Item5Appendix2PreAppResponse

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Agenda Item 5 Appendix 2 08/11/2024

Agenda Item 5

Appendix 2

PRE/2024/0026

Pre-applic­a­tion response (PRE/2024/0015)

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY PRE-APPLIC­A­TION RESPONSE FORM For com­ple­tion and return to the rel­ev­ant Loc­al Plan­ning Author­ity for incor­por­a­tion in detailed response to applic­ant. Any rel­ev­ant CNPA Plan­ning Advice Notes should be enclosed or attached to this response.

All applic­ants should be advised that CNPA encour­ages the com­ple­tion of Pro­cessing Agree­ments with all plan­ning applic­a­tions. These will be provided by the plan­ning case officer fol­low­ing Call in by CNPA. It will set out times­cales for the pro­cessing of the applic­a­tion and tar­get com­mit­tee date.

All com­ments are based on the inform­a­tion sub­mit­ted and are made without pre­ju­dice to any decision CNPA may make in the future. Addi­tion­al issues may arise as a res­ult of detailed ana­lys­is of any sub­mit­ted applic­a­tion and asso­ci­ated plans and documentation.

CASE DETAILS | Ref­er­ence num­ber LPA | 24/02097/PREAPP | | — -| — -| | Ref­er­ence num­ber CNPA | PRE/2024/0015 | | Site Address/​Location | Land 160M South of Lyn­stock Park Nethy Bridge | | Details of Pro­pos­al | 35 unit hous­ing devel­op­ment in vacant field at out­skirts of Nethy Bridge | | Date of Site vis­it (if applic­able) | 19/06/2024 |

SITE DES­IG­NA­TIONS & CON­STRAINTS Cairngorm Nation­al Park

Nearby con­straints:

• River Nethy to west is part of River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion (SAC.) The River Spey is also a SSSI This will require fur­ther con­sid­er­a­tion by the applicant.
• Cairngorms Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion (SAC) and Aber­nethy Forest Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Area (SPA) are with­in 5 km of the site
• Elec­tri­city infrastructure/​line crosses the site.
• The west­ern part of the site is iden­ti­fied in SEPA’s flood maps as being as risk from river flooding.
• There are no lis­ted build­ings of archi­tec­tur­al and his­tor­ic import­ance evid­ent with­in the imme­di­ate vicin­ity of the site.

REL­EV­ANT PLAN­NING POLICIES AND GUID­ANCE | Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 Scot­land 2045 (NPF4) | Policy 1: Tack­ling the cli­mate and nature crises | | — -| — -|

| Avail­able on this link nation­al-plan­ning-frame­work‑4. | Policy 2: Cli­mate mit­ig­a­tion and adapt­a­tion Policy 3: Biod­iversity Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Places Policy 5: Soils Policy 6 Forestry wood­land and trees Policy 9: Brown­field, vacant and derel­ict land and empty build­ings Policy 12: Zero Waste Policy 13: Sus­tain­able Trans­port Policy 14: Design, Qual­ity and Place Policy 15 Loc­al Liv­ing and 20- minute neigh­bour­hoods Policy 16 Qual­ity Homes Policy 18 Infra­struc­ture First Policy 20: Blue and green infra­struc­ture Policy 21: Play recre­ation and sport Policy 22: Flood risk and water man­age­ment Policy 23: Health and Safety Policy 25: Com­munity Wealth Build­ing | | Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Policies Avail­able on this link https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/wp- con­tent/up­load­s/2021/03/CNPA-LDP-2021- web.pdf | Policy1 New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age Policy 5: Land­scape Policy 10: Resources Policy 11: Developer Oblig­a­tions | | Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance Avail­able on this link https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​p​l​a​n​ning- devel­op­ment/ldp-2021/ | Hous­ing Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance Design and Place­mak­ing Non- Stat­utory Guid­ance Nat­ur­al Her­it­age Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance Land­scape Non-Stat­utory Guidance |

| | Resources Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance Developer Con­tri­bu­tions Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance | | Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan also sets the stra­tegic frame­work for the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP) the policies of which reflect the aims and object­ives of the Part­ner­ship Plan and is ref­er­enced in the LDP, Plan avail­able on this link. https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​w​o​r​king- together/​partnershipplan/​| |

LIKELY CON­SUL­TEES (CNPA & EXTERN­AL) | Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity (CNPA) | | — -|

• Eco­logy Officer
• Land­scape Officer
• Out­door Access Team | | Loc­al Author­ity – The High­land Council | | — -|
• Trans­port Team
• Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team
• Con­tam­in­ated Land
• Waste Man­age­ment
• Developer Oblig­a­tions Team
• Region­al Archae­olo­gist if con­straints maps indic­ate any archae­olo­gic­al interest.
• Hous­ing Team regard­ing hous­ing needs assessment
• Out­door Ser­vices – for landscape/​play advice | | Oth­er External | | — -|
• SEPA — in respect of flood risk, mit­ig­a­tion and man­age­ment proposals
• Nature Scot – in respect of poten­tial impact on any des­ig­nated sites in par­tic­u­lar the River Spey SAC
• Scot­tish Water – in respect of capa­city of exist­ing water sup­ply and wastewa­ter infra­struc­ture if pro­pos­ing to join and drain­age provision
• Com­munity Council
• Spey Fish­ery Board
• Scot­tish and South­ern Energy – in rela­tion to elec­tri­city infra­struc­ture cross­ing the site.
• Police Com­munity Safety Officer |

