Item6AA NewtonmoreRemixCommitteeReport20240297DET

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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Com­mit­tee report Devel­op­ment pro­posed: Change of house types: Plots 49 – 50 and 53 – 60, repos­i­tion­ing Plots 51 – 52 (2018/0242/DET) at Land Between Perth Road and Sta­tion Road, Newtonmore

Ref­er­ence: 2024/0297/DET

Applic­ant: Tul­loch Homes Ltd.

Date called-in: 11 Novem­ber 2024

Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve sub­ject to conditions

Case officer: Kath­er­ine Don­nach­ie, Plan­ning Officer Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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CNPA Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Applic­a­tion Site This map 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. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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Site descrip­tion, pro­pos­al and his­tory Site description

1. The applic­a­tion site is loc­ated at the south­ern edge of New­ton­more with­in an approved phase of an ongo­ing hous­ing devel­op­ment here. The New­ton­more to Perth B9150 road runs to the west. The site lies in the south­ern part of the wider site, with agri­cul­tur­al land loc­ated to the east and south.

2. The remainder of this phase lies to the west, between the applic­a­tion site and Perth Road. The ongo­ing wider hous­ing devel­op­ment lies to the north. To the far west, on the oppos­ite side of the main road, there is a café and pet­rol station.

3. A site access for the over­all site has been formed to the north of Perth Road. This diverges to serve the north­ern and south­ern parts of the wider site. The south­ern spur road leads south to con­nect onto a second access point to Perth Road at the south­ern­most end of the site. South of this is an area where the Sus­tain­able Urb­an Drain­age Systems(SuDS) infra­struc­ture will be provided. The Coffin Road path runs along the south­ern bound­ary bey­ond this SuDS area. The access roads are cur­rently under con­struc­tion and at present the applic­a­tion site is part of a build­ing site, with a num­ber of houses now con­struc­ted fur­ther north. The applic­a­tion site and wider site are fairly level, former graz­ing ground.

4. There are no spe­cif­ic envir­on­ment­al des­ig­na­tions on the site, with the River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion and Site of Spe­cial Sci­entif­ic Interest (SSSI) lying around 0.4 km to the far south. There is no appar­ent con­nectiv­ity to this water­course from the site. There are no lis­ted buildings/​scheduled monu­ments with­in the imme­di­ate vicinity.

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=S2H06USI0CP00 Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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Title Draw­ing Date on Date Num­ber Plan* Received

Plan — Aer­i­al Views- afford­able 3295−01−062 01/12/24 12/12/24 hous­ing remix Rev B

Plan — 3B5PV Plans and sec­tions — 3295−01−101− 01/12/24 12/12/24 plots 49 to 52 Rev A

Plan — 3B5PV Elev­a­tions ‑plots 49 3295−01−102− 01/12/24 12/12/24 to 52 Rev A

Plan — 3B5PV Plans and sec­tions — 3295−01−103− 01/12/24 12/12/24 plots 53 to 56 Rev B

Plan — 3B5PV Elev­a­tions ‑plots 53 3295−01−104 — 01/12/24 12/12/24 to 56 Rev C

Plan — 3B5PV Plans and sec­tions — 3295−01−105 — 01/12/24 12/12/24 plots 57 to 60 Rev A

Gen­er­al — 3B5PV Elev­a­tions ‑plots 3295−01−106 — 01/12/24 12/12/24 57 to 60 Rev A

Plan — Site remix as exist­ing — 3295 – 01 049 26/11/24 26/11/24 afford­able hous­ing remix

Plan — Land­scap­ing plan ΤΗ Ν 110.23 SL- 26/11/24 26/11/24 01 Rev G

Plan — Bound­ary Treat­ment 3295−01−054 01/11/24 26/11/24 afford­able hous­ing remix Rev A

Plan — Site Sec­tions Afford­able 3295−01−056− 01/01/25 09/01/25 Hous­ing remix Rev B

Plan — Site Plan as pro­posed — 3295−01−055− 01/11/24 26/11/24 afford­able hous­ing remix Rev A

Plan — Phas­ing Plan — deliv­ery 21/11/24 schedule

Plan — ser­vices rout­ing plan 191030−000− 31/10/24 06/11/24 CAM-DR-C-032- Rev D

Plan — Road Con­struc­tion Con­sent 91030−000− 31/10/24 06/11/24 CAM-DR-C-005- Rev H

