Item5Appendix2HRAjune20200009DET

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Agenda Item 5 Appendix 2 25/06/2021

AGENDA ITEM 5

APPENDIX 2

2020/0009/DET

HAB­IT­ATS REG­U­LA­TION APPRAISAL

HAB­IT­ATS REG­U­LA­TIONS APPRAISAL

Plan­ning ref­er­ence and pro­pos­al information	2020/0009/DET Erec­tion of 18 dwell­ings includ­ing asso­ci­ated drain­age and road layout.
Appraised by	Emma Bryce — Plan­ning Man­ager Nina Caudrey – Plan­ning Officer
Date	17/06/2021
Checked by	Hay­ley Wiswell – Con­ser­va­tion Officer
Date	26/03/2021

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INFORM­A­TION

European site details

Name of European site(s) poten­tially affected
1. River Spey SAC 2. Anagach Woods SPA

Qual­i­fy­ing interest(s)

1. Atlantic sal­mon Otter
Fresh water pearl mussel
Sea lamprey
2. Caper­cail­lie

Con­ser­va­tion object­ives for qual­i­fy­ing interests

1. River Spey SAC:

To avoid deteri­or­a­tion of the hab­it­ats of the qual­i­fy­ing spe­cies, thus ensur­ing that the integ­rity of the site is main­tained and the site makes an appro­pri­ate con­tri­bu­tion to achiev­ing favour­able con­ser­va­tion status for each of the qual­i­fy­ing fea­tures; and

To ensure for the qual­i­fy­ing spe­cies that the fol­low­ing are main­tained in the long term:

• Pop­u­la­tion of the avoid deteri­or­a­tion of the hab­it­ats of the qual­i­fy­ing spe­cies or sig­ni­fic­ant dis­turb­ance to spe­cies, includ­ing range of genet­ic types for sal­mon, as a viable com­pon­ent of the site

• Dis­tri­bu­tion of the spe­cies with­in site

• Dis­tri­bu­tion and extent of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing the species

• Struc­ture, func­tion and sup­port­ing pro­cesses of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing the species

• No sig­ni­fic­ant dis­turb­ance of the species

• Dis­tri­bu­tion and viab­il­ity of fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sel host species

• Struc­ture, func­tion and sup­port­ing pro­cess of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sel host species.

1. Anagach Woods SPA

To avoid deteri­or­a­tion of the hab­it­ats of the qual­i­fy­ing spe­cies or sig­ni­fic­ant dis­turb­ance to the qual­i­fy­ing spe­cies, thus ensur­ing that the integ­rity of the site is main­tained; and

To ensure for the qual­i­fy­ing spe­cies that the fol­low­ing are main­tained in the long term:

• Pop­u­la­tion of the spe­cies as a viable com­pon­ent of the site

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• Dis­tri­bu­tion of the spe­cies with­in site
• Dis­tri­bu­tion and extent of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing the species
• Struc­ture, func­tion and sup­port­ing pro­cesses of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing the species
• No sig­ni­fic­ant dis­turb­ance of the species

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APPRAIS­AL

STAGE 1:
What is the plan or project?
Rel­ev­ant sum­mary details of pro­pos­al (includ­ing loc­a­tion, tim­ing, meth­ods, etc)
Erec­tion of 18 dwell­ings includ­ing asso­ci­ated drain­age, mains sew­er­age con­nec­tion and road lay­out. Sur­face water drain­age will be via a deten­tion basin with an out­flow con­nec­tion to the exist­ing Crom­dale Burn. Site alloc­ated as HI in the 2020 LDP.
STAGE 2:
Is the plan or pro­ject dir­ectly con­nec­ted with or neces­sary for the man­age­ment of the European site for nature conservation?
No
STAGE 3:
Is the plan or pro­ject (either alone or in-com­bin­a­tion with oth­er plans or pro­jects) likely to have a sig­ni­fic­ant effect on the site(s)?
1. River Spey SAC
Otter:

Poten­tial for likely sig­ni­fic­ant effects dur­ing con­struc­tion (not­ably con­struc­tion of the SUDS out­flow and foul drain out­flow, both of which are in close prox­im­ity to the Crom­dale burn, part of the SAC) through dis­turb­ance and pol­lu­tion events caused by con­struc­tion activ­ity and sed­i­ment release from ground works reach­ing the Crom­dale burn, affect­ing water qual­ity and smoth­er­ing hab­it­ats. There is also a risk of entrap­ment in the SUDs out­flow if a ver­min screen is not fit­ted to the pipe. The foul drain is pro­posed to link into an exist­ing foul drain from the main vil­lage, which runs to the sewage works down­stream. The pro­posed con­nec­tion appears to be almost dir­ectly on top of the burn in line with a track cross­ing the burn (Drain­age Lay­out Plan CTCH-J2844-002).