SUM­MARY OF LIKELY ISSUES

Call In Any applic­a­tion would be sub­mit­ted to the High­land Coun­cil for val­id­a­tion. The Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity (CNPA) would be noti­fied of the applic­a­tion by the Coun­cil. At that stage a decision would be made as to wheth­er any applic­a­tion would be called in. Due to the scale of the devel­op­ment (more than 5 houses with­in a set­tle­ment) and the fact that is likely to be a major applic­a­tion under the terms of the Scot­tish Government’s hier­archy of devel­op­ment any such applic­a­tion would be called in more detail on this link below on call in cri­ter­ia. This devel­op­ment would con­sti­tute a type 1 devel­op­ment ‑highly likely to called in. https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​w​p​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​/​u​p​l​o​a​d​s​/​2​0​2​2​/​0​9​/​2​0​2​2​-​P​A​N​-​A​p​p​l​ying- for-Planning-Permission.pdf

If the red line applic­a­tion site was more than 2 hec­tares in size then the devel­op­ment would con­sti­tute a major applic­a­tion. This would appear to the case as areas of land­scap­ing, drain­age and access would require to be included with­in the red line applic­a­tion site.

Prin­ciple of Development

The prin­ciple of devel­op­ment is con­sidered against the rel­ev­ant policies and guid­ance as con­tained with­in the Devel­op­ment Plan. This now com­prises the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 (LDP)and the Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4(NPF4). Where there is con­flict between policies, NPF4 policies will be used.

Policy Back­ground – Des­ig­na­tion in Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan The pro­posed devel­op­ment site lies partly with­in the set­tle­ment bound­ary of Nethy Bridge as des­ig­nated in the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan more detail on page 170 — 173 on this link https://cairngorms.co.ukhted/wp- content/uploads/2021/03/CNPA-LDP-2021-web.pdf

The set­tle­ment state­ment for Nethy Bridge explains it is a small wood­land vil­lage and an attract­ive des­tin­a­tion for vis­it­ors with a good range of com­munity facil­it­ies and an extens­ive loc­al path net­work. It also sets out that the object­ives are to sup­port the deliv­ery of hous­ing that sup­ports loc­al needs and to increase and enhance flood man­age­ment and resi­li­ence. It high­lights that all devel­op­ments should include 25% afford­able hous­ing and that plan­ning oblig­a­tions will be sought towards increas­ing capa­city at stra­tegic com­munity leis­ure facil­it­ies serving Nethy Bridge.

Part of the site lies with­in an area des­ig­nated for hous­ing as H1 – Lettoch Road. The south­east­ern part of the site- plots 12 – 16 of the sub­mit­ted lay­out- lie out­with the des­ig­nated set­tle­ment bound­ary as do some of the west­ern­most plots, SUDS basin and green area towards the river. The H1 des­ig­na­tion sets

out that there is an indic­at­ive capa­city for 20 dwell­ings and that any pro­pos­als must take account of, and com­ple­ment, the nature of the wood­land oppos­ite, views towards the Cairngorms, and the nature of nearby devel­op­ment. It spe­cific­ally states that semi-detached and ter­raced dwell­ings in a sim­il­ar pat­tern to Lyn­stock Cres­cent (which lies fur­ther north­w­est into the vil­lage set back from the road with green area in front) is desir­able here. The state­ment also high­lights that there is medi­um to high prob­ab­il­ity flood risk adja­cent to the sit whereby a Flood Risk Assess­ment may be required to determ­ine the develop­able area. It is also high­lights that the site will need to take account of and respond to the wider land­scape con­text par­tic­u­larly views towards the Cairngorms plat­eau. It also out­lines spe­cif­ic eco­logy study require­ments and notes that water infra­struc­ture runs through the site.

The rel­ev­ant Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan policy is Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment part 1.1 which explains that new hous­ing pro­pos­als will be sup­por­ted where they are loc­ated on an iden­ti­fied alloc­ated site or with­in an iden­ti­fied set­tle­ment bound­ary and meet the require­ments for the set­tle­ment as out­lined in the com­munity inform­a­tion sec­tion and rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of the set­tle­ment. Also part of the Devel­op­ment Plan is Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work Policy 9: Brown­field, Vacant and Derel­ict Land and Empty Build­ings which states that pro­pos­als on green­field sites will not be sup­por­ted unless the site has been alloc­ated for devel­op­ment or the pro­pos­al is expli­citly sup­por­ted by policies in the LDP. Sim­il­arly, NPF Policy 16 Qual­ity Homes sets out that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als for new homes on land alloc­ated for hous­ing in the LDP will be supported.

