Item5AASnowFactoryCairngormMountain20220307DET

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 28/04/2023

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DEVEL­OP­MENT PRO­POSED: Relo­ca­tion of snow fact­ory and imple­ment­a­tion of related infra­struc­ture at Land 350M SE Of Ranger Base Office Cairngorm Moun­tain Glen­more Aviemore

REF­ER­ENCE: 2022/0307/DET APPLIC­ANT: Cairngorm Moun­tain (Scot­land) Lim­ited DATE CALLED-IN: 10^th Octo­ber 2022 RECOM­MEND­A­TION: Approve, sub­ject to Con­di­tions CASE OFFICER: Stephanie Wade Plan­ning Officer

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CNPA Plan­ning Committee

Applic­a­tion Site

0 35 70 140 Meters Ski Centre

N

Sewage Works

Path

Car Park

Crown copy­right and data­base rights 2023. Ord­nance Sur­vey Licence num­ber 100040965

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 28/04/2023

Path

FB Day Lodge

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 528÷04÷2023 SITE DESCRIP­TION, PRO­POS­AL AND HISTORY

Site Descrip­tion

1. The applic­a­tion site is loc­ated on the north-west­ern slope of Coire Cas and to the south and south-east­ern area, adja­cent to the Cairngorm Moun­tain Ski Centre Day Lodge. It com­prises slop­ing, veget­ated land with drain­age chan­nels flow­ing into the Allt a‑Choire Chais. The land, forms part of the ski slope used by the ski centre and is segreg­ated in places by snow fen­cing. A foot­path runs par­tially with­in, and sub­sequently adja­cent to, the north- east­ern devel­op­ment site bound­ary, which links the Day Lodge to the Mid- Sta­tion area, fur­ther up the slope. The vehicu­lar track to the west­ern side of the Funicu­lar rail­way is also par­tially with­in the devel­op­ment area. The devel­op­ment area also includes the vehicu­lar track which runs north-east­erly to south-west­erly at the Mid-Station.

2. The wider ski centre is accessed by the exist­ing B970 road from Glen­more, which ter­min­ates at a large park­ing area, beside the Day Lodge and Funicu­lar Rail­way Base Station.

3. The applic­a­tion site lies with­in the Cairngorms Nation­al Scen­ic Area but is not covered by any oth­er spe­cif­ic envir­on­ment­al des­ig­na­tions. The Cairngorms Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion, des­ig­nated for hab­it­at interests, and the North­ern Cor­ries, Cairngorms Site of Spe­cial Sci­entif­ic Interest lies over 400 metres west of the site. The Cairngorms Wild Land Area No.15 lies over 600 metres west of the site at its closet point, circ­ling the entire ski 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=RJ0OXASIOC 100

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
PLANS
Plan — Loc­a­tion Plan	110 Rev.B	16/03/2022	10/10/2022
Plan — Pro­posed Plan	101 Rev.G	18/11/2022	23/01/2023
Plan- Pro­posed Snow Fact­ory Base Lay­out and Sections	111 Rev.A	30/03/2020	10/10/2022

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Plan – Pro­posed Crane Pad Lay­out and Sec­tions | 112 Rev.A | 25/01/2022 | 10/10/2022 Plan — Loc­a­tion and Details of Exist­ing Snow Fact­ory | OM1 | 15/11/2018 | 10/10/2022 Plan – Pro­posed Track Cross Sec­tions | 104 Rev.C | 18/11/2022 | 23/01/2023 Plan — Pro­posed Track Cross Sec­tions | 102 Rev.B | 06/03/2020 | 10/10/2022 Plan – Pro­posed Track Cross Sec­tions | 103 Rev.B | 06/03/2020 | 10/10/2022 Plan- Pipeline Route | 674103- GIS001 Rev.B | 24/01/2022 | 10/10/2022 Plan — Intake Cham­ber and Sup­ply Pipe Details | 674103- CAD003 | 20/12/2021 | 10/10/2022 Plan – Intake Arrange­ment Sec­tion A‑A | 674103- CAD002 | 20/12/2021 | 10/10/2022 Plan – Intake Arrange­ment Plan | 674103- CAD001 | 20/12/2021 | 10/10/2022 Plan – Pipe Intake | 674103- GIS003 Rev.A | 20/12/2021 | 10/10/2022 Plan – Pro­posed Shed Gen­er­al Arrange­ment | 2195- 113A | 15/02/2022 | 10/10/2022 Plan – View­point 05A Snow Fact­ory Cur­rent View | | 18/02/2023 | 08/03/2023 Plan – View­point 05B Snow Fact­ory Pro­posed View | | 18/02/2023 | 08/03/2023 Plan – View­point 06A and B Snow Fact­ory Cur­rent and Pro­posed | | 26/02/2023 | 08/03/2023 Plan – View­point 01A Cur­rent View | | 15/08/2021 | 10/10/2022 Plan — View­point 01B – Pro­posed View | | 15/08/2021 | 10/10/2022 Plan – View­point 01C – Snow Fact­ory with ⁵⁄₇ years plant­ing | | 12/01/2022 | 10/10/2022

