing, includes wel­comed ele­ments relat­ing to its set­ting such as the dry­stone wall, roof height and mater­i­al palette, includ­ing nat­ur­al slate. A land­scap­ing scheme has been provided which includes the plant­ing of 16 broadleaf trees, cre­at­ing a pos­it­ive land­scape effect, break­ing up the hard edges and sur­faces. The height of the road­side dry­stone wall has also been increased in line with the com­ments of the Land­scape Officer. Sub­ject to plan­ning con­di­tions being include for, a land­scape main­ten­ance scheme, and exter­i­or light­ing details, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

2. The pro­posed lay­out fol­lows the gen­er­al grain of the street pat­tern, with act­ive front­ages along Main Street and build­ing scales appro­pri­ate to the wider street scene and to the struc­tures being replaced. On this basis the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with the spe­cif­ic policy require­ments of Policy I and Policy 3.

3. Regard­ing design, Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to ensure that all new devel­op­ment deliv­ers high stand­ards of design and con­trib­utes to the sense of place. It should min­im­ise the effect of cli­mate change and make use of sus­tain­able resources. The design of the pro­posed dwell­ings adopts a mod­ern approach whilst util­ising tra­di­tion­al pro­por­tions and scale, which is evid­ent with the loc­al archi­tec­tur­al ver­nacu­lar. The site is con­sidered to have capa­city for the num­ber of res­id­en­tial units pro­posed and the dens­ity is there­fore con­sidered accept­able to the site size. Sol­ar pan­els are pro­posed to be installed to aid the min­im­isa­tion of energy usage.

4. On this basis, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to accord with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing and Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Envir­on­ment­al Impacts

1. Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to ensure that there is no adverse impact upon des­ig­nated areas, pro­tec­ted spe­cies, or biod­iversity whilst Policy 10: Resources sets out the need to fully con­sider impacts on flood­ing and water resources.

2. The European sites poten­tially affected are col­lect­ively referred to as the Badenoch and Strath­spey caper­cail­lie Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Areas. NatureScot agrees with the con­clu­sions of the HRA that the pro­pos­al is unlikely to res­ult in an adverse effect to any European des­ig­nated sites. All the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the SPAs will con­tin­ue to be met, and it is highly likely that the future res­id­ents of the devel­op­ment will con­tin­ue to util­ise the extens­ive net­work of exist­ing recre­ation­al routes through these woods. There is no reas­on to believe that this small increase in the pop­u­la­tion of Car­rbridge will res­ult in a

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

change in recre­ation­al beha­viour or a sig­ni­fic­ant increase in recre­ation­al dis­turb­ance to caper­cail­lie using the sur­round­ing area.

1. Regard­ing pro­tec­ted spe­cies and hab­it­ats, the CNPA Eco­logy Officer has no objec­tion to the scheme, con­firm­ing that the pro­pos­al will have a neg­li­gible impact on eco­lo­gic­al interests. The build­ing to be demol­ished has low value as a bat roost and a bat spe­cies pro­tec­tion plan is recom­men­ded as a plan­ning con­di­tion, to ensure mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures as advised by the bat sur­vey are under­taken. Eco­lo­gic­al enhance­ments are included with­in the scheme such as swift bricks, and the plant­ing of nat­ive tree species.

2. It is noted that there are no ​‘green’ SUDs incor­por­ated with­in the pro­posed devel­op­ment. The CNPA Eco­logy Officer sug­ges­ted the inclu­sion of this as a biod­iversity enhance­ment. The bene­fit of such a sys­tem has been acknow­ledged but giv­en the size and mix of ten­ure togeth­er with scheme viab­il­ity and main­ten­ance reas­ons, this approach has not been adop­ted in the design of this devel­op­ment. This is unfor­tu­nate, how­ever the pro­posed SUDs as presen­ted with­in the scheme sat­is­fies the stand­ards spe­cified in rel­ev­ant guid­ance. Giv­en this, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