Set against this back­ground the prin­ciple of hous­ing devel­op­ment on the des­ig­nated site is estab­lished sub­ject to the details of lay­out, land­scap­ing and ser­vi­cing being sat­is­fact­ory. How­ever, a con­sid­er­able part of the devel­op­ment lies out­with the des­ig­nated area whereby the devel­op­ment as pro­posed con­sti­tutes a depar­ture from the Devel­op­ment Plan and would require to be advert­ised as such. If it were sup­por­ted then the Plan­ning Author­ity would require to set out the reas­ons for depart­ing from policy.

For the avoid­ance of doubt, in rela­tion to this policy back­ground, part of the applic­a­tion site is green­field and not alloc­ated for devel­op­ment. NPF4 Policy 9 essen­tially requires that the applic­a­tion demon­strates that it is sup­por­ted by the policies of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan. This is presently not the case giv­en that the site is not all alloc­ated for devel­op­ment and as such is con­trary to LDP policies.

Issues of prin­ciple to be addressed. In these cir­cum­stances any applic­a­tion would need to clearly explain why it is con­sidered neces­sary to devel­op out­with the des­ig­nated area so that we could con­sider the case for depart­ing from policy. Whilst there may be some rationale for extend­ing the site in order to provide a good, land­scaped setting

for devel­op­ment and achieve sus­tain­able urb­an drain­age object­ives, the reas­on­ing for addi­tion­al hous­ing out­side the des­ig­nated bound­ar­ies would need to be explained as this is not obvi­ous par­tic­u­larly as extend­ing the devel­op­ment fur­ther up Lettoch Road means it is fur­ther away from the vil­lage core.

Afford­able Housing

NPF Policy 16 Qual­ity Homes requires that new hous­ing devel­op­ment makes pro­vi­sion for afford­able homes to meet an iden­ti­fi­able need. It also sets out under point © that devel­op­ments which improve afford­ab­il­ity and choice by being adapt­able to chan­ging and diverse needs and address­ing iden­ti­fied gaps in pro­vi­sion will be sup­por­ted with a list of hous­ing types that could be con­sidered included. Sim­il­arly, LDP Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment states that devel­op­ments of four or more dwell­ings should include pro­vi­sion for afford­able hous­ing. In Nethy­bridge 25% of the total num­ber of dwell­ings pro­posed must be affordable.

Any applic­a­tion will need to demon­strate com­pli­ance with these policies and set out the type of afford­able hous­ing pro­vi­sion to be delivered here along with the means of deliv­ery. At present 9 afford­able units are indic­ated on site which would com­ply with the 25% require­ment. If there is a pro­pos­al to provide the afford­able hous­ing else­where in the vil­lage this must be fully explained and jus­ti­fied togeth­er with clear explan­a­tion of the means of deliv­ery. It is under­stood that the developer has dis­cussed hous­ing require­ments with the appro­pri­ate hous­ing authorities/​providers and any sup­port­ing afford­able hous­ing state­ment should sum­mar­ise those discussions.

Sit­ing and Land­scape Impacts

Policy Back­ground NPF4 Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Places sets out that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als which affect a Nation­al Park will only be sup­por­ted where the object­ives of des­ig­na­tion and the over­all integ­rity of the area will not be com­prom­ised and any sig­ni­fic­ant adverse effects on the qual­it­ies for which the area has been des­ig­nated are clearly out­weighed by social, envir­on­ment­al or eco­nom­ic bene­fits of nation­al import­ance. Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 sets out sim­il­ar object­ives with a pre­sump­tion against any devel­op­ment that does not con­serve or enhance the land­scape char­ac­ter or spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park

NPF4 Policy 14: Design, Qual­ity and Place also states devel­op­ment pro­pos­als should improve the qual­ity of an area and be con­sist­ent with the six qual­it­ies of suc­cess­ful places. It also sets out that pro­pos­als which are poorly designed and det­ri­ment­al to the amen­ity of the area will not be sup­por­ted. This echoes the require­ments of Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Local

Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 which also sets out prin­ciples of sus­tain­able design to be met with new devel­op­ment includ­ing require­ments to ensure that new devel­op­ment is sym­path­et­ic to the tra­di­tion­al pat­tern and char­ac­ter of the sur­round­ing area whilst encour­aging innov­a­tion in design and mater­i­al, min­im­ising the effects on cli­mate change in terms of sit­ing and con­struc­tion and using mater­i­als and land­scap­ing to com­ple­ment the set­ting of development.

As noted earli­er the set­tle­ment state­ment for Nethy Bridge expressly sets out the vari­ous require­ments to be met here in rela­tion to tak­ing account of and com­ple­ment­ing the nature of the wood­land oppos­ite, views towards the Cairngorms, and the nature of nearby development

Con­sul­tee Feed­back The CNPA Land­scape Advisor has con­sidered the pro­posed lay­out and notes that the pro­pos­al com­prises 35 hous­ing units loc­ated on the south­east­ern edge of Nethy Bridge, bounded by the River Nethy to the south­w­est and Lettoch Road to the north­east. Exist­ing hous­ing on the edge of the vil­lage lies to the north­w­est while the south­east­ern bound­ary com­prises rising ground cul­min­at­ing in a more com­plex knolly out­crop. The advisor notes that the sub­mis­sion does not include a sup­port­ing state­ment set­ting out the sit­ing and design object­ives of the pro­posed development.