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SUP­PORT­ING INFORM­A­TION | | | Oth­er — Sup­port­ing Plan­ning State­ment | | 01/06/2022 | 10/10/2022 Oth­er — Sup­port­ing Report-Meth­od­o­logy | | 01/06/2022 | 10/10/2022 Oth­er – Snow Fact­ory Water Sup­ply | | 15÷12÷021 | 10/10/2022 Oth­er – Work­ing with the Envir­on­ment at Cairngorm | | 01/02/2018 | 10/10/2022 Oth­er — Photo A – North Elev­a­tion | | | 10/10/2022 Oth­er — Photo B – East Elev­a­tion | | | 10/10/2022 Oth­er — Photo C – South Elev­a­tion | | | 10/10/2022 Oth­er — Photo D – West Elev­a­tion | | | 10/10/2022 Oth­er — Eco­lo­gic­al Sur­vey Report | 8767 | 17/07/2020 | 10/10/2022 Oth­er — Addendum to Con­struc­tion Man­age­ment State­ment | | 27/01/2023 | 27/01/2023 Oth­er – Tem­por­ary Vis­it­or and Con­struc­tion Man­age­ment Plan | | 01/01/2023 | 27/01/2023 Oth­er ‑NPF4 Policy Sum­mary State­ment | | | 23/03/2023 *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 looks to relo­cate the exist­ing snow fact­ory from the Coire Cas car park to 350m south-east of the Ranger Base Sta­tion. The fact­ory com­prises two ship­ping con­tain­ers, which house the snow mak­ing machine. The rect­an­gu­lar, flat roofed stacked units meas­ure 12.4 metres by 3.6 metres with a height of 8.4 metres. The unit has a con­nec­ted water sup­ply installing a new intake on the nearby water­course. The pro­pos­al also includes the con­struc­tion of an access haul road and open­ing of a bor­row pit. The snow fact­ory will be sited on a new rein­forced, con­crete plinth, meas­ur­ing 15 metres x 5 metres. The area where the plinth will be formed is pro­posed to be regraded and filled with a sub­base of com­pacted 6A rock­fill. Adja­cent to the plinth, will be anoth­er con­crete pad which will be used by the crane and sub­sequently will provide the base for the pro­posed tim­ber shed. The slab will meas­ure 12 metres x 12 metres and the ground is to be regraded to provide a level plat­form will fill from the bor­row pit. The sur­face mater­i­al of the slab is

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pro­posed as com­pacted rock­fill. 4 spread­er pads will be used on the sur­face for the crane.

1. The pro­posed haul road will use the exist­ing vehicu­lar access, to the front of the Day Lodge and fol­low the route of the Car Park T Bar Tow Track, up the slope before split­ting off in an east­erly dir­ec­tion to a turn­ing point. The haul road will have a width of 4.5m and will be con­struc­ted using cut and fill over a length of 311 metres. Once the relo­ca­tion works are com­pleted, the haul road width will be reduced by pulling side cast mater­i­al over to reduce the track width to 2.5m wide. The track will remain under veget­a­tion for any future work relat­ing to the access/​maintenance of remov­al of the snow factory.

2. The pro­posed tim­ber shed meas­ures 6m x 3.6m with a max­im­um height of 3.6m. The elev­a­tions are pro­posed with a ver­tic­al close boarded fin­ish, whilst the mono-pitched roof is to be clad in cor­rug­ated roof­ing sheets, col­oured grey. The shed is pro­posed to be used for the stor­age of tools and main­ten­ance equip­ment and to house 2000 litre hold­ing tank.