With regard to poten­tial dis­turb­ance to otter from res­id­ents dur­ing occu­pa­tion of the pro­posed hous­ing, the res­id­ents of the site are likely to use the exist­ing foot­path net­work, which fol­lows the Crom­dale burn to the Spey where there is an inform­al seat­ing area and pic­nic area. This path is already well used by res­id­ents of the vil­lage as part of a cir­cu­lar recre­ation­al route that includes the old Spey­side rail­way line and links to Crom­dale Kirk. In addi­tion there is a play­ing field on the oppos­ite side of the burn, which appears to main­tained and in use. As a res­ult otter will be used to some dis­turb­ance from recre­ation­al activ­ity in the vicin­ity of the pro­posed devel­op­ment. Recre­ation is also most likely to take place dur­ing day­light hours when otter are less likely to be act­ive. There­fore, the small area affected by recre­ation dis­turb­ance already exper­i­ences a level of human activ­ity due to close prox­im­ity of the Spey­side Way foot­path and adja­cent play­ing field, so the intro­duc­tion of a rel­at­ively small num­ber of addi­tion­al people under­tak­ing the same activ­it­ies as exist­ing loc­al people would not cause otter to avoid the area. The impact of addi­tion­al recre­ation­al activ­ity on otter is not con­sidered to be sig­ni­fic­ant, there­fore no likely sig­ni­fic­ant effect caused by recre­ation activity.

Atlantic sal­mon, sea lamprey, fresh water pearl mussel:

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Poten­tial for likely sig­ni­fic­ant effects dur­ing con­struc­tion (not­ably con­struc­tion of the SUDS out­flow and foul drain con­nec­tion) through pol­lu­tion events caused by sed­i­ment release from excav­a­tions reach­ing the Crom­dale burn, affect­ing water qual­ity and smoth­er­ing hab­it­ats. The foul drain is pro­posed to link into an exist­ing fowl drain from the main vil­lage which runs to the sewage works down­stream. The pro­posed new con­nec­tion appears to be almost dir­ectly on top of the burn in line with a track cross­ing the burn (Drain­age Lay­out Plan CTCH-J2844-002) and should be relo­cated fur­ther away from the burn if possible.

1. Anagach Woods SPA

Caper­cail­lie:

No likely sig­ni­fic­ant effect see Appendix I (it is con­sidered HRA under­taken for LDP remains val­id for this applic­a­tion). Anagach Woods SPA is there­fore not con­sidered fur­ther in this HRA.

STAGE 4:

Under­take an Appro­pri­ate Assess­ment of the implic­a­tions for the site(s) in view of the(ir) con­ser­va­tion objectives

No sig­ni­fic­ant dis­turb­ance of the species

Otter: con­struc­tion activ­ity at the water­course, in par­tic­u­lar the SUDs out­flow and sew­er con­nec­tion, could cause dis­turb­ance to otter using the Crom­dale burn.

Dis­tri­bu­tion of the spe­cies with­in site, Dis­tri­bu­tion and extent of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing the spe­cies, Struc­ture, func­tion and sup­port­ing pro­cesses of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing the species,

Dis­tri­bu­tion and viab­il­ity of fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sel host spe­cies, and Struc­ture, func­tion and sup­port­ing pro­cess of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sel host species

All spe­cies: Pol­lu­tion from sed­i­ment run off dur­ing con­struc­tion could affect the struc­ture, func­tion and sup­port­ing pro­cesses of hab­it­ats sup­port­ing the spe­cies (and their host spe­cies) and there­fore the dis­tri­bu­tion of spe­cies (and their host spe­cies) on the site. This would occur through changes in water qual­ity and smoth­er­ing of hab­it­at if sed­i­ment released dur­ing con­struc­tion reached the watercourse.

Pop­u­la­tion of the spe­cies, includ­ing range of genet­ic types for sal­mon, as a viable com­pon­ent of the site

Atlantic sal­mon, sea lamprey, fresh water pearl mus­sel: As a res­ult of above effects on the oth­er con­ser­va­tion object­ives, the pop­u­la­tion of these spe­cies as a viable com­pon­ent of the site could be affected through changes in water qual­ity and smoth­er­ing of hab­it­at if sed­i­ment released dur­ing con­struc­tion reached the watercourse.