It is noted that the pro­posed devel­op­ment is size­able and would increase the extent of the set­tle­ment of Nethy­bridge to the south­east and be loc­ated some dis­tance from the core of the set­tle­ment and key facil­it­ies includ­ing the shop, bus stops and school. The pro­posed site is how­ever alloc­ated for hous­ing in the LDP with capa­city for 20 units stated and the highest qual­ity of design required, along with the need to rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of the set­tle­ment. It is also noted that the lower part of the site adja­cent to the River Nethy is pro­posed to be kept free of devel­op­ment for reas­ons of increased flood risk.

The advisor con­siders that the pro­posed lay­out of the devel­op­ment and design of build­ings gives an impres­sion of a rather sub­urb­an char­ac­ter unlike some of the more inter­est­ing hous­ing with­in Nethy­bridge which relates well to the wood­land set­ting, for example, by using tim­ber in con­struc­tion. The open­ness of the site also con­trasts with the ​‘forest vil­lage’ feel which is a dis­tinct­ive char­ac­ter­ist­ic of Nethy­bridge. It is noted that two ​‘wild­life cor­ridors’ are pro­posed across the site link­ing the River Nethy with an exist­ing wood­land on the north-east side of Lettoch Road. Tree plant­ing is indic­ated with­in these cor­ridors on the site lay­out plan and an exist­ing area of juni­per scrub is also pro­posed to be retained. Trees with­in these cor­ridors should, in time, cre­ate a more wooded set­ting to the devel­op­ment, but are unlikely to rep­lic­ate the dens­er wood­land sur­rounds which par­tially screen hous­ing either side of the lower sec­tion of the River Nethy closer to the core of the settlement.

The advisor also notes that plots 12 – 16 are loc­ated on high­er ground and are likely to be more visu­ally prom­in­ent. It will be import­ant that these hous­ing units do not intrude on key views from Lettoch Road towards the Cairngorms Plat­eau. It is there­fore recom­men­ded that con­sid­er­a­tion be giv­en to omit­ting these units in favour of plant­ing nat­ive wood­land on high­er slopes with the aim of cre­at­ing a robust set­tle­ment edge to Nethy­bridge. It is recom­men­ded that the pro­posed design of the hous­ing is of high qual­ity and makes a pos­it­ive con­tri­bu­tion to the char­ac­ter of Nethy­bridge. It is also advised that plant­ing of Scots pine and birch should be under­taken in a more wide­spread man­ner across the site with the aim of rep­lic­at­ing the dis­tinct­ive char­ac­ter of the set­tle­ment and fil­ter views of built development.

Issues to be addressed. It is con­sidered that there is an ideal oppor­tun­ity on this site to cre­ate a high qual­ity hous­ing devel­op­ment with good land­scaped set­ting around and with­in the plots, all as required by policies. This oppor­tun­ity does not appear to be being fully taken with the cur­rent lay­out, but it is con­sidered that it could be achieved with some amendments/​reconsideration.

It is recom­men­ded that the lay­out be amended to remove plots 12 – 16 which are loc­ated on the rising ground which forms a clear back­drop to the wider site. Remov­ing these plots and recon­sid­er­ing the lay­out would avoid expens­ive cut and fill on this land, enable views of the Cairngorms plat­eau to be retained and also reduce the intru­sion out­with the set­tle­ment bound­ary. It would also anchor the devel­op­ment visu­ally with the small wood­land copses and veget­a­tion pat­tern to the south­w­est fur­ther up Lettoch Road out­side the site. This would res­ult in a devel­op­ment more likely to com­ply with LDP policies and set­tle­ment objectives.

It is also recom­men­ded that fur­ther con­sid­er­a­tion be giv­en to the fol­low­ing aspects in order to ensure that new devel­op­ment fits in with the very attract­ive exist­ing char­ac­ter of Nethy Bridge, reflects the require­ments of the hous­ing des­ig­na­tion here and achieves the Devel­op­ment Plan object­ive of con­serving or enhan­cing the land­scape char­ac­ter and spe­cial land­scape qual­it­ies of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park:

1. Care­ful con­sid­er­a­tion of how the treat­ment of the hous­ing which backs onto Lettoch Road will be dealt with to avoid a ​“dead” visu­al appear­ance of tim­ber screen fen­cing facing this road. Fur­ther towards Nethy vil­lage the houses face the road with pick­et fen­cing and/​or plant­ing between hous­ing and road cre­at­ing an attract­ive rur­al feel and this could act as a design cue here

2. Strengthened plant­ing along this Lettoch road­side bound­ary would also help reflect the wood­land oppos­ite and over time cre­ate a very attract­ive aspect along Lettoch Road.