3. The bor­row pit which has in excess of 1500m³ of mater­i­al avail­able will be covered with side cast top­soil when excav­a­tion when is com­pleted. The exist­ing tow track will be util­ised to trans­port the mater­i­al from the pro­posed bor­row pit to the snow fact­ory access track and found­a­tion area. Whilst the track is in use for the con­struc­tion works, the top­soil is pro­posed to be stripped and side cast, expos­ing the exist­ing gran­u­lar track beneath and rein­stated post trans­port­a­tion works.

4. The snow fact­ory cre­ates snow by abstract­ing water which is then cooled to freez­ing point with­in the con­tain­er. A new per­man­ent water abstrac­tion intake and water sup­ply pipe­work is pro­posed to be installed 275m up the slope, with any over­flow returned to exist­ing land drains via the land drain to the edge of the access track. This will be a grav­ity fed sys­tem. The sup­ply is designed to provide a thermally resi­li­ent flow to the snow fact­ory up to the 2 — 5 litres per second design flow require­ments. This flow rate can be con­trolled by the in-line valves at the intake point and at the snow factory.

5. A Vis­it­or Man­age­ment Plan has been sub­mit­ted, which includes inform­a­tion on how the vis­it­or exper­i­ence will be man­aged around the con­struc­tion works of the pro­pos­al. A Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment Man­age­ment Plan has also been submitted.

6. Plans of the pro­pos­al can be viewed at Appendix 1.

His­tory

1. There have been numer­ous plan­ning applic­a­tions with­in the wider Cairngorm Moun­tain area. On 14^th Octo­ber 2021, High­land Coun­cil gran­ted consent

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(21/03808/S42) for the con­tin­ued tem­por­ary sit­ing of a double snow fact­ory unit on ground near the Day Lodge, extend­ing the dur­a­tion of the sit­ing which has been per­mit­ted by both the CNPA and High­land Coun­cil in pre­vi­ous years.

1. An applic­a­tion for the install­a­tion of car park bar­ri­ers (2020/0097/DET) at the entrance to the Upper Coire Cas car park was gran­ted con­sent by the CNPA on 16 June 2020. In May 2020, plan­ning per­mis­sion was gran­ted by the CNPA for the engin­eer­ing works related to the strength­en­ing of the funicu­lar via­duct (2020/0076/DET).

2. With­in the same devel­op­ment area as the applic­a­tion being con­sidered with­in this report, was plan­ning per­mis­sion 2019/0247/DET which per­mit­ted engin­eer­ing works to smooth and regrade the land; and more recently plan­ning per­mis­sion 2022/0046/DET, which was gran­ted approv­al by Plan­ning Com­mit­tee in Feb­ru­ary 2022. This per­mis­sion relates to the form­a­tion of moun­tain bike tracks and related infrastructure.

Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Appraisal

1. An Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al [HRA] has been under­taken to con­sider the effects of the pro­pos­al upon the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the European Sites the River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion [SAC]. A copy of the HRA is attached at Appendix 2.

2. The HRA con­cludes that there will be no dir­ect or indir­ect effects on the hab­it­ats, their struc­tures or func­tion or sup­port­ing pro­cesses, sub­ject to the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion to ensure that the Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment Man­age­ment Plan and its addendum are imple­men­ted. This is to ensure that pol­lu­tion does not enter the River Spey SAC and so avoid an adverse effect on site integrity.

DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN CONTEXT

Policies

Nation­al Policy	Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4) Scot­land 2045
POLICY 1	Tack­ling the Cli­mate and Nature Crises
POLICY 2	Cli­mate Mit­ig­a­tion and Adaptation
POLICY 3	Biod­iversity
POLICY 4	Nat­ur­al Places
POLICY 5	Soils
POLICY 9	Brown­field, Vacant and Derel­ict Land, and Empty Buildings
POLICY 20	Blue and Green Infrastructure
POLICY 21	Play, Recre­ation and Sport