Plan — Loc­a­tion Plan afford­able 3295−02−005 01/10/24 06/11/24 hous­ing remix Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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Plan — Kerb lay­out plan 191030−000− 31/10/24 06/11/24 CAM-DR-C-006- Rev h

Plan — Pro­posed water­main lay­out 191030−000− 31/10/24 06/11/24 CAM-DR-C-029- Rev I

Plan — Roads and site con­tours 191030−000− 31/10/24 06/11/24 CAM-DR-C-012- Rev E

Plan — Drain­age Lay­out Plan 191030−000− 31/10/24 06/11/24 CAM-DR-C-020- Rev M

Oth­er — Air Source heat pump type 06/11/24 aro­therm plus

Oth­er — Sup­port­ing state­ment 3295- Ver­sion 2 09/01/25 10/01/25 remix of plots 49 – 60

Oth­er — Extern­al Fin­ishes sched­ule 3295/FS02 12/12/24 12/12/24 Ver­sion 2

Oth­er — Hous­ing Demand 12/12/24 12/12/24 Commentary

Oth­er — Con­struc­tion Meth­od 10/01/25 State­ment *Where no spe­cif­ic day of month has been provided on the plan, the sys­tem defaults to the 1^st of the month.

1. Plans of the pro­pos­als are included in Appendix 1.

2. This applic­a­tion is essen­tially a remix of afford­able hous­ing on this phase of an approved wider devel­op­ment for 81 units. It is loc­ated with­in an area known as phase 1 in this ori­gin­al applic­a­tion which dates from 2007. In 2018 an applic­a­tion for a revised lay­out for this afford­able ele­ment was approved and it is that lay­out which it is now pro­posed to change. When approved in 2018 there were a total of 20 units in this phase com­pris­ing four, one-bed­room prop­er­ties, 14 two-bed­room prop­er­ties and two, three-bed­room prop­er­ties. The four, one-bed­room prop­er­ties and four of the two-bed­room prop­er­ties were grouped around a court­yard type area on the west­ern side of this phase, nearest to Perth Road. This part of the devel­op­ment remains unchanged and is single storey. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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1. It is pro­posed to change house types on the east­ern side of the site access to a total of 12 two storey res­id­en­tial units com­pris­ing six, three-bed­room semi-detached blocks. This area formerly com­prised two, three-bed­room prop­er­ties and 10 two- bed­room prop­er­ties. This was made up of one single storey semi-detached block, two pairs of semi-detached two storey units and two ter­races of two storey units, with two com­mun­al car park­ing areas and in cur­til­age park­ing for the north­ern­most four units.

2. The total mix of the over­all afford­able phase as now pro­posed will increase the num­ber of three-bed­room units to 12 and decrease the num­ber of two-bed­room units to four. In sum­mary, the pro­pos­al will res­ult in 10 more three-bed­room units and 10 few­er two-bed­room units.

3. The house types pro­posed with this remix are simple two storey semi-detached blocks set back from the access road in a stepped line. They are sim­il­ar in form to the two storey blocks pre­vi­ously approved. Fol­low­ing dis­cus­sion, revi­sions have been made to the pro­posed fin­ishes in terms of clad­ding, harling col­our and door col­ours to intro­duce more variety.

4. Pro­posed fin­ishes are now a mix­ture of smooth grey and anthra­cite (dark grey) con­crete roof tiles; mix­ture of dolo­mite (white) and Tuscany beige harling; mix­ture of anthra­cite and even­ing blue clad­ding fea­tures and a mix­ture of anthra­cite and steel blue doors; and grey win­dows. Air source heat pumps are pro­posed and 1.8 metres high tim­ber screen fen­cing around rear gar­dens. In cur­til­age car park­ing is pro­posed and there will be pro­vi­sion for elec­tric vehicle char­ging with­in each plot.

5. No changes to the wider ser­vi­cing are pro­posed, with the houses con­nect­ing into the ori­gin­ally pro­posed ser­vi­cing arrange­ments of pub­lic water and foul drain­age con­nec­tions. They will be served by the ori­gin­ally approved roads lay­out. The sur­face water from roofs will be dis­posed of by in-site soakaways with per­meable drive­ways, and roads water will con­nect to the pre­vi­ously approved SuDS scheme in the south­ern part of the site. Bin stor­age pro­vi­sion will be made with­in gardens.