3. Use of nat­ive plant­ing through the site, with­in plots and around the devel­op­ment could help to cre­ate the desired wood­land set­ting here

4. Recon­sid­er­a­tion of house types to con­sider, for example, inclu­sion of ter­raced hous­ing which could provide more units to com­pensate for loss of units at the south end of the site. If new hous­ing was designed sym­path­et­ic­ally to include tim­ber fea­tures and was set in good qual­ity land­scaped grounds/​setting then the scale/​mass of hous­ing could be more read­ily be absorbed to per­haps allow dens­er devel­op­ment on the core lower des­ig­nated land.
5. Sit­ing of houses with­in plots could be var­ied to avoid an overly form­al lay­out too.
6. Con­sid­er­a­tion of the poten­tial for sit­ing of play area more cent­rally with­in the site or jus­ti­fic­a­tion of choice of loc­a­tion. Full details of the play area includ­ing equip­ment and future main­ten­ance will be required.

Fur­ther guid­ance on the land­scape char­ac­ter here is avail­able on the fol­low­ing link which may help to provide fur­ther con­text. https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​p​l​a​n​n​i​n​g​-​d​e​v​e​l​o​p​m​e​n​t​/​l​a​n​d​s​c​a​p​e​-​t​o​o​lkit/

With any future sub­mis­sion a Design and Access State­ment will require to cov­er these issues. It is recom­men­ded that this State­ment includes

• sec­tions and visu­al­isa­tions to show how the new devel­op­ment will sit in the landscape.
• inform­a­tion on how the devel­op­ment has been designed to take account of all users. There is use­ful inform­a­tion provided by the Sens­ory Trust Sens­ory Trust guide to writ­ing an access statement_​Local Author­it­ies (in this case the High­land Coun­cil) have Access Pan­els who may give some input depend­ent on what type of pro­ject it is– more inform­a­tion here (Access Pan­els | Equal­ity and diversity con­tacts | The High­land Council)

Nat­ur­al Her­it­age and Biod­iversity Issues

Policy Back­ground NPF4 Policy 3: Biod­iversity requires that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als con­trib­ute to the enhance­ment of biod­iversity includ­ing where rel­ev­ant restor­ing degraded hab­it­ats and build­ing and strength­en­ing nature net­works and the con­nec­tions between them. They should also integ­rate nature-based solu­tions where pos­sible. Devel­op­ments for major devel­op­ment, as is likely to be the case here, will only be sup­por­ted where it is demon­strated that the pro­pos­als will con­serve, restore and enhance biod­iversity includ­ing nature net­works so they are in a demon­strably bet­ter state than without inter­ven­tion. A list of cri­ter­ia to be met is set out. NPF4 Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Places does not sup­port devel­op­ment which will have an unac­cept­able impact on the nat­ur­al envir­on­ment, or which will have a sig­ni­fic­ant effect on European Site des­ig­na­tions which include Spe­cial Areas of Con­ser­va­tion and Sites of Spe­cial Sci­entif­ic Interest.

Sim­il­arly, Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 requires new devel­op­ment to have no adverse effects on the integ­rity of des­ig­nated sites, the Nation­al Park or on pro­tec­ted spe­cies or hab­it­ats. Policy 3 Design and Place­mak­ing also requires devel­op­ment to cre­ate oppor­tun­it­ies for fur­ther biod­iversity and to pro­mote eco­lo­gic­al interest.

Issues arising The CNPA Eco­logy Officer has com­men­ted on the applic­a­tion and has high­lighted that the fol­low­ing European des­ig­nated sites are all with­in 5km of the site and may have the poten­tial for con­nectiv­ity, so this is likely to require fur­ther con­sid­er­a­tion by the applicant:

• River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion (SAC)designated for its Atlantic sal­mon, fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sels, sea lamprey and otter interests.
• Cairngorms Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion (SAC) des­ig­nated for hab­it­at and otter interests.
• Aber­nethy Forest Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Area (SPA) des­ig­nated for caper­cail­lie, osprey and cross­bill interests.

Con­sequently, suf­fi­cient inform­a­tion should be sub­mit­ted to allow an assess­ment of the devel­op­ment on the above inter­na­tion­ally import­ant sites and if neces­sary to enable the Plan­ning Author­ity to under­take a Hab­it­at Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al in con­sulta­tion with Nature Scot.

With regard to nation­ally import­ant areas for nature con­ser­va­tion, in accord­ance with the NatureScot/​National Parks case­work agree­ment (avail­able via https://www.nature.scot/doc/agreement-roles-advisory- case­work-between-naturescot-and-scot­tish-nation­al-park-author­it­ies), NatureScot lead on provid­ing advice in rela­tion to effects on Sites of Spe­cial Sci­entif­ic Interest (SSSIs) and Nation­al Nature Reserves at this stage in the plan­ning pro­cess. How­ever, we would take the oppor­tun­ity to high­light that the below sites may have the poten­tial for con­nectiv­ity and are likely to require fur­ther con­sid­er­a­tion by the applicant:

• Aber­nethy Forest SSSI
• Aber­nethy NNR

In terms of biod­iversity in order to com­ply with NPF4 Policy 3 Biod­iversity a State­ment demon­strat­ing enhance­ment for biod­iversity should be sub­mit­ted with any applic­a­tion. This should include an assess­ment of the cur­rent value of the site and clear pro­posed details on the value after the devel­op­ment. NatureScot have guid­ance on com­mon meas­ures which can be used to enhance biod­iversity in the pro­posed devel­op­ment site — https://www.nature.scot/doc/developing-nature-guidance