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POLICY 22 | Flood Risk and Water Man­age­ment POLICY 29 | Rur­al Devel­op­ment Stra­tegic Policy | Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022 – 2027 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 1 | NEW HOUS­ING DEVEL­OP­MENT 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 DEISGN OF DIGIT­AL COM­MU­NIC­A­TIONS EQUIP­MENT POLICY 7 | RENEW­ABLE ENERGY POLICY 8 | OPEN SPACE, SPORT AND RECRE­ATION X POLICY 9 | CUL­TUR­AL HER­IT­AGE 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 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​-​2021- web.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 1 | Hous­ing Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance Policy 2 | Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance X Policy 3 | Design and Place­mak­ing Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance X 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 X Policy 9 | Cul­tur­al Her­it­age Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance Policy 10 | Resources Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance X Policy 11 | Developer Oblig­a­tions Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 5 28/04/2023

CON­SULTA­TIONS

Sum­mary of the main issues raised by consultees

1. NatureScot agrees with­in the con­clu­sions of the Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al that an adverse effect on the site integ­rity of the River Spey SAC is likely to be avoided should adequate pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures iden­ti­fied with­in the Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment Man­age­ment Plan be fully imple­men­ted. They there­fore sup­port the imple­ment­a­tion of the CEMP being a con­di­tion on any plan­ning per­mis­sion that is granted.

2. High­land Coun­cil Envir­on­ment­al Health Officer was con­sul­ted but provided no comments.

3. High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team has reviewed the applic­a­tion and has no objec­tions to flood risk or drain­age for the proposal.

4. CNPA Eco­logy Officer con­cludes that sub­ject to the inclu­sion of plan­ning con­di­tions for pre-con­struc­tion sur­vey checks, imple­ment­a­tion of the Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment­al Man­age­ment Plan and tim­ing of works to out­with hare and bird breed­ing sea­sons, the pro­pos­al would not adversely affect eco­lo­gic­al interests of the site and sur­round­ing area.

5. CNPA Land­scape Officer con­firms that the snow fact­ory has become a famil­i­ar fea­ture at the ski centre and is phys­ic­al char­ac­ter­ist­ics are well under­stood. At the pro­posed site, it will be viewed in com­bin­a­tion to the vari­ous ski uplift infra­struc­ture and snow fen­cing in the vicin­ity. These ele­ments clearly mark the area as being part of a ski centre. Regard­ing views, it will not break the hori­zon unless view­ers are close by. From oth­er view­points it will be ​‘back clothed’ by the sur­round­ing hill­side. Views will be con­strained to the cor­rie itself due to topo­graphy except for longer views from the west.

6. The Officer con­siders that the pro­pos­al will not enhance the land­scape char­ac­ter of the area, how­ever its func­tion is appro­pri­ate to the loc­a­tion gen­er­ally and this will encour­age accept­ance on the part of many ski­ers using the slopes here. There will be a mod­er­ately sig­ni­fic­ant adverse effect from the imme­di­ate vicin­ity of the fact­ory dur­ing the snow free part of the year. This will reduce rap­idly to low with the ski centre and when there is snow cov­er. The visu­al sig­ni­fic­ance of the effect from out with the cor­rie will be very low because it will be seen in the con­text of the remain­ing infra­struc­ture. Dur­ing snow cov­er this will be neg­li­gible or noth­ing. Regard­ing mit­ig­a­tion, there is noth­ing likely to be effect in the short to medi­um term, how­ever, the pro­posed plant­ing will mit­ig­ate long term effects. A plan­ning con­di­tion is recommended

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to pre­vent any night-time illu­min­a­tion and to ensure that the fact­ory is presen­ted as simply as pos­sible the large writ­ing should be removed or over- painted.

1. CNPA Out­door Access Officer has no objec­tion fol­low­ing a review of the sub­mit­ted Out­door Access Man­age­ment Plan.

2. Aviemore Com­munity Coun­cil were con­sul­ted on the applic­a­tion but provided no comments.

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS

1. The applic­a­tion was advert­ised when first sub­mit­ted. No let­ters of pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tion have been received with­in the con­sulta­tion period.

