Item5Appendix3aSupportingComments20190247DET

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Agenda Item 5 Appendix 3a 13/12/2019

AGENDA ITEM 5

APPENDIX 3A

2019/0247/DET

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS — SUPPORT

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BSA BADENOCH & STRATH­SPEY SCHOOLS SNOWSPORT ASSOCIATION

Plan­ning Applic­a­tion — 2019/0247/DET State­ment of Support

Badenoch and Strath­spey Schools Snowsports Asso­ci­ation are a loc­al char­ity whom work in part­ner­ship with Cairngorm Moun­tain, loc­al snowsports schools, DSUK and the 8 loc­al primary schools in the val­ley to provide a 4 week block of ski­ing or snow­board­ing to in the region of 150 – 200 seni­or primary pupils each year.

The asso­ci­ation are in sup­port of the above plan­ning applic­a­tion as we believe this could enhance the con­tinu­ations of the loc­al schools snowsports pro­gramme as well as enhance snowsports oppor­tun­it­ies for all on cairngorm.

Last sea­son was a chal­len­ging one for every­one involved in the snowsports industry with such change­able weath­er con­di­tions and the loss of the funicu­lar rail­way the oppor­tun­ity to par­ti­cip­ate in snowsports was hindered. For­tu­nately for Bsssa we were able to run 1 day of les­sons for each of the 8 loc­al primary schools. The weath­er was poor for the first week of the pro­gramme so les­sons were delayed, by week 2 there had been fresh snow which held up at the begin­ning of the week to offer a fant­ast­ic day of les­sons. Weath­er was then to get warm so with the use of the new snow­mak­ing machines and a great effort from all the snowsports school and moun­tain staff they were able to make a begin­ners area and patched up as best they could the bot­tom slopes there­fore allow­ing us to offer les­sons to all pupils by the end of the week.

We believe that is a good example of how improv­ing snowsports facil­it­ies at the bot­tom of the moun­tain can allow for more reg­u­lar access for loc­al chil­dren to exper­i­ence Cairngorm moun­tain and what it has to offer which in turn provides pupils with the oppor­tun­ity to exper­i­ence the envir­on­ment, sport, tour­ism, wild­life, industry and for some future employ­ment opportunities.

Without these facil­it­ies our pro­gramme would only have been able to provide 1 day of les­sons for 2 out of 8 of the loc­al schools. We would be in sup­port of any pro­vi­sions on Cairngorm that would increase the like­li­hood of snowsports opportunities.

Ker­rie Dickson

Chair

Badenoch & Strath­spey Schools Snowsports Association

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Com­ments for Plan­ning Applic­a­tion 2019/0247/DET

Applic­a­tion Sum­mary Applic­a­tion Num­ber: 2019/0247/DET Address: Cairngorm Moun­tain Glen­more Aviemore High­land PH22 1RB Pro­pos­al: Engin­eer­ing works to smooth and re-grade land Case Officer: Stephanie Wade

Cus­tom­er Details Name: Mr keith tay­or Address: caladesi insh kingussie

Com­ment Details Com­menter Type: Mem­ber of Pub­lic Stance: Cus­tom­er made com­ments in sup­port of the Plan­ning Applic­a­tion Com­ment Reas­ons: Comment:Cairngorm Moun­tain Trust sup­ports the plan­ning application.

I have had an onsite vis­it and Jim Corn­foot (CMSL Land Man­ager) explained in detail the pro­posed works. The works are with­in the ski area and in an already well-developed area of ski runs. The works are on a small per­cent­age of the ski area. The pro­posed works would ensure the best use of the snow mak­ing equip­ment cur­rently on Cairngorm.

Hav­ing this area close to the Daylodge and car­park is a big advant­age for novices, the ski schools, school groups and oth­er snowsport enthu­si­asts. Hav­ing a bet­ter novice area will pro­mote eco­nom­ic sus­tain­ab­il­ity and employ­ment through­out Badenoch and Strathspey.