Otter: It is unlikely that the pop­u­la­tion of otter would become unvi­able, as they are numer­ous and wide­spread through­out the SAC, and the pro­posed works would tem­por­ar­ily (dur­ing con­struc­tion) have a short effect a very small stretch of one water­course that is used for com­mut­ing and pos­sible for­aging (based on the eco­lo­gic­al sur­vey results).

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Con­clu­sion: Not pos­sible to con­clude that the con­ser­va­tion object­ives would all be met for all of the qual­i­fy­ing interests, how­ever straight­for­ward good prac­tice mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures could be applied to ensure that all the con­ser­va­tion object­ives could be met. Recom­men­ded mit­ig­a­tion is:

Otter:

• a Spe­cies Pro­tec­tion Plan with appro­pri­ate mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures over­seen by an ECOW onsite dur­ing con­struc­tion of the SUDs pond and mains sew­er con­nec­tion. This should include: a ver­min grill to be fit­ted to the out­flow of the SUDs pond to pre­vent access by otter, a pre-con­struc­tion sur­vey in accord­ance with NatureScot guid­ance (https://www.nature.scot/species-planning-advice-otter) and appro­pri­ate mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures to avoid dis­turb­ance such as, but not lim­ited to„ work­ing hours avoid­ing one hour before sun­set until one hour after sunrise.

All Spe­cies:

• a Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment­al Man­age­ment Plan which details pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures dur­ing con­struc­tion to pre­vent pol­lu­tion reach­ing the Crom­dale burn (par­tic­u­larly from con­struc­tion of the SUDs pond (includ­ing out­flow) and con­nec­tion to the mains sew­er), and ref­er­ences the most uptod­ate SEPA Guid­ance for Pol­lu­tion Pre­ven­tion Works and main­ten­ance in or near water’

The Spe­cies Pro­tec­tion Plan and the Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment­al Man­age­ment Plan should be approved in writ­ing by CNPA pri­or to com­mence­ment of works on site.

STAGE 5:

Can it be ascer­tained that there will not be an adverse effect on site integrity?

Provided the mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures iden­ti­fied in Stage 4 are applied as con­di­tions on any plan­ning per­mis­sion gran­ted and sub­sequently are fully imple­men­ted, then the con­ser­va­tion object­ives will be met and there­fore there will not be an adverse effect on site integ­rity for the River Spey SAC. The con­di­tions required to avoid pol­lu­tion reach­ing the Crom­dale Burn (part of the SAC) for all spe­cies and to avoid dis­turb­ance to otter are:

• No devel­op­ment shall com­mence on site until a Spe­cies Pro­tec­tion Plan is sub­mit­ted to and approved in writ­ing by the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity act­ing as Plan­ning Author­ity. There­after the approved plan will be imple­men­ted in full and over­seen by suit­able qual­i­fied Eco­lo­gic­al Clerk of Works on site dur­ing con­struc­tion of the SUDs pond and mains sew­er con­nec­tion. This should include: a ver­min grill to be fit­ted to the out­flow of the SUDs pond to pre­vent access by otter, a pre-con­struc­tion sur­vey in accord­ance with NatureScot guid­ance (https://www.nature.scot/species-planning-advice-otter) and appro­pri­ate mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures to avoid dis­turb­ance such as, but not lim­ited to, work­ing hours avoid­ing one hour before sun­set unti­lone hour after sunrise.

• No devel­op­ment shall com­mence on site until a Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment­al Man­age­ment Plan which details pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion dur­ing con­struc­tion to pre­vent pol­lu­tion reach­ing the Crom­dale burn (par­tic­u­larly from con­struc­tion of the SUDs pond (includ­ing out­flow) and con­nec­tion to the mains sew­er) and ref­er­ences the most uptod­ate SEPA Guid­ance for

1 https://​www​.net​regs​.org​.uk/​e​n​v​i​r​o​n​m​e​n​t​a​l​-​t​o​p​i​c​s​/​g​u​i​d​a​n​c​e​-​f​o​r​-​p​o​l​l​u​t​i​o​n​-​p​r​e​v​e​n​t​i​o​n​-gpp- doc­u­ment­s/guid­ance-for-pol­lu­tion-pre­ven­tion-gpps-full-list/

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Pol­lu­tion Pre­ven­tion Works and main­ten­ance in or near water² is sub­mit­ted to and approved in writ­ing by the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity act­ing as Plan­ning Author­ity in con­sulta­tion with SEPA. There­after the devel­op­ment shall com­mence strictly in accord­ance with the approved plan.