APPRAIS­AL

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

Prin­ciple

1. Policy 2: Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 sup­ports devel­op­ment which enhances form­al and inform­al recre­ation and leis­ure facil­it­ies; and tour­ism and leis­ure-based busi­ness activ­it­ies where:

a) It has no adverse envir­on­ment­al or amen­ity impacts on the site or neigh­bour­ing areas; and b) It makes a pos­it­ive con­tri­bu­tion to the exper­i­ence of vis­it­ors; and c) It sup­ports or con­trib­utes to a year-round economy.

1. In addi­tion to the above policy, Policy 8: Open Space, Sport and Recre­ation per­mits exten­sions and enhance­ments to exist­ing sport and recre­ation related busi­ness activ­it­ies where:

a) They demon­strate best prac­tice in terms of sus­tain­able design, oper­a­tion, and future main­ten­ance, and where there are no adverse envir­on­ment­al impacts on the site or neigh­bour­ing areas; and b) They will meet an iden­ti­fied com­munity or vis­it­or need; and c) They main­tain and max­im­ise all oppor­tun­it­ies to link into the exist­ing path network.

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1. At nation­al policy level, Policy 30: Tour­ism of NPF4 sup­ports tour­ist related devel­op­ment which is com­pat­ible with the sur­round­ing area and con­trib­utes to the loc­al economy.

2. By way of back­ground, since Novem­ber 2017, a snow fact­ory has been loc­ated with­in the car park area at Coire Cas in response to the unre­li­ab­il­ity of snow­fall with­in the ski­ing sea­son. The ori­gin­al loc­a­tion was chosen for the tem­por­ary unit as it offered the most access­ible and suit­able loc­a­tion for a tem­por­ary unit which would test the effect­ive­ness of gen­er­at­ing snow. This was per­mit­ted as a tem­por­ary con­sent, which has sub­sequently been renewed through a series of addi­tion­al applic­a­tions and has also been expan­ded to double the snow-mak­ing capa­city in 2018. Fol­low­ing these tem­por­ary per­mis­sions, the applic­ant now looks to relo­cate the struc­ture from its tem­por­ary sit­ing to a more effect­ive, per­man­ent location.

3. The site is with­in the estab­lished ski centre, where the prin­ciple of recre­ation­al devel­op­ment is well estab­lished, and it is gen­er­ally accep­ted that there will be a require­ment for ancil­lary build­ings / oper­a­tions with­in the site and sur­round­ing area to sup­port the oper­a­tion of the facil­ity. The per­man­ent snow fact­ory site pro­posed, has been loc­ated to offer the best access to the ski area between the mid sta­tion and Day Lodge, an area that suf­fers from poor snow cov­er­age due to adverse wind con­di­tions and warm­er tem­per­at­ures. The per­man­ent facil­ity will con­tin­ue to provide improved facil­it­ies for skiers.

4. Policies 2 and 8 of the LDP offer strong sup­port for the prin­ciple of this type of devel­op­ment which will con­tin­ue to make a pos­it­ive con­tri­bu­tion to the exper­i­ence of vis­it­ors and helps to main­tain the oper­a­tion of the facil­ity whilst meet­ing an iden­ti­fied vis­it­or need. The pro­posed devel­op­ment is there­fore con­sidered to sup­port the ongo­ing viab­il­ity and oper­a­tion of this tour­ist site and the prin­ciple accords with Policy 2: Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth and Policy 8: Open Space, Sport and Recre­ation of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021, and Policy 30: Tour­ism of NPF4, sub­ject to the oth­er mater­i­al plan­ning con­sid­er­a­tions as out­lined below.

Land­scape, Sit­ing and Design Impacts

1. The applic­a­tion site is loc­ated with­in the Cairngorm Nation­al Scen­ic Area, the Nation­al Park and close to the Cairngorms Wild Land Area No.15. As such, it is import­ant that the land­scape impacts of the pro­posed devel­op­ment are fully con­sidered in rela­tion to Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021. This policy seeks to ensure that all new devel­op­ment con­serves and enhances the land­scape char­ac­ter and spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park and the set­ting of the devel­op­ment. Any sig­ni­fic­ant impacts must be clearly out­weighed by social or economic

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bene­fits of nation­al import­ance and all adverse effects must be min­im­ised and mitigated.

