Item6AABalavilEstateHouses

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DEVEL­OP­MENT PRO­POSED: Change of use of land to form 3 staff (replace­ment) farm­houses includ­ing asso­ci­ated access, drain­age, land­scape, ground works, ser­vices and the demoli­tion of Lyn­voan Cot­tage and out­build­ings at Land 795M West Of Garden Cot­tage Kingussie

REF­ER­ENCE: 2021/0407/DET

APPLIC­ANT: Bal­avil Estate Limited

DATE CALLED-IN: 22 Decem­ber 2021

RECOM­MEND­A­TION: Approve sub­ject to Con­di­tions and Developer Contribution

CASE OFFICER: Stephanie Wade, Plan­ning Officer

CNPA Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Applic­a­tion Site 0 70 140 Meters

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 SITE DESCRIP­TION, PRO­POS­AL AND HISTORY

Site Descrip­tion

1. The pro­posed site lies on the north­ern side of the A9 oppos­ite Lyn­chat, approx­im­ately 3km north­east of Kin­gussie. The site lies on slop­ing ground above the exist­ing A9 to its south and wraps around the north of the wooded knoll and per­mit­ted Bal­avil Farm relo­ca­tion (2020/0077/MSC). The wider area is char­ac­ter­ised by estate farm­land, plant­a­tion wood­land and Lyn­voan Cot­tage sits to the south-west­ern corner of the site. Lyn­voan Cot­tage is a one and a half storey, detached dwell­ing of stone con­struc­tion which has been unin­hab­ited for sev­er­al years and has fallen into a state of disrepair.

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=R45OG6SI0C100

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
PLANS
Plan — Loc­a­tion Plan	50895 – 01-001-P02	17/11/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Site Gen­er­al Arrangement	50895 – 14-001-P03	11/04/22	25/04/22
Plan — Site Lay­out Plan House I	16 213/L01	01/10/21	22/12/21
Plan — Site Lay­out Plan Houses 2 and 3	16 213/L02	01/10/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Plan House I	19 290/ P01	01/10/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Plan House I	19 290/P02	01/10/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Plan- House 2	19 290/P04	01/10/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Plan – House 3	19 290/ P06	01/10/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Elev­a­tions- House		19 290/P03	01/10/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Elev­a­tions – House		19 290/ P05	01/10/21	2/12/21
2
Plan — Pro­posed Elev­a­tions- House	19 290/ P07	01/10/21	22/12/21
3
Plan — Road Lon­git­ud­in­al Sections	50895 – 48-001-P02	17/11/21	22/12/21
Plan — Pro­posed Con­tour Plan Cross	Sec­tions	50895 – 27-002-P03	11/04/22	25/04/22
Plan — Con­tour Plan	50895−27−	11/04/22	25/04/22

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22

|Plan — Pro­posed Mound Fil­ter Sys­tem Houses 2 and 3|50895 – 33-002-P02|17/11/21|22/12/21| |Plan — Pro­posed Foul and Surface|Water Drain­age Strategy|50895 – 27-001-P04|11/04/22|25/04/22| |Plan — Site Bound­ary Plan|50895 – 01-001-P02|11/04/22|25/04/22| |Plan — Land­scape Proposals|50895 – 601-P03|22/04/22|25/04/22| |SUP­PORT­ING DOC­U­MENT­A­TION|||| |Oth­er- Drain­age Assessment|50895 V2|01/11/21|22/12/21| |Oth­er- Design and Access|Statement- Parts A — C||29/11/21|22/12/21| |Oth­er- Con­struc­tion Meth­od Statement|50895 V4|01/11/21|22/12/21| |Oth­er- Eco­lo­gic­al Sur­vey Report|||06/01/22|| |Oth­er — Arbor­i­cul­tur­al Impact Assessment|9826|24/11/21|22/12/21| |Oth­er — Agent Response to Consultees|||22/04/22|25/04/22| |Oth­er — Agent Response to|Consultees- Note A|||06/04/22|| |Oth­er — Agent Response to|Consultees- Note B|||06/04/22|| |Oth­er — Agent Response to|Consultees- Note C|||06/04/22|| |Oth­er — Bat Spe­cies Pro­tec­tion Plan|||01/03/22|25/04/22| |Oth­er — Otter (and further|protected spe­cies except bats)|||20/04/22|25/04/22| |sur­vey report|||||

*Where no spe­cif­ic day of month has been provided on the plan, the sys­tem defaults to the 1^st of the month.