6. In response to a request for biod­iversity enhance­ments, a revised land­scape plan was sub­mit­ted. The agents explain that this provides addi­tion­al nat­ive hedge Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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plant­ing along the north­ern and south­ern bound­ar­ies to cre­ate com­mut­ing links for wild­life as well as places for shel­ter / food sources mid to long term. They note that fur­ther tree plant­ing with­in the south­ern extent of the site and in front gar­dens is inten­ded to provide darkened areas for wild­life more sus­cept­ible to human dis­turb­ance. They high­light that addi­tion­al nat­ive mead­ow and seed plant­ing is pro­posed in areas cur­rently used as amen­ity grass­land and that pole moun­ted bird boxes will be erec­ted with­in the SuDS area. Whilst this is out­with the red line applic­a­tion site (but with­in the wider site), their ecologist’s pref­er­ence is for the bird boxes to be as far away as pos­sible from people and roads. Beech hedging is pro­posed in front gar­dens too.

1. Visu­al­isa­tions have been provided to show how the new hous­ing will sit in the imme­di­ate streetscape.

2. A Design State­ment and Sup­port­ing State­ment has been sub­mit­ted out­lining the pro­posed changes from the ori­gin­al sub­mis­sion. This also explains that the changes are being sought due to a change in registered social land­lord for the units from Cale­do­nia Hous­ing Asso­ci­ation to High­land Hous­ing Alli­ance and the High­land Coun­cil and their dif­fer­ent requirements.

3. The agent has provided a Hous­ing Demand Com­ment­ary. This doc­u­ment explains that High­land Hous­ing Alli­ance have con­firmed that there is demand for three- bed­room homes which are the most pop­u­lar type of home that they rent out, with the High­land Coun­cil con­firm­ing they are happy that the mix of prop­er­ties reflects demand in the area.

4. Key changes from the ori­gin­ally approved lay­out may be sum­mar­ised as fol­lows: a) Com­mun­al park­ing areas now deleted with all park­ing in cur­til­age. b) Change on plots 53 – 54 from single storey, semi-detached pair of houses with rear wing to two storey house types. c) Change to all units now being blocks of semi-detached two storey hous­ing. d) Loss of some land­scap­ing around the com­mun­al park­ing areas- the land­scap­ing pre­vi­ously approved com­prised beech hedging to north and south of site; some birch and row­an trees; and flower­ing plants includ­ing juni­per and blue­berry. e) Beech hedging is now pro­posed in the front gar­dens and row­an trees in front gar­dens. Birch trees and some hazel, wil­low, and heath­er plants/​shrubs are Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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pro­posed to the south of plot 60. To the north of plot 49 mixed nat­ive hedging is pro­posed. f) Biod­iversity enhance­ments as out­lined in para­graph 13 above.

His­tory

1. Ref­er­ence 07/230/CP- Plan­ning con­sent was ini­tially gran­ted in 2011 for a hous­ing devel­op­ment on the wider site here for 81 houses and access roads. This con­sent was sub­ject to numer­ous con­di­tions and a Sec­tion 75 leg­al agree­ment regard­ing developer oblig­a­tions. Sus­pens­ive plan­ning con­di­tions were sub­sequently dis­charged, and a start was made on site. With this ori­gin­al con­sent pri­or­ity pur­chase hous­ing for loc­al res­id­ents was also iden­ti­fied on the east­ern edge of that wider site (plots 29 ‑48) under the terms of plan­ning con­di­tion 3. A num­ber of non- mater­i­al vari­ations to this con­sent have been gran­ted over the years.

2. Ref­er­ence 2018/0242/­DET- In 2018 plan­ning con­sent was gran­ted to amend the lay­out of plots 49 to 68 in the south­ern­most part of the site — phase 1. This lay­out com­prised the afford­able unit pro­vi­sion for the scheme (20 houses), and it is this lay­out that the cur­rent applic­a­tion seeks to amend in terms of the east­ern­most part.

3. Ref­er­ence 2022/0358/DET — In 2022 con­sent was gran­ted for form­a­tion of a road and SuDS basin in the south­ern part of the over­all site. This SuDS basin is inten­ded to serve the wider hous­ing development.