1. In this regard, the devel­op­ment is con­fined to the exist­ing developed area of Cairngorm Moun­tain which is cur­rently strongly char­ac­ter­ised by a vari­ety of ski infra­struc­ture includ­ing: the funicu­lar, ski tows, snow fences, build­ings, car park­ing, vehicle tracks and foot­paths. The pres­ence of the snow fact­ory has been estab­lished with­in the wider site for four and a half years now and its phys­ic­al char­ac­ter­ist­ics are well under­stood. The addi­tion of the snow fact­ory in its pro­posed loc­a­tion would be seen in the con­text of the wider ski infra­struc­ture with­in the developed bowl of this part of Coire Cas. Views of the snow fact­ory would be back clothed by the sur­round­ing hill­side, and it would not break the horizon.

2. The CNPA Land­scape Officer con­siders that this pro­pos­al will not enhance the land­scape char­ac­ter of this area due to its form, size and col­our, and that no single col­our would work all year round to aid its visu­al mit­ig­a­tion. How­ever, its func­tion is appro­pri­ate to the loc­a­tion gen­er­ally and this will encour­age accept­ance on the part of many ski­ers using the slopes here. There will be a mod­er­ately sig­ni­fic­ant adverse effect from the imme­di­ate vicin­ity of the fact­ory dur­ing snow free part of the year. This will reduce rap­idly to low else­where with the ski centre and when there is snow cov­er. The visu­al sig­ni­fic­ance of effect from out with the cor­rie will be very low because it will still be seen it in the con­text of the remain­ing infra­struc­ture (includ­ing the funicu­lar) and the ski centre build­ings. Dur­ing snow cov­er the Officer con­siders it will be negligible.

3. Based on this, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to have a neut­ral impact on the land­scape char­ac­ter and the pre­ven­tion of night-time illu­min­a­tion, togeth­er with the pre­ven­tion of addi­tion­al text on the fact­ory facades, are recom­men­ded to be agreed by plan­ning con­di­tion to ensure that the impact level remains the same. A plan­ning con­di­tion is also recom­men­ded to ensure the remov­al of struc­tures and rein­state­ment of land should the facil­ity cease to oper­ate in the future, to safe­guard the long-term land­scape char­ac­ter of the site.

Envir­on­ment­al Impacts

1. Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021, seeks to ensure there are no adverse impacts upon des­ig­nated areas, pro­tec­ted spe­cies, or biod­iversity, whilst Policy 10: Resources sets out the need to fully con­sider impacts on flood­ing and water resources. Policy 3: Biod­iversity of NPF4 requires devel­op­ment pro­pos­als to con­trib­ute to the enhance­ment of biod­iversity, includ­ing restor­ing degrad­ing habitats.

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1. There are nat­ur­al her­it­age assets of inter­na­tion­al import­ance with­in the wider Cairngorm area, how­ever the work pro­posed is out­side the bound­ary of any nature con­ser­va­tion sites des­ig­nated for their bio­lo­gic­al or geo­graph­ic­al interests. A Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al has been under­taken and sub­ject to the mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures being adhered to, by way of plan­ning con­di­tion, then the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the River Spey SAC will be met and there will not be an adverse effect on site integ­rity. NatureScot has no objec­tion to the pro­pos­al and agree with the con­clu­sions and mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures out­lined with­in the HRA.

2. Regard­ing the pro­posed impact on pro­tec­ted spe­cies and hab­it­ats, the CNPA Eco­logy Officer has no objec­tions to the scheme. Sat­is­fact­ory sur­vey work has been car­ried out with appro­pri­ate mit­ig­a­tion iden­ti­fied in rela­tion to impacts upon pro­tec­ted spe­cies, hydro­logy, and hab­it­ats. Plan­ning con­di­tions for pre- con­struc­tion checks and works to avoid breed­ing bird and breed­ing moun­tain hare sea­sons are recom­men­ded on any sub­sequent decision. In addi­tion, the pro­posed biod­iversity enhance­ment of the addi­tion­al tree plant­ing with­in the wider area is welcomed.

3. Sub­ject to the recom­men­ded plan­ning con­di­tions relat­ing to pre-con­struc­tion eco­lo­gic­al sur­veys and sub­ject to the con­di­tions required from the HRA, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age and Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 and Policy 3 of NPF4.

Ser­vi­cing, Flood­ing and Access Impacts

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 without harm to resources or the environment.