1. The applic­a­tion pro­poses the erec­tion of three new dwell­ings with­in the estate to be occu­pied for staff accom­mod­a­tion. The pro­posed dwell­ings are to be sited on land to the north­ern side of the A9 at Lyn­voan along­side the per­mit­ted Bal­avail Farm relo­ca­tion. The pro­pos­al includes the demoli­tion of Lyn­voan Cot­tage and out­build­ings togeth­er with the install­a­tion of asso­ci­ated access, drain­age, land­scap­ing, and ser­vices for the three new dwellings.

2. A pro­posed new access track for the dwell­ings will extend from the per­mit­ted farm access track fol­low­ing con­tours, from the east of the farm, in a north­erly dir­ec­tion to House I and extend­ing fur­ther north into the plant­a­tion to then head in a south- west­erly dir­ec­tion to link to Houses 2 and 3 and fin­ish­ing fur­ther south to link into the

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 north-west­ern corner of the farm­yard. The track is pro­posed to be sur­faced in con­crete. Park­ing areas for three vehicles per dwell­ing are loc­ated to the north­ern elev­a­tions of Houses 2 and 3 and to the south­ern elev­a­tion of House 1.

1. House I is a detached, 4 bed­room dwell­ing with accom­mod­a­tion arranged over two and a half storeys due to the dwell­ing being built on slop­ing ground. The design takes form of an L‑shape with the incor­por­a­tion of a con­tem­por­ary fea­tures includ­ing sig­ni­fic­ant glaz­ing to the south­ern elev­a­tion, flat-roof zinc dormer win­dows, larch and zinc clad elev­a­tions and a zinc roof. The garden for the dwell­ing is pro­posed to be laid to the east­ern and south­ern sides of the dwell­ing which is to be bound by the pro­posed access track.

2. Houses 2 and 3 are both detached units of sim­il­ar scale and design, with accom­mod­a­tion arranged over two floors and sig­ni­fic­ant levels of glaz­ing on the south­ern elev­a­tions. Like House I, the designs and char­ac­ter take a con­tem­por­ary form with the use of a zinc roof over part rendered / part larch clad elev­a­tions. Flat-roofed zinc dormer win­dows are incor­por­ated on the south roof slopes. Both units provide three double bed­rooms, with­in the liv­ing accom­mod­a­tion. A patio area and garden area extend to the south­ern elev­a­tions of both houses.

3. A SuDS basin is pro­posed with­in the south-west­ern corner of the devel­op­ment site which has been sized to accom­mod­ate the sur­face water for the three new dwell­ings and the sur­face water from the farm­yard. The devel­op­ment would be con­nec­ted to the pub­lic water sup­ply infra­struc­ture. Land­scap­ing pro­posed includes the addi­tion of nat­ive wood­land planting.

4. Dur­ing the pro­gres­sion of the applic­a­tion, the agent has provided addi­tion­al inform­a­tion in response to quer­ies raised dur­ing the con­sulta­tion pro­cess and the applic­a­tion includes the fol­low­ing sup­port­ing documents:

a) Arbor­i­cul­tur­al Impact Assess­ment con­firms that the site com­prises sev­er­al large plant­a­tion wood­land groups that are primar­ily dom­in­ated by con­ifer spe­cies. These groups are bordered or divided by grazed sheep pas­tures. Scattered small birch, scots pine and sitka spruce were iden­ti­fied with­in the cent­ral grass­land area. Tο accom­mod­ate the design, the pro­pos­al includes the remov­al of 0.35 Ha of com­mer­cial con­i­fer­ous wood­land togeth­er with the remov­al of 30 indi­vidu­al trees.

b) Land­scape Plan includes nat­ive tree plant­ing of 45 indi­vidu­al trees com­pris­ing sessile oak and row­an; nat­ive wood­land plant­ing mix one cov­er­ing an area of 3036sqm; nat­ive wood­land plant­ing mix two cov­er­ing an area of 1551sqm and wet wood­land plant­ing of 578sqm. The plan also includes amen­ity grass for private garden areas, and wild­flower grass mixes in vari­ous places includ­ing the SUDS pond.

c) Drain­age Assess­ment: states that the access track will be col­lec­ted through fil­ter drains. The sur­face water run-off from the roofs and drive­ways will be col­lec­ted and con­nec­ted to the road­side fil­ter drains, con­nect­ing through to a SUDS deten­tion basin, which in turn get dis­charged to the exist­ing water­course at a green run­off equi­val­ent flow rate. The SUDs basin will also take sur­face water from the approved farm com­plex. Regard­ing foul drain­age, Farm­house I is pro­posed to con­nect to the approved mound fil­ter sys­tem and sep­tic tank at the new farm com­plex which has

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 capa­city to cater for both devel­op­ments. Houses 2 and 3 will dis­charge into a sep­ar­ate mound fil­ter sys­tem and sub­sequent sep­tic tank.