4. Ref­er­ence 2024/0149/DET — plan­ning con­sent was gran­ted in August 2024 for amended house types and drive­way loc­a­tions on Plots 20 and 21 with­in the wider site to the north.

Devel­op­ment plan con­text Policies Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4) Scot­land 2045 Nation­al policy (Officer to delete policies that are not rel­ev­ant) Policy 1 Tack­ling the cli­mate and nature crises Policy 2 Cli­mate mit­ig­a­tion and adapt­a­tion Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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Policy 3 Biod­iversity Policy 4 Nat­ur­al places Policy 5 Soils 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 22 Flood risk and water management

Stra­tegic policy Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022 – 2027 Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (2021) Loc­al plan policy (Policies rel­ev­ant to the assess­ment of this applic­a­tion are marked with a cross (x)) Policy 1 New hous­ing devel­op­ment X Policy 2 Sup­port­ing eco­nom­ic growth Policy 3 Design and place­mak­ing X Policy 4 Nat­ur­al her­it­age X Policy 5 Land­scape X The sit­ing and design of digit­al com­mu­nic­a­tions Policy 6 equip­ment Policy 7 Renew­able energy Policy 8 Open space, sport and recre­ation Policy 9 Cul­tur­al her­it­age Policy 10 Resources X Policy 11 Developer oblig­a­tions X Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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1. All new devel­op­ment pro­pos­als require to be assessed in rela­tion to policies con­tained in the adop­ted Devel­op­ment Plan which com­prises Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4) and the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan
2. The full word­ing of policies can be found at: https://www.gov.scot/publications/national-planning-framework‑4/documents/ and at: https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​w​p​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​/​u​p​l​o​a​d​s​/​2​0​2​1​/​0​3​/​C​N​P​A​-​L​D​P​-​2​0​2​1​-​w​e​b.pdf

Plan­ning guidance

1. Sup­ple­ment­ary guid­ance also forms part of the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan and provides more details about how to com­ply with the policies. Guid­ance that is rel­ev­ant to this applic­a­tion is marked with a cross (x). Policy 1 Hous­ing sup­ple­ment­ary guid­ance X Policy 2 Sup­port­ing eco­nom­ic growth non-stat­utory guid­ance 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 Policy 9 Cul­tur­al her­it­age non-stat­utory guid­ance Policy 10 Resources non-stat­utory guid­ance X Policy 11 Developer oblig­a­tions sup­ple­ment­ary guid­ance X

Con­sulta­tions

1. A sum­mary of the main issues raised by con­sul­tees now follows:

2. Scot­tish Water has no objec­tion to the applic­a­tion. They advise that the applic­ant require to con­tact them regard­ing con­nec­tions to their sys­tems. They fur­ther note that they will not accept any sur­face water con­nec­tions into their com­bined sew­er system.

3. The High­land Coun­cil Trans­port Plan­ning Team note that the devel­op­ment is loc­ated with­in an ongo­ing hous­ing devel­op­ment and seeks to amend a pre­vi­ously Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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con­sen­ted lay­out. In terms of roads and trans­port issues they note that this new lay­out involves only lim­ited changes, and they have no objec­tions. They note that a minor vari­ation to the cur­rent Roads Con­struc­tion Con­sent will be required.

1. The High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team note that the pro­pos­al is for a change of house type with­in a con­sen­ted site. The pro­posed sur­face water drain­age pro­vi­sion is for private soakaways with­in the cur­til­age of each plot which is the same as the pre­vi­ous lay­out. They remain con­tent with this pro­pos­al and have no objections.

2. The High­land Coun­cil Hous­ing Ser­vice was con­sul­ted in respect of con­cerns raised by the loc­al Com­munity Coun­cil with regards to hous­ing needs. They have advised that they are con­tent with the mix. They note that mid-mar­ket prop­er­ties can be alloc­ated with an addi­tion­al bed­room space and fam­il­ies grow. In terms of social rent, they fur­ther note there is flex­ib­il­ity around alloc­a­tions, and it should be remembered that chil­dren of a dif­fer­ent sex have to have sep­ar­ate bed­rooms after age eight.

3. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Out­door Access Officer has no com­ments, not­ing that there are no changes which affect pub­lic access at the site.