2 https://​www​.net​regs​.org​.uk/​e​n​v​i​r​o​n​m​e​n​t​a​l​-​t​o​p​i​c​s​/​g​u​i​d​a​n​c​e​-​f​o​r​-​p​o​l​l​u​t​i​o​n​-​p​r​e​v​e​n​t​i​o​n​-gpp- doc­u­ment­s/guid­ance-for-pol­lu­tion-pre­ven­tion-gpps-full-list/

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Extract of the HRA for the 2020 LDP for Set­tle­ment: Crom­dale Anagach Woods SPA – capercaillie

Settlement(s) / site(s)	Poten­tial likely sig­ni­fic­ant effects	LDP modi­fic­a­tion / mit­ig­a­tion	Resid­ual effects	Con­clu­sion — any adverse effect on site integrity?
Crom­dale (H1: Kirk Road; H2: Auchroisk Park)	There are no likely sig­ni­fic­ant effects because the pro­posed devel­op­ment sites are either: A) i. not pre­dicted to increase the pop­u­la­tion of the set­tle­ment over the plan peri­od; and / or change levels or pat­terns of recre­ation­al activ­ity around the set­tle­ment; and ii. not sig­ni­fic­antly more access­ible to caper­cail­lie woods	None required	None	The iden­ti­fied mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures and applic­a­tion of safe­guard­ing policies with­in the LDP will ensure there will be no adverse effect on the integ­rity of the SAC, either alone or cumu­lat­ively with oth­er devel­op­ment affect­ing it
OR B)	i. res­id­ents of the devel­op­ment sites are not pre­dicted to under­take off path recre­ation­al activ­it­ies in any of the woods; and ii. the woods are already estab­lished loc­a­tions for recre­ation; and iii. residents/​users of the devel­op­ment site are not expec­ted to have different

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tem­por­al pat­terns of recre­ation use from any exist­ing vis­it­or or under­take a dif­fer­ent pro­file of activ­it­ies; and iv. the over­all level of recre­ation­al use will not sig­ni­fic­antly increase.

(See set­tle­ment spe­cif­ic table below for fur­ther details).

Q1. If all the cur­rent and pro­posed devel­op­ment sites in this set­tle­ment are developed, is the pop­u­la­tion of the set­tle­ment pre­dicted to increase over the plan peri­od and/​or are any non-hous­ing devel­op­ment sites likely to change levels of human activ­ity or pat­terns of recre­ation around the settlement?

Yes. New hous­ing over the plan peri­od could mean that Crom­dale is able to accom­mod­ate a net increase in pop­u­la­tion of around 9%. How­ever, this would only equate to just over 20 addi­tion­al people.

Q2. Are caper­cail­lie woods sig­ni­fic­antly more access­ible from this devel­op­ment site than from oth­er parts of the settlement?

No

Q3. Which caper­cail­lie woods are likely to be used reg­u­larly for recre­ation by res­id­ents / users of the devel­op­ment site at detect­able levels? (list all)

Anagach Woods (Anagach Woods SPA)

Tom an Aird (Anagach Woods SPA)

Castle Grant and Mid Port (Anagach Woods SPA)

Q4. Are res­id­ents / users of this devel­op­ment site pre­dicted to under­take any off path recre­ation­al activ­it­ies in any of the woods iden­ti­fied at Q3 at detect­able levels?

No

Q5: Are each of the woods iden­ti­fied at Q3 already estab­lished loc­a­tions for recreation?

Yes

Q6: For each of the woods iden­ti­fied at Q3, are res­id­ents / users of the devel­op­ment site pre­dicted to have dif­fer­ent tem­por­al pat­terns of recre­ation­al use to any exist­ing vis­it­ors, or to under­take a dif­fer­ent pro­file of activ­it­ies? (eg. more dog walk­ing, or early morn­ing use)

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No

Q7: For each of the woods iden­ti­fied at Q3, could the pre­dicted level of use by res­id­ents / users of the devel­op­ment site sig­ni­fic­antly increase over­all levels of recre­ation­al use?

No

Con­clu­sion: Is mit­ig­a­tion needed as a con­sequence of this devel­op­ment site in rela­tion to each wood lis­ted at Q3? Give Yes/​No answer for each wood

Mit­ig­a­tion is not required for any of the wood­lands listed

Reas­ons mit­ig­a­tion needed

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