1. Plans of the pro­pos­al can be viewed in Appendix 1.

His­tory

1. There have been sev­er­al plan­ning applic­a­tions and lis­ted build­ing con­sents per­mit­ted with­in the wider estate con­text. Of rel­ev­ance is the per­mis­sion for the relo­ca­tion of the Bal­avil Home Farm to the north­ern side of the A9 under per­mis­sions 2018/0354/PPP and 2020/0077/MSC.

2. Also of rel­ev­ance is the renew­al plan­ning per­mis­sion for the ​“Con­ver­sion of Farm Build­ings to Vis­it­or Facil­it­ies and Com­mer­cial Use, Exten­sions and Form­a­tion of a Café and Park­ing” at the Stead­ing, Bal­avil Mains. This con­ver­sion includes the loss of the res­id­en­tial farm­house to the com­mer­cial use per­mit­ted. There is also exist­ing con­sent (High­land Coun­cil ²⁰⁄₀₁₂₇₄) for an access track up the hill from Lyn­voan for forestry use.

Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Appraisal

1. A Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al [HRA] has been under­taken to con­sider the effects of the pro­pos­al upon the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the European Sites: Insh Marches SAC, River Spey SAC, and the River Spey — Insh Marshes SPA. A copy of the HRA is included at Appendix 2. The loc­a­tion of the pro­posed SuDS pond has been revised to loc­ate it out of the area of wet birch wood­land and asso­ci­ated water­courses pro­posed in the ori­gin­al sub­mis­sion. Due to the risk of sed­i­ment release dur­ing excav­a­tion and con­struc­tion works enter­ing the nearby water­course, a plan­ning con­di­tion is recom­men­ded for the agree­ment of a con­struc­tion meth­od state­ment with pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures detailed. Sub­ject to the inclu­sion of this con­di­tion, the pro­pos­al will not have an adverse effect on site integ­rity and the con­ser­va­tion object­ives will be met.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN CONTEXT

Policies |Nation­al Policy |Scot­tish Plan­ning Policy 2014| |Stra­tegic Policy |Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2017 — 2022| |Loc­al Plan Policy |Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (2021) | |Those policies rel­ev­ant to the assess­ment of this applic­a­tion are || marked with a cross| |POLICY I| NEW HOUS­ING DEVELOPMENT|X| |POLICY 2| SUP­PORT­ING ECO­NOM­IC GROWTH|| |POLICY 3| DESIGN & PLACEMAKING|X| |POLICY 4| NAT­UR­AL HERITAGE|X| |POLICY 5| LANDSCAPE|X| |POLICY 6| THE SIT­ING AND DESIGN OF DIGIT­AL | |COM­MU­NIC­A­TIONS EQUIP­MENT| |POLICY 7| RENEW­ABLE ENERGY|| |POLICY 8| OPEN SPACE, SPORT AND RECRE­ATION|| |POLICY 9| CUL­TUR­AL HERITAGE|X| |POLICY 10| RESOURCES|X| |POLICY 11| DEVELOPER CONTRIBUTIONS|X|

1. All new devel­op­ment pro­pos­als require to be assessed in rela­tion to policies con­tained in the adop­ted Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan. The full word­ing of policies can be found at:

https://​cairngorms​.co​.uk/​w​p​-​c​o​n​t​e​n​t​/​u​p​l​o​a​d​s​/​2​0​2​1​/​0​3​/​C​N​P​A​-​L​D​P​-​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.

|Policy I| New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance (2015)|X| |Policy 2| Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance|| |Policy 3| Sus­tain­able Design Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance (2015)|X| |Policy 4| Nat­ur­al Her­it­age Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance|X| |Policy 5| Land­scape Non-Stat­utory Guidance|X| |Policy 7| Renew­able Energy Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance|| |Policy 8| Sport and Recre­ation Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance|| |Policy 9| Cul­tur­al Her­it­age Non-Stat­utory Guidance|X| |Policy 10| Resources Non-Stat­utory Guidance|X| |Policy 11| Developer Con­tri­bu­tions Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance (2015)|X|

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 CONSULTATIONS

Sum­mary of the main issues raised by consultees

1. NatureScot con­firms that the HRA cov­ers all the issues and they have no fur­ther com­ments to make.

2. Scot­tish Water has no objec­tion to the pro­pos­al. They con­firm that the devel­op­ment would be fed from Aviemore Water Treat­ment Works although capa­city will have to be reviewed once per­mis­sion is gran­ted for the scheme. Regard­ing wastewa­ter, they con­firm there is no waste water infra­struc­ture with­in the vicin­ity of the pro­posed devel­op­ment and the applic­ant is advised to invest­ig­ate private water treat­ment options.