4. New­ton­more and Vicin­ity Com­munity Coun­cil recog­nise that there are now new afford­able hous­ing part­ners work­ing with the developers and that the house types are out­with the developers’ con­trol. How­ever, they con­sider that the pro­posed remix to all three-bed­room houses is not what is needed by the com­munity. The com­munity coun­cil con­sider that the loc­al demand is for two-bed­room afford­able homes for young fam­il­ies. They are also con­cerned that with the involve­ment now of High­land Coun­cil the pro­pos­al may be seen as a solu­tion to demand arising from people who are not res­id­ent in Badenoch, but rather from the wider High­land area and so will not address the demand from loc­al families.

5. They also raise con­cern regard­ing the design of the hous­ing which they do not con­sider enhances the site as the pre­vi­ous designs did, which had vary­ing roof heights and styles. They con­sider that the pro­posed designs look like an estate of old-style social hous­ing. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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1. Accord­ingly, the Com­munity Coun­cil object to the pro­pos­als on the basis that the pro­posed mix of hous­ing and the style is not suited to the loc­al com­munity or the need for afford­able hous­ing for loc­ally employed fam­il­ies rather than lar­ger, more expens­ive three-bed­room prop­er­ties as pro­posed now. A copy of their com­ments is attached as Appendix 2.

Rep­res­ent­a­tions

1. The applic­a­tion was advert­ised loc­ally, and no rep­res­ent­a­tions have been received.

Apprais­al

1. Sec­tion 25 of the 1997 Act as amended requires applic­a­tions to be determ­ined in accord­ance with the Devel­op­ment Plan. This now com­prises the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP) 2021 and the Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4). Where there is con­flict between policies, NPF4 policies will be used.

2. The main plan­ning con­sid­er­a­tions in this case are the prin­ciple of devel­op­ment, sit­ing and design, and any envir­on­ment­al or ser­vi­cing issues. These are con­sidered in detail below.

Prin­ciple

1. NPF4 Policy 9: Brown­field, Vacant and Derel­ict Land and Empty Build­ings 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, Policy 16: Qual­ity Homes sets out that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als for new homes on land alloc­ated for hous­ing in the LDP will be sup­por­ted. It also explains that pro­pos­als which improve afford­ab­il­ity and choice will be supported.

2. Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan also 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. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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1. In this regard the applic­a­tion site lies with­in a lar­ger approved hous­ing devel­op­ment loc­ated with­in the set­tle­ment bound­ary of New­ton­more as des­ig­nated in the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan. The ori­gin­ally approved devel­op­ment for 81 houses lies with­in a wider site which is des­ig­nated for hous­ing devel­op­ment as H1, alloc­ated for a total of 120 dwell­ings. The set­tle­ment state­ment explains that as this is a visu­ally prom­in­ent site, the design of any detailed pro­pos­als must take account of the sens­it­ive set­ting of the vil­lage and be designed in a way that pro­motes the highest stand­ards of access, lay­out, build­ing design and pub­lic realm. Medi­um to high-risk prob­ab­il­ity flood risk is iden­ti­fied in the south­ern part of the wider site and the need for flood risk, drain­age and land­scap­ing inform­a­tion is noted in the set­tle­ment statement.

2. Also rel­ev­ant in terms of prin­ciples, is the issue of afford­able hous­ing pro­vi­sion. NPF4 Policy 16: Qual­ity Homes sets out that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als for new homes will be sup­por­ted where they make pro­vi­sion for afford­able homes to meet an iden­ti­fied need, with pro­vi­sion of at least 25% sought unless the LDP sets out loc­a­tions where a high­er or lower con­tri­bu­tion is sought. In this regard Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan states that devel­op­ments of four or more dwell­ings should include pro­vi­sion for afford­able hous­ing. For New­ton­more 25 % of the total num­ber of dwell­ings pro­posed must be affordable.

3. In this case, afford­able hous­ing pro­vi­sion was agreed with pre­vi­ous applic­a­tions, with a total of 20 houses iden­ti­fied in this south­ern part of the site as being for afford­able pro­vi­sion. The cur­rent applic­a­tion com­prises part of this afford­able hous­ing pro­vi­sion and simply seeks a remix of 12 of the approved total of 20 units.