3. Regard­ing oth­er envir­on­ment­al mat­ters, it is con­firmed that the site is not at risk of flood­ing from any source, nor will it impact on any neigh­bour­ing res­id­en­tial prop­er­ties in terms of flood­ing. The High­land Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land Team request the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion for the sub­mis­sion of a scheme to deal with poten­tial con­tam­in­a­tion and site invest­ig­a­tion due to the age of the build­ing and its poten­tial to house asbes­tos mater­i­al with­in its fab­ric. Sub­ject to the inclu­sion of this con­di­tion, the pro­pos­al is there­fore con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Ser­vi­cing

1. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 sets out the need for new devel­op­ment to be sat­is­fact­or­ily ser­viced and without harm to resources or the environment.

2. Regard­ing water con­nec­tions, the pro­pos­al would be con­nec­ted to the mains water in the area, of which Scot­tish Water have no objec­tions but require the applic­ant to sub­mit a form­al applic­a­tion to them fol­low­ing the grant­ing of any per­mis­sion to review capacity.

3. The site is pro­posed to be con­nec­ted into the Scot­tish Water pub­lic sew­er. For sur­face water run­off arising from the site, it is pro­posed that this is dealt por­ous pav­ing and infilt­ra­tion. The High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team request the sub­mis­sion of a final­ised drain­age scheme by plan­ning con­di­tion, to ensure that the actu­al infilt­ra­tion rate is suf­fi­ciently reflec­ted in the drain­age scheme. On this basis the pro­posed sur­face water and foul water drain­age meas­ures are accept­able in accord­ance with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing and Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 22/04/22

Access

1. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 states that all new devel­op­ment must include an appro­pri­ate means of access, egress and space for off street parking.

2. The devel­op­ment will be sat­is­fact­or­ily accessed from the exist­ing access onto Main Street from the private lane which serves the site. The High­land Coun­cil Trans­port Plan­ning Team has no objec­tion to the scheme regard­ing its access, car park­ing and refuse col­lec­tion points. The Team note that the pro­posed res­id­ent cycle stor­age is under­sized, and a plan­ning con­di­tion is there­fore recom­men­ded to seek revi­sions to this to ensure the size meets standards.

3. Regard­ing access­ib­il­ity of walk­ing routes to loc­al ser­vices from the devel­op­ment, the Trans­port Plan­ning Team high­light the absence of a foot­way out­side Kin­chyle House and there­fore request a plan­ning con­di­tion is included for a buil­dout at this loc­a­tion to be provided ensur­ing there is a con­tinu­ous ped­es­tri­an route to the bus stop/​ser­vices in the vil­lage. This issue is also high­lighted by the Com­munity Coun­cil who sug­gest the widen­ing of pave­ments to improve access­ib­il­ity with­in the vil­lage. The agent objects to the inclu­sion of this require­ment. Their reas­ons for object­ing state that the issue is a Roads mat­ter and not for this devel­op­ment to resolve with the pro­posed buil­dout being out­with the red line bound­ary. The agent con­siders that this prob­lem has exis­ted for some con­sid­er­able time and has not been pur­sued as a require­ment for oth­er recent hous­ing devel­op­ments with­in the area. As the con­sul­tee and the applic­ant are both depart­ments of High­land Coun­cil, it is recom­men­ded that a plan­ning con­di­tion is included to deliv­er the buil­dout by the rel­ev­ant depart­ment. Sub­ject to the appro­pri­ate con­di­tions being attached, it is con­sidered that the applic­a­tion sat­is­fies the roads require­ments of Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Impact on Neigh­bour­ing Amenity

1. In terms of res­id­en­tial amen­ity Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to ensure that new devel­op­ment pro­tects amen­ity cur­rently enjoyed by neigh­bour­ing occu­pants to sites and affords suf­fi­cient private amen­ity ground and off-street park­ing with