In terms of Pro­tec­ted spe­cies a Pro­tec­ted Spe­cies Sur­vey (eco­lo­gic­al con­straints) will be required and appro­pri­ate spe­cies buf­fers provided (in line

with NatureScot guid­ance avail­able via https://www.nature.scot/professional- advice/­plan­ning-and-devel­op­ment/­plan­ning-and-devel­op­ment- advice/­plan­ning-and-devel­op­ment-pro­tec­ted-spe­cies The_​results of the sur­vey should be factored into times­cales and used to inform sit­ing, design and any mit­ig­a­tion required. Based on the avail­able inform­a­tion, at this stage, spe­cies such as (but not lim­ited to) breed­ing birds, otter, badger are likely to be present in the area. How­ever, the advice of a suit­ably exper­i­enced eco­lo­gic­al sur­vey­or should be used to inform which pro­tec­ted spe­cies need to be sur­veyed for

In terms of Habitats/​Species a Phase 1 Hab­it­at sur­vey will be required and the report sub­mit­ted with any future applic­a­tion. A num­ber of species/​habitats iden­ti­fied as Cairngorms Nature Action Plan (CNAP) pri­or­ity spe­cies, Birds of Con­ser­va­tion Con­cern (BOCC) red or amber list spe­cies, and/​or on the Scot­tish Biod­iversity List as requir­ing con­ser­va­tion action or the avoid­ance of neg­at­ive impacts are likely to be present in the area. For example (but not lim­ited to): Pine­wood mason bee, dark bordered beauty moth and wax­caps. The sit­ing and design pro­cess must include con­sid­er­a­tion of all the poten­tial dir­ect, indir­ect and cumu­lat­ive effects of the pro­posed devel­op­ment on the biod­iversity interests iden­ti­fied in the CNAP, BOCC and Scot­tish Biod­iversity lists.

Finally in terms of the Water envir­on­ment, giv­en the prox­im­ity to a drain­age fea­ture and the River Nethy which flows into the River Spey, an out­line Con­struc­tion Envir­on­ment­al Man­age­ment Plan should be sub­mit­ted with any future applic­a­tion to demon­strate that any impacts from the pro­posed devel­op­ment can be adequately mit­ig­ated. Fur­ther com­ments on the water envir­on­ment and poten­tial links with biod­iversity and land­scape will be covered in the next section.

Flood­ing, Drain­age and Ser­vi­cing Issues

Policy Back­ground NPF4 Policy 22: Flood Risk and Water Man­age­ment cre­ates a pre­sump­tion against all devel­op­ment at risk from flood­ing and seeks to ensure that that there is no risk of sur­face water flood­ing to oth­ers, and that all rain and sur­face water is man­aged through sus­tain­able urb­an drain­age sys­tems (SUDS) with area of imper­meable sur­faces min­im­ised. It also explains that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als with­in a flood risk aera will only be sup­por­ted where they are for essen­tial infra­struc­ture, water com­pat­ible uses, redevel­op­ment of an exist­ing build­ing or site for an equal or less vul­ner­able use, or redevel­op­ment of pre­vi­ously used sites in built up areas where the LDP has iden­ti­fied a need to bring these into pos­it­ive use. NPF4 Policy 20: Green and Blue Infra­struc­ture is also of some rel­ev­ance. This sup­ports devel­op­ment which incor­por­ates new or enhanced blue and/​or green infra­struc­ture with pro­pos­als for their future man­age­ment to be included. Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 requires devel­op­ment to min­im­ise the use of treated

and abstrac­ted water, treat sur­face water in accord­ance with the SUDS manu­al, ensure no adverse impacts on private water sup­plies, and ensure no det­ri­ment­al impacts on the water envir­on­ment as well as to be free from flood risk and not increase the risk of flood­ing elsewhere.

Part of the applic­a­tion site lies with­in an area des­ig­nated on SEPA’s flood maps as being at risk of flood­ing and the devel­op­ment does not appear to fall into any of the excep­tion cri­ter­ia set out in NPF Policy 22 Flood Risk and Water Man­age­ment. The Nethy­bridge set­tle­ment state­ment also high­lights that the des­ig­nated hous­ing site lies adja­cent to an area of medi­um to high prob­ab­il­ity flood risk whereby a Flood Risk Assess­ment may be required to determ­ine the develop­able area. The site as pro­posed extends towards this area and a draft FRA has been sub­mit­ted with this pre applic­a­tion inquiry. Con­sequently, the views of SEPA and the High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team will be cru­cial to inform the future lay­out here. The set­tle­ment state­ment also high­lights that water infra­struc­ture runs though the site and this will need to be iden­ti­fied and con­sidered in con­sulta­tion with Scot­tish Waer

Issues to be addressed. As noted above High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment, Scot­tish Water and SEPA will be able to advise on the require­ments for any future plan­ning applic­a­tion in terms of flood­ing and pub­lic drainage/​water supply/​water infra­struc­ture issues.