4. Set against this policy back­ground, the prin­ciple of this applic­a­tion to remix afford­able house types and lay­out with­in an approved hous­ing devel­op­ment on land spe­cific­ally des­ig­nated for hous­ing read­ily com­plies with NPF4 and LDP policies. It is the detail of the design and lay­out that falls to be con­sidered now as fol­lows. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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Land­scape Issues, Lay­out and Design

1. 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

2. 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 namely healthy, pleas­ant, con­nec­ted, dis­tinct­ive, sus­tain­able and adapt­able. 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. As noted earli­er, the set­tle­ment state­ment for New­ton­more also sets out the need for high qual­ity design and lay­out on this prom­in­ent site.

3. In this regard the over­all lay­out and house num­bers was approved with the ori­gin­al plan­ning applic­a­tion. The cur­rent pro­pos­al now seeks to amend the lay­out in terms of a move from com­mun­al park­ing to indi­vidu­al accesses and a change to intro­duce all two-storey semi-detached hous­ing (six blocks) instead of two blocks of two storey semi-detached hous­ing, one single storey semi-detached block and two ter­raced two storey blocks as pro­posed pre­vi­ously. All house types will now be three-bed­room as noted earli­er in this report.

4. As noted by the Com­munity Coun­cil, the ori­gin­al lay­out had more vari­ety in terms of roof heights and mass­ing in that there was a single storey ele­ment, and the lay­out was broken up by the com­mun­al park­ing. How­ever, when viewed along­side the approved single storey hous­ing to the west (which is dir­ectly beside the main road and com­prises the remainder of this afford­able phase), it is con­sidered that the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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over­all lay­out, mass­ing and scale is sat­is­fact­ory, all as illus­trated on the applicant’s visualisations.

1. The pro­posed lay­out involves the remixed hous­ing being stepped back from the access road with nat­ive hedging and plant­ing pro­posed in the front gar­dens along with plant­ing of mixed nat­ive hedging to the north and south, and trees to the south. Togeth­er with the areas of land­scap­ing and amen­ity areas already approved in the west­ern part of this afford­able phase, and the plant­ing to the south around the SuDS area, it is con­sidered that this will provide a suit­able set­ting for the devel­op­ment as well as cre­at­ing con­nect­ing veget­a­tion / land­scape cor­ridors on this part of the site. The loss of some land­scap­ing around the com­mun­al park­ing areas (as was ori­gin­ally pro­posed) is con­sidered to be sat­is­fact­or­ily mit­ig­ated by the plant­ing now proposed.

2. In these over­all cir­cum­stances it is con­sidered that the pro­posed devel­op­ment will over time cre­ate a sat­is­fact­ory exten­sion to the town­scape of New­ton­more and that the pro­posed changes are in keep­ing with the wider lay­out of the site.

3. The revised plans now show dif­fer­ent fin­ishes for the new houses which it is con­sidered address the ​“bland” appear­ance as high­lighted by the Com­munity Coun­cil. It will allow a suit­able level of vari­ety in the devel­op­ment enabling it to com­ply with policies.

4. There will be no loss of amen­ity for any exist­ing houses in the area which lie some dis­tance to the north­east in large, wooded gar­dens. The lay­out, scale and win­dow pos­i­tions of the pro­posed new houses will not give rise to adverse impacts in terms of pri­vacy and amen­ity to the remain­ing devel­op­ment in this phase.

5. Finally in terms of design issues, the pro­pos­al as set out earli­er seeks to provide more three-bed­room houses than pre­vi­ously approved. The Com­munity Coun­cil has raised con­cern that this does not address loc­al demand which is for smal­ler two-bed­room prop­er­ties. The pro­pos­al is for afford­able hous­ing to be provided by the High­land Coun­cil and High­land Hous­ing Alli­ance who have both con­firmed the demand for this type of hous­ing which addresses the need for suf­fi­cient bed­room space for fam­il­ies with chil­dren as well as any needs for home work­ing pro­vi­sion. Giv­en the Com­munity Council’s con­cern, the tech­nic­al con­sul­tee (High­land Coun­cil Hous­ing Ser­vice) was con­sul­ted, and they have con­firmed that the mix reflects loc­al demand. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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They have also con­firmed that they are con­tent with the mix, not­ing that mid-mar­ket prop­er­ties can be alloc­ated with an addi­tion­al bed­room space, and that fam­il­ies grow. In terms of social rent, they fur­ther note there is flex­ib­il­ity around alloc­a­tions, and it should be remembered that chil­dren of a dif­fer­ent sex have to have sep­ar­ate bed­rooms after age eight. In light of this inform­a­tion, there are not con­sidered to be any mater­i­al land use plan­ning issues with the pro­posed mix which will help deliv­er much needed afford­able housing.