2. The pro­posed relo­ca­tion of the Snow Fact­ory will involve the unit being loaded onto a HGV lorry by a crane, trans­por­ted to the site using the pro­posed haul track and unloaded into pos­i­tion by the crane. The pro­posed re-sit­ing will there­fore not have any effects on the exist­ing pub­lic road network.

3. An Out­door Access Man­age­ment Plan has been sub­mit­ted which details how the vis­it­ing pub­lic will be man­aged dur­ing the con­struc­tion works, and the con­tents of this are deemed sat­is­fact­ory by the Out­door Access Officer.

4. The High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team has no objec­tion on the grounds of flood impact and the pro­pos­al is not con­sidered to cause any adverse impacts relat­ing to flood­ing on or off site. Veget­ated drain­age chan­nels are pro­posed to feed into the exist­ing drain­age net­work on site

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which is accept­able. Pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion dur­ing con­struc­tion will adhere to the meas­ures to be agreed with­in the con­struc­tion meth­od state­ment plan­ning condition.

CON­CLU­SION

1. This applic­a­tion involves the per­man­ent relo­ca­tion of the snow fact­ory at an estab­lished tour­ist facil­ity with­in the Nation­al Park. Any remain­ing points of detail that have not been suf­fi­ciently addressed will be resolved through the impos­i­tion of suit­able con­di­tions. Sub­ject to these recom­men­ded con­di­tions, the pro­posed devel­op­ment is con­sidered to com­ply with the policies con­tained with­in the adop­ted Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 and the policies of NPF4. Approv­al is there­fore recommended.

RECOM­MEND­A­TION

That Mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee sup­port a recom­mend­a­tion to APPROVE the Relo­ca­tion of snow fact­ory and imple­ment­a­tion of related infra­struc­ture at Land 350M SE Of Ranger Base Office Cairngorm Moun­tain Glen­more Aviemore sub­ject to the fol­low­ing conditions:

Those con­di­tions lis­ted below in bold text are sus­pens­ive con­di­tions, which require to be dis­charged pri­or to imple­ment­a­tion of the development.

Con­di­tions

1. No devel­op­ment shall com­mence dur­ing the bird breed­ing sea­son, March – August (inclus­ive). If this is not pos­sible, a pre-start walkover sur­vey of the site by a suit­ably exper­i­enced eco­lo­gist will be required to identi­fy signs of breed­ing birds and an appro­pri­ate breed­ing bird pro­tec­tion plan imple­men­ted before any ground pre­par­a­tion or con­struc­tion works commence.

Reas­on: Το avoid adverse effects on breed­ing birds and com­ply with pro­tec­ted spe­cies legis­la­tion in accord­ance with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 and Policy 3: Biod­iversity of NPF4.

1. **No devel­op­ment shall com­mence dur­ing the moun­tain hare breed­ing sea­son (1 March – 31 July inclus­ive), or, if this is not pos­sible, then a pre- start sur­vey and daily walk over sur­veys of the area affected by con­struc­tion must be car­ried out by a suit­ably exper­i­enced eco­lo­gic­al sur­vey­or to identi­fy wheth­er moun­tain hare and their young are present with­in the con­struc­tion cor­ridor, with works then sched­uled to avoid loc­a­tions used by moun­tain hare, with con­tract­ors made aware of the

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poten­tial pres­ence of moun­tain hare and how to avoid adverse effects should they encounter any dur­ing works.**

Reas­on: Το avoid harm and to com­ply with spe­cies pro­tec­tion legislation.

1. No devel­op­ment shall com­mence, (unless oth­er­wise agreed in writ­ing), until pre-con­struc­tion sur­veys for water vole, moun­tain hare, and rep­tiles vole, have been under­taken and the res­ults, togeth­er with any asso­ci­ated spe­cies pro­tec­tion plans have been sub­mit­ted to and approved in writ­ing by the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity act­ing as Plan­ning Author­ity – details of any mit­ig­a­tion required to be iden­ti­fied and agreed and there­after imple­men­ted in accord­ance with the approved details before con­struc­tion works commence.

Reas­on: Το avoid adverse harm and com­ply with pro­tec­ted spe­cies legis­la­tion in accord­ance with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 and Policy 3: Biod­iversity of NPF4.