Details of how sur­face water is to be man­aged and main­tained in a sus­tain­able man­ner will be required togeth­er with any sup­port­ing Drain­age Impact Assess­ment. This should take into account any water­courses in the area, cov­er any new sur­fa­cing and the implic­a­tions of any ground changes in terms of cut and fill oper­a­tions. High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team will be able to advise fur­ther on requirements.

Mean­time we have dis­cussed this case with our Con­ser­va­tion Officers and con­sider that this devel­op­ment offers an ideal oppor­tun­ity to design sur­face water drain­age arrange­ments which could help to greatly enhance biod­iversity interests, land­scape and over­all lay­out of the development.

It is noted from the sub­mit­ted plans that a SUDs atten­u­ation fea­ture is pro­posed in the west­ern part of the site. It is con­sidered that there is poten­tial to use the two land­scape cor­ridors which cross the site from Lettoch Road towards the river to provide SUDS fea­tures to con­nect to the atten­u­ation pond. Rather than using under­ground pip­ing there could be poten­tial to devel­op rain garden fea­tures in this area which could deal with sur­face water more nat­ur­ally. If the ground con­di­tions are suit­able for infilt­ra­tion here, then this could be a very cost- effect­ive solu­tion by cre­at­ing, for example, shal­low swales or con­nec­ted small rain gar­dens. Areas of around 6 square metres have been used in oth­er devel­op­ments to good effect. This would effect­ively oper­ate as wet swales. If

planted with suit­able spe­cies these could provide an extremely attract­ive fea­ture which would also bene­fit biod­iversity and encour­age oth­er spe­cies into the area. They are also low main­ten­ance and could form part of the land­scap­ing main­ten­ance in any event.

There could also be poten­tial for using sim­il­ar rain garden solu­tions with­in indi­vidu­al plots too. There are numer­ous examples of how this has been planned and achieved else­where and some examples are set out below to illus­trate this.

• Hous­ing Expo site Inverness link to case study here inverness expo
• 1000 rain gar­dens Scot­land site https://​www​.bing​.com/​c​k​/​a​?​!​&​&​p​=​6​9​0​a​f​f​3​6​4​5​1​e​0​f​9​5​J​m​l​t​d​H​M​9​M​T​cxODk yODAwMCZpZ3VpZD0wMzIjMTc3Yi02YmVkLTZ|YzEtMmZhYi0wNDA2 NmFjYTZmMTUmaW5zaWQ9NTIxMw&ptn=3&ver=2&hsh=3&fclid=039 c177b-6bed-6ec1-2fab- 04066aca6f15&psq=examples+of+rain+gardens+scotland&u=a1aHR0c HM6Ly93d3cuMTBrcmFpbmdhcmRlbnMuc2NvdC8&ntb=1
• City of Edin­burgh guid­ance https://​www​.bing​.com/​c​k​/​a​?​!​&​&​p​=​e​4​e​6​b​2​a​2​2​b​e​d​a​e​b​b​J​m​l​t​d​H​M​9​M​TcxOD kyODAwMCZpZ3VpZD0wMzljMTc3Yi02YmVkLTZIYzEtMmZhYi0wNDA2 NmFjYTZmMTUmaW5zaWQ9NTMyMA&ptn=3&ver=2&hsh=3&fclid=039 c177b-6bed-6ec1-2fab- 04066aca6f15&psq=examples+of+rain+gardens+scotland&u=a1aHR0c HM6Ly93d3cuZWRpbmJ1cmdoLmdvdi51ay9kb3dubG9hZHMvZmlsZS8 zMDEwMC9zdXN0YWluYWJsZS1yYWlud2F0ZXItbWFuYWdlbWVudC1 ndWlkYW5jZS1mYWN0c2hlZXQtdzMtcmFpbi1nYXJkZW5z&ntb=1 Some more loc­al examples are:
• Countess­wells /​cults devel­op­ment Cults Burn Park | Optim­ised Envir­on­ments (op​-en​.co​.uk)
• Case study of rur­al rain garden attached.

Finally with regard to ser­vi­cing details of any waste man­age­ment pro­vi­sion includ­ing pro­mo­tion of recyc­ling and the move to zero waste will be required.

Trans­port and Pub­lic Access Issues

Policy Back­ground NPF4 Policy 13: Sus­tain­able Trans­port sup­ports new devel­op­ment where it is line with the sus­tain­able trans­port and invest­ment hier­arch­ies and where appro­pri­ate provides safe links to loc­al facil­it­ies via walk­ing, wheel­ing and cyc­ling net­works, is access­ible by pub­lic trans­port, provides low or zero emis­sion char­ging points and secure cyc­ling park­ing, is designed to incor­por­ate safe cross­ing for walk­ing and wheel­ing and redu­cing the speed of vehicles, and takes account of the trans­port needs of diverse groups and adequately mit­ig­ates any impact on loc­al pub­lic access routes. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 also requires

devel­op­ment to have an appro­pri­ate means of access, park­ing and pro­mote sus­tain­able trans­port meth­ods and act­ive travel. It also requires new devel­op­ment to main­tain and max­im­ise all oppor­tun­it­ies for respons­ible out­door access includ­ing links into the exist­ing path net­work and ensur­ing con­sist­ency with the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Core Paths Plan.