1. In these cir­cum­stances the pro­posed the devel­op­ment is con­sidered to com­ply with NPF4 and LDP policies.

Deliv­ery of Afford­able Housing

1. As noted earli­er in this report, NPF4 Policy 16: Qual­ity Homes sets out that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als for new homes will be sup­por­ted where they make pro­vi­sion for afford­able homes to meet an iden­ti­fied need with pro­vi­sion of at least 25% sought unless the LDP set out loc­a­tions where a high­er or lower con­tri­bu­tion is sought. Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan also states that devel­op­ments of four or more dwell­ings should include pro­vi­sion for afford­able housing.

2. The cur­rent remix applic­a­tion forms part of the afford­able hous­ing com­pon­ent of 20 units for the wider site here with pri­or­ity pur­chase plots iden­ti­fied in addi­tion to this too. As such, the require­ment for suf­fi­cient afford­able hous­ing in this over­all devel­op­ment is read­ily met.

3. This afford­able phase was iden­ti­fied as ​“phase 1 ​“with the ori­gin­al 2007 plan­ning applic­a­tion, with con­di­tions in place requir­ing deliv­ery of phased devel­op­ment. A phas­ing plan was approved in 2023 under the terms of con­di­tion 2. This showed a sequence of phas­ing with phase 2 to the north west due to com­mence in April – June 2024 and phase 3 to the north east April to June 2025. Work has com­menced on site on the road infra­struc­ture for this cur­rent phase 1, and a phas­ing plan has been sub­mit­ted with this cur­rent applic­a­tion show­ing con­struc­tion on the road infra­struc­ture com­men­cing sum­mer 2024 and ongo­ing, and work on the con­struc­tion of the houses due to start Janu­ary 2025 sub­ject to times­cales to be agreed in the con­tracts with the pro­viders. Work has also star­ted on the con­struc­tion of the houses Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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in phase 2. Giv­en the over­all size of the devel­op­ment (81 houses), it is not unusu­al for work to be con­tinu­ing in sub­sequent phases too.

1. In these cir­cum­stances this Ser­vice is con­tent that deliv­ery of the afford­able hous­ing will be timely, with work­force cur­rently on site.

Envir­on­ment­al Impacts

1. NPF4 Policy 3: Biod­iversity requires devel­op­ment pro­pos­als to con­trib­ute to the enhance­ment of biod­iversity and to include appro­pri­ate meas­ures to con­serve, restore and enhance biod­iversity pro­por­tion­ate to the nature and scale of the devel­op­ment. This includes where rel­ev­ant build­ing and strength­en­ing nature net­works. 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. Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan sim­il­arly requires new devel­op­ment to have no adverse effects on the integ­rity of des­ig­nated sites, the Nation­al Park or on pro­tec­ted spe­cies or habitats.

2. This applic­a­tion does not involve any addi­tion­al loss of hab­it­at as com­pared to the ori­gin­al applic­a­tions, involving devel­op­ment on pre­vi­ously approved plots which are part of a wider site being cleared for devel­op­ment. As noted at the time of the Hab­it­at Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al for the SuDS basin in 2022, there is no con­nectiv­ity to water­courses and in par­tic­u­lar the River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion (SAC) and accord­ingly no adverse effects on des­ig­nated sites.

3. As noted earli­er in this report, whilst there has been some loss of plant­ing / amen­ity space around the ori­gin­ally pro­posed com­mun­al park­ing areas, it is con­sidered that this has been sat­is­fact­or­ily mit­ig­ated by meas­ures such as the increased hedging to improve con­nectiv­ity togeth­er with the pro­posed bird boxes. This offers the oppor­tun­ity for pro­por­tion­ate biod­iversity enhance­ments as required by NPF4 policy,

4. In these over­all cir­cum­stances the devel­op­ment is con­sidered to com­ply with NPF4 and LDP policy. Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh Item 6 Plan­ning Com­mit­tee 24 Janu­ary 2025

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Ser­vi­cing – water environment

1. 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