1. The devel­op­ment, hereby per­mit­ted, shall be under­taken in strict accord­ance with the fol­low­ing doc­u­ments: a) Sup­port­ing State­ment Meth­od­o­logy for Relo­cat­ing Snow Fact­ory, dated 01/06/2022; b) Addendum to Con­struc­tion Man­age­ment State­ment, dated 27/01/2023; c) Tem­por­ary Vis­it­or and Con­struc­tion Man­age­ment Plan, dated 01/01/2023; and d) Work­ing with the Envir­on­ment at Cairngorm, dated 01/02/2018.

Reas­on: To ensure pol­lu­tion does not enter the River Spey SAC and so avoid an adverse effect on site integ­rity in accord­ance with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021, and Policy 3: Biod­iversity of NPF4 and to ensure that pub­lic access rights are main­tained and man­aged around the inten­ded work­ing area in accord­ance with Policy 3: New Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

1. With­in three months from when the devel­op­ment, hereby approved, ceases to be used for the pur­poses applied for, the devel­op­ment must be removed in its entirety and land rein­stated to its con­di­tion pri­or to the grant­ing of the per­mis­sion 2022/0307/DET, all to the sat­is­fac­tion of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity, act­ing as Plan­ning Authority.

Reas­on: In recog­ni­tion of the nature of the facil­ity and to ensure that struc­tures are removed, and land restored to safe­guard long term impacts of the site should the pro­pos­al cease to oper­ate in accord­ance with Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

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1. The extern­al fin­ish for the elev­a­tions of the snow fact­ory shall be col­oured pale grey, plain sur­faces and shall remain so for the dur­a­tion of the devel­op­ment. For the avoid­ance of doubt, no sig­nage or logos shall be installed on the elevations.

Reas­on: To mit­ig­ate the visu­al impact of the snow fact­ory in accord­ance with Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

1. The devel­op­ment, hereby per­mit­ted, shall not be extern­ally illu­min­ated at night, unless oth­er­wise agreed in writ­ing by the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity, act­ing as Plan­ning Authority.

Reas­on: To mit­ig­ate the visu­al impact of the snow fact­ory in accord­ance with Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

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Inform­at­ives

1. The devel­op­ment hereby approved must com­mence with­in 3 years of the date of this decision notice. If devel­op­ment has not com­menced with­in this peri­od, then this plan­ning per­mis­sion will lapse.

2. The per­son under­tak­ing the devel­op­ment is required to give the Plan­ning Author­ity pri­or writ­ten noti­fic­a­tion of the date which it is inten­ded to com­mence the devel­op­ment. Attached to this decision notice is a Notice of Ini­ti­ation of Devel­op­ment for com­ple­tion and sub­mis­sion. Sub­mis­sion of this inform­a­tion assists the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Mon­it­or­ing and Enforce­ment Officer in mon­it­or­ing act­ive work with­in the area to ensure com­pli­ance with the approved details and to identi­fy and cor­rect any poten­tial prob­lems, as they arise, rather than later when it may be more dif­fi­cult and more costly to rec­ti­fy. Fail­ure to give notice would con­sti­tute a breach of plan­ning con­trol which may res­ult in enforce­ment action being taken.

3. Fol­low­ing com­ple­tion of the devel­op­ment, a noti­fic­a­tion of com­ple­tion shall, as soon as prac­tic­able, be giv­en to the Plan­ning Author­ity. Attached to this decision notice is a Notice of Com­ple­tion of Devel­op­ment for com­ple­tion and sub­mis­sion. Sub­mis­sion of this form will assist the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Mon­it­or­ing and Enforce­ment Officer in mak­ing a final inspec­tion and check­ing com­pli­ance with the approved draw­ings and con­di­tions. If the devel­op­ment hereby approved is to be car­ried out in phases, then a notice of com­ple­tion should be sub­mit­ted at the com­ple­tion of each phase.

4. Con­struc­tion work (includ­ing the loading/​unloading of deliv­ery vehicles, plant, or oth­er machinery) should not take place out­with the hours of 0800 hours to 1900 hours Mondays to Fri­days, 0800 hours to 1300 hours on Sat­urdays or at any time or Bank Hol­i­days to min­im­ise dis­turb­ance to res­id­ents in the area.

The map on the first page of this report 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.

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