Issues to be addressed High­land Coun­cil Trans­port­a­tion Team will advise on any transport/​access issues. It is noted that the site is adja­cent to the exist­ing set­tle­ment whereby it is well loc­ated in rela­tion to ser­vices and amen­it­ies, but there will need to be safe con­nec­tions made to that net­work. Care will need to be taken to avoid any overly urb­an solu­tions with paths.

The CNPA Out­door Access Officer has also been con­sul­ted and has noted that the new devel­op­ment should con­nect to exist­ing path net­works / act­ive travel routes wherever pos­sible. The officer has high­lighted that it is not clear if a pave­ment is provided from the pro­posed devel­op­ment turn-off to link to exist­ing pave­ments – this will need to be clarified.

Finally details of the fin­ishes, drain­age and main­ten­ance arrange­ments for paths with­in the site should be provided with any future applic­a­tion. Con­sid­er­a­tion could also be giv­en to pro­mo­tion of links to the river­side as appro­pri­ate to cre­ate attract­ive walks.

Developer Con­tri­bu­tions NPF Policy 18 Infra­struc­ture First sets out that the impacts of devel­op­ments on infra­struc­ture must be mit­ig­ated. Sim­il­arly, Policy 11 – Developer Oblig­a­tions of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan sets out where devel­op­ment gen­er­ates a need to increase and improve pub­lic ser­vices or infra­struc­ture or to mit­ig­ate adverse effects, the developer will be required to make a fair and reas­on­able con­tri­bu­tion, in cash or kind, towards the addi­tion­al costs or requirements.

With any applic­a­tion the CNPA Plan­ning Policy team will con­sider the require­ment for any developer con­tri­bu­tions / plan­ning oblig­a­tions for any pro­pos­al in line with our policies and guid­ance. These will be pro­por­tion­ate and More inform­a­tion in this link related to the impacts of the devel­op­ment. https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​w​p​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​/​u​p​l​o​a​d​s​/​2​0​2​2​/​0​9​/​L​D​P​-​D​e​v​e​l​oper- Obligations-Supplementary-Guidance-.pdf

As noted earli­er the set­tle­ment state­ment for Nethy Bridge high­lights that plan­ning oblig­a­tions will be sought towards increas­ing capa­city at stra­tegic com­munity leis­ure facil­it­ies serving the village.

Sus­tain­ab­il­ity and Cli­mate Change

Policy Back­ground The Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 high­lights that the glob­al cli­mate emer­gency and the nature crises have formed the found­a­tions of the strategy as a whole. This is rein­forced by NPF4 Policy 1: Tack­ling the Cli­mate and Nature Crises which applies to all devel­op­ment and sets out that when con­sid­er­ing all devel­op­ment pro­pos­als sig­ni­fic­ant weight will be giv­en to the glob­al cli­mate and nature crises. NPF4 Policy 2: Cli­mate Mit­ig­a­tion and Adapt­a­tion also seeks to ensure that devel­op­ment is sited and designed to min­im­ise life­cycle green­house gas emis­sions as far as pos­sible and to be able to adapt to cli­mate change risks. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 also requires new devel­op­ment to min­im­ise the effects on cli­mate change in terms of sit­ing and con­struc­tion The NPF recog­nises the need to min­im­ise waste with NPF Policy 12 – Zero Waste seek­ing to encour­age, pro­mote and facil­it­ate devel­op­ment that is con­sist­ent with the waste hier­archy and Policy 5 Soils seek­ing to pro­tect soils. Sim­il­arly, Policy 3 Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan also requires new devel­op­ment to make arrange­ments for stor­age, segreg­a­tion and col­lec­tion of recyc­lable mater­i­als and pro­vi­sion for com­post­ing, and to make sus­tain­able use of resources includ­ing min­im­isa­tion of waste and energy usage. Policy 10 Resources of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan also seeks to ensure min­im­isa­tion of waste dur­ing con­struc­tion and life of developments.

Issues to be addressed Any future applic­a­tion should explain how these object­ives are being met and con­sider how to min­im­ise use of resources. For example:

• sit­ing of houses to max­im­ise sol­ar gain.
• using con­tours of site to accom­mod­ate devel­op­ment and reduce cut fill.
• min­im­ise soil move­ment reuse of soil on site for land­scap­ing etc.
• con­sider how the devel­op­ment is designed and oper­ate to min­im­ise energy use etc.
• use of sus­tain­able materials

CON­CLU­SION In gen­er­al terms hous­ing devel­op­ment in Nethy­bridge is wel­comed sub­ject to any applic­a­tion here address­ing all the issues set out earli­er in this report. In par­tic­u­lar the lay­out should be guided by land­scape, flood­ing, biod­iversity and drain­age issues with any depar­ture from the set­tle­ment bound­ary as des­ig­nated in the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan fully explained and justified.

It is not con­sidered that the present lay­out meets the policy require­ments as set out through­out this report. Recom­mend­a­tions made in this report set out how