3. Trans­port Scot­land has no objec­tion. They are sat­is­fied that the pro­pos­als are out­with the bound­ary of the Trans­port Scotland’s Com­puls­ory Pur­chase Order for the nearby A9 Dualling project.

4. High­land Coun­cil Trans­port Plan­ning Team sup­ports the devel­op­ment. The devel­op­ment is to be served by a private track and 3 private accesses. It is their under­stand­ing that the track and private accesses are to remain privately owned and maintained.

5. High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team has no objec­tion to the pro­pos­al. They note that the site has a low flood risk, They Team notes that the applic­ant is pro­pos­ing to relo­cate and extend the size of the SUDs basin, pre­vi­ously accep­ted under plan­ning per­mis­sion 2020/0077/MSC to have capa­city for both devel­op­ments. The Team is sat­is­fied with the revised lay­out and cal­cu­la­tions. Regard­ing the foul drain­age pro­pos­als, the Team note that per­mis­sion to dis­charge treated efflu­ent should be sought from SEPA.

6. High­land Coun­cil Archae­olo­gist notes that the pro­pos­al includes the demoli­tion of Lyn­voan Cot­tage and asso­ci­ated out­build­ings which are of his­tor­ic import­ance. The Officer there­fore recom­mends a plan­ning con­di­tion is attached for the detailed pho­to­graph­ic record­ing of the build­ings to provide a record of their cur­rent con­di­tion and setting.

7. High­land Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land Officer has no objec­tion. There are no known con­tam­in­ated land issues with­in the site bound­ary, and they do not recom­mend a con­di­tion to be placed on this applic­a­tion. They do note that the applic­ant should ensure they are sat­is­fied via sur­vey work that the build­ing does not con­tain asbes­tos fabric.

8. High­land Coun­cil Forestry Officer did not provide any comments.

9. High­land Coun­cil His­tor­ic Envir­on­ment Officer did not provide any comments.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22

1. CNPA Eco­logy Officer has no objec­tion to the scheme. Fol­low­ing the sub­mis­sion of the revised inform­a­tion, the Officer wel­comes the relo­ca­tion of the pro­posed SuDS pond so that the south-west corner wet wood­land can be retained and pro­tec­ted to reduce the eco­lo­gic­al impact of the pro­pos­al. The Officer notes that the loc­a­tion of House I no longer needs to be altered to avoid tree felling as the trees in ques­tion have fallen dur­ing recent storm events. Regard­ing the fur­ther sur­vey work, the Officer notes that no fresh signs of otter were found, nor any rest­ing sites and mit­ig­a­tion pro­posed dur­ing con­struc­tion should be con­di­tioned in accord­ance with the report recom­mend­a­tions. Plan­ning con­di­tions are also required for the sub­mis­sion of a rep­tile sur­vey and any sub­sequent agree­ment of mit­ig­a­tion, if required.

2. The Officer wel­comes the Bat Spe­cies Pro­tec­tion Plan which incor­por­ates neces­sary tim­ing to avoid demoli­tion dur­ing winter months and the pres­ence of an ECoW dur­ing the dis­mant­ling of the build­ing. Three com­pens­at­ory roosts is pro­posed and con­sidered suf­fi­cient for the status of roost and impact.

3. The agent has provided cla­ri­fic­a­tion that the design and topo­graphy of the site is not suit­able for veget­ated swales and the Officer accepts the use of fil­ter drains on this basis. A plan­ning con­di­tion is required to update the Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment to include ref­er­ence to spe­cies pro­tec­tion plan and pre-con­struc­tion surveys.

4. CNPA Land­scape Officer states that the pro­posed houses are in two groups which would be upon hill slopes above Lyn­voan, away from nearby set­tle­ments, roads and the new farm, and thereby con­trib­ute to a slight increase in the dens­ity of dis­persed houses upon the strath side slopes. House I would be very large in scale and prom­in­ent loc­ally but could relate to the broad land­scape pat­tern and a loc­al land­form shelf if con­struc­ted sens­it­ively. Houses 2 and 3 would be in a more dis­creet loc­a­tion and appear to fit more intim­ately with the land­scape pat­tern, sur­roun­ded on three sides by exist­ing woodland.