For the novice the advant­age of hav­ing a graded slope close to Ski Hire, Toi­lets, and Cater­ing out­lets is sig­ni­fic­ant. It would bring their exper­i­ence closer in line with oth­er Scot­tish ski areas. For school groups and those stick­ing to an extern­al (school bus) timetable. The abil­ity to arrive at Cairngorm and get­ting straight onto improved begin­ner slopes means that they can max­im­ise their time on snow.

For the more advanced ski­ers and boarder who would not gen­er­ally use this pre­pared area it means that those still mas­ter­ing the basic skills are not using the main pistes or attempt­ing to ride ski lifts bey­ond their abil­it­ies. For skilled free­style ski­ers and boarders, the more effi­cient use of snow mak­ing would enable fea­tures and jumps to be created.

When com­pleted the ground works will extend the num­ber of avail­able snowsport days, this in turn will increase the com­mer­cial viab­il­ity and sus­tain­ab­il­ity of those busi­ness that rely on Cairngorm

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Moun­tain. Look­ing at oth­er Scot­tish ski areas (where ground works have already taken place) it is notice­able that it need less snow, either man made or nat­ur­al to get snowsports operational.

For the above reas­ons — The Cairngorm Moun­tain Trust sup­ports the application

Keith Taylor Chair Cairngorm Moun­tain Trust

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CAIRNGORM SKI CLUB

PLAN­NING APPLIC­A­TION 2019/0247/DET — STATE­MENT OF SUPPORT

Cairngorm Ski Club is a registered char­ity that has been provid­ing per­form­ance ski coach­ing to young people, aged 8 – 18, on Cairngorm Moun­tain for over 40 years. Our mis­sion is to increase par­ti­cip­a­tion in snowsports and we boast a num­ber of Olympi­ans as past members.

Ski­ing and snowsports is a sig­ni­fic­ant part of the cul­tur­al her­it­age of the area and have played a sig­ni­fic­ant role in the devel­op­ment of Aviemore. Over the past 5 years, the ski club has had as many as 100 young people involved in a 10-week winter ski pro­gramme. This num­ber sig­ni­fic­antly reduced last year as a res­ult of poor weath­er and oper­a­tion­al chal­lenges on Cairngorm.

The work sub­ject to this applic­a­tion will enhance the abil­ity of Cairngorm Moun­tain (Scot­land) Lim­ited to provide a ski area both using arti­fi­cial snow (from the snow fact­ory and snow can­nons) and nat­ur­al snow.

This will sig­ni­fic­antly help the ski club in the fol­low­ing ways:-

• It will enable/​guarantee early sea­son ski, race and free­style, coach­ing on snow when the Club would oth­er­wise need to use loc­al arti­fi­cial ski slopes or under­take non-ski training.
• It will offer full sea­son facil­it­ies for free­style ski training
• It will enable the club to offer on-snow train­ing as part of our 10-week schools ski pro­gramme which offers on cur­ricular ski coach­ing to young people from Kin­gussie High School and Grant­own Gram­mar school. Sig­ni­fic­antly increas­ing par­ti­cip­a­tion. This pro­gramme was can­celled early last year, this would not have been the case had there been arti­fi­cial snow provision.
• It will enable the club to con­tin­ue to build participation.
• It will enable the club to sus­tain a pro­gramme which provides guar­an­teed employ­ment for 6 – 10 qual­i­fied ski coaches.
• It will help ski schools to con­tin­ue to provide begin­ner les­sons through­out the sea­son act­ing as a feed­er for loc­al chil­dren to Cairngorm and oth­er ski and snow­board clubs increas­ing sports participation.
• When snow con­di­tions are good it will enable bet­ter man­age­ment of those devel­op­ing their ski­ing and snow­board­ing and in turn ensure capa­city on oth­er uplift is max­im­ised and ski coach­ing oppor­tun­it­ies are maximised.

We believe that this work will sup­port both the char­it­able object­ives of Cairngorm Ski Club and the aims of the Nation­al Park in respect of:

Cairngorm Ski Club is a Scot­tish Char­it­able Incor­por­ated Organ­isa­tion Char­ity num­ber SC047401

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CAIRNGORM SKI CLUB

• Pre­serving the cul­tur­al her­it­age of the area
• Pro­mot­ing sus­tain­able use of the nat­ur­al resources of the area
• Pro­mot­ing under­stand­ing and enjoy­ment (includ­ing in the form of recreation)
• Pro­mot­ing sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic development.

Chair, Cairngorm Ski Club

OSCR Scot­tish Char­ity Reg­u­lat­or www​.oscr​.org​.uk Registered SCIO SC047401

Cairngorm Ski Club is a Scot­tish Char­it­able Incor­por­ated Organ­isa­tion Char­ity num­ber SC047401

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Com­ments for Plan­ning Applic­a­tion 2019/0247/DET

Applic­a­tion Sum­mary Applic­a­tion Num­ber: 2019/0247/DET Address: Cairngorm Moun­tain Glen­more Aviemore High­land PH22 1RB Pro­pos­al: Engin­eer­ing works to smooth and re-grade land Case Officer: Stephanie Wade

Cus­tom­er Details Name: Mr Colin McFar­lane Address: 18 View­field Road Edinburgh

Com­ment Details Com­menter Type: Mem­ber of Pub­lic Stance: Cus­tom­er made com­ments in sup­port of the Plan­ning Applic­a­tion Com­ment Reas­ons: Comment:Any future mas­ter­plan for Cairngorm Moun­tain will include lift served win­ter­s­ports. I believe this to be self-evident.

Changes to the work­ing at height reg­u­la­tions are already in stat­ute and regard­less of how long the car park T‑Bar remains in ser­vice they must be com­plied with. The pro­posed ground works at the cur­rent Car Park T‑Bar load­ing area are a sens­ible solution.

Whilst the choice of uplift has still to be determ­ined, neither option (aer­i­al or sur­face) would influ­ence the pro­posed ground works as these relate solely to the qual­ity and deliv­ery of ski­ing on the piste and not uplift.

The works as pro­posed will enhance an area for begin­ners ski­ing. This helps CMSL and oth­er ski schools in deliv­er­ing les­sons and improves participation.

I believe that the applic­a­tion should be supported.

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FREE-SKI [DEE-808

Plan­ning Applic­a­tion 2019/0247/DET Address Cairngorm Moun­tain, Glen­more, High­land PH22 1RB Pro­posed engin­eer­ing works to smooth and re-grade lower slopes Case officer Stephanie Wade

I am Writ­ing in response to the above proposal.

I am the Own­er, Dir­ect­or of Free-Ski. A Snowsports School offer­ing les­sons on Cairngorm Moun­tain, Based in Aviemore and oper­at­ing for 7 seasons.

The pro­posed works are a major, Pos­it­ive step for­ward. I whole heartedly sup­port the Proposal.

From a Ski Schools point of view it will greatly enhance the area that we are able to teach on.

With the grad­ing and land­scap­ing it will allow the teach­ing exper­i­ence and out­come of cli­ents to be a far more pos­it­ive and enjoy­able one. The exist­ing ter­rain provides a chal­lenge and this new Area will allow safer, Wider slope angles mak­ing the learn­ing out­comes great­er. As a Ski School, we teach a great num­ber of School chil­dren. On some days we may well have up to 80 out. They need suit­able ter­rain to learn in, the pro­pos­al will help this.

The pro­pos­al will allow a great­er num­ber of Instruct­ors work and employ­ment. In busy peri­ods, we could have 40 Instruct­ors working.

This surely is a big step for­ward. The loc­al area thrives on work­ing and sup­port­ing each oth­er. If we can devel­op this, it will massively improve the work­able teach­ing and ski­ing area. It will boost vis­it­or num­bers, give great­er employ­ment and lift the loc­al feel­ing which recently has been far too negative.

Kind regards Jerry Craig,

Own­er, Ski School Dir­ect­or FREE-SKI