5. The con­crete sur­face of the pro­posed access roads to houses 1 – 3 would be out of char­ac­ter where dis­tant from the farm, but their effects could be mit­ig­ated with care­ful design and wood­land plant­ing. Con­versely the pro­posed con­crete road high­er up the hill than the houses, link­ing across the hill­side far away from the farm below, would appear more incon­gru­ous and it is advised that the pro­posed sur­fa­cing for this road is amended to be more low-key and befit­ting of its rur­al, hill­side loc­a­tion with­in the Nation­al Park.

6. The pro­posed wood­land plant­ing and tree spe­cies mix has been sim­pli­fied and bet­ter reflect the loc­al land­scape char­ac­ter. The extent of the pro­posed wood­land east of house site I has been amended to be fur­ther south to avoid con­trast­ing to the char­ac­ter­ist­ic field pat­tern. Addi­tion­al wood­land plant­ing is also shown in-between the pro­posed the pro­posed road and exist­ing wood­land to the south, and this is wel­comed. Some addi­tion­al details are required, includ­ing for the pro­posed roads and con­struc­tion meth­od state­ment, which are recom­men­ded as plan­ning conditions.

7. CNPA Out­door Access Officer con­firms there is a core path nearby (LBS146), which in part fol­lows which in part fol­lows the vehicle track lead­ing to/​from the exist­ing Lyn­voan prop­erty, adja­cent to which there has tra­di­tion­ally been a small inform­al park­ing area. This has at the agree­ment of the Estate, cus­tom­ar­ily been avail­able for

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 pub­lic use and has served to facil­it­ate loc­al access to the core path, nearby sou­ter­rain and view­point. Its loc­a­tion is shown on the Paths Leaf­let. In not­ing the vari­ous devel­op­ments pro­posed here­abouts the Officer is hope­ful the park­ing area will be retained as they pro­gress such that it bene­fi­cially serves use of the core path and oth­er fea­tures of interest to the public.

1. Kin­craig and Vicin­ity Com­munity Coun­cil were con­sul­ted on the applic­a­tion but have not provided any comments.

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS

1. The applic­a­tion was advert­ised when first sub­mit­ted. There have been no let­ters of pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tion received.

APPRAIS­AL

1. The main plan­ning con­sid­er­a­tions are the prin­ciple of devel­op­ment; the impact upon the land­scape, lay­out, and design; the envir­on­ment­al impacts; impacts on the his­tor­ic envir­on­ment; access and ser­vi­cing and developer contributions.

Prin­ciple of Development

1. Policy 1.3 Oth­er Hous­ing in the Coun­tryside of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 sup­ports pro­pos­als for new hous­ing devel­op­ment with­in the open coun­tryside where they rein­force the exist­ing pat­tern of devel­op­ment and:

a) are neces­sary for or improve the oper­a­tion­al and eco­nom­ic viab­il­ity of an act­ive busi­ness which has a loc­a­tion­al require­ment dir­ectly linked to the coun­tryside; or b) are on a rur­al brown­field site.

1. The sup­port­ing doc­u­ment­a­tion con­firms that the dwell­ings to be erec­ted are for occu­pa­tion by employ­ees of the estate and that it is essen­tial that farm staff live close to the new farm com­plex for the day-to-day oper­a­tions, anim­al wel­fare and secur­ity of the farm­ing unit. The mod­ern­isa­tion of the estate has led to vari­ous plan­ning applic­a­tions which affect the exist­ing hous­ing stock on the Estate. The per­mis­sion to relo­cate the farm com­plex to the north of the A9 would see the exist­ing house- Chapel­park Cot­tage- segreg­ated from the new farm com­plex and there­fore this applic­a­tion looks to ensure all farm staff dwell­ings are loc­ated adja­cent to the new farm com­plex to improve the over­all effi­ciency and run­ning of the farm and to improve occu­pant amen­ity, by being set back fur­ther from the A9 dualling. The former farm and redund­ant cot­tage site will be redeveloped as part of a future plan­ning application.

2. The plan­ning per­mis­sion to con­vert the Bal­avil Mains Stead­ing to a com­mer­cial com­plex would see the loss of anoth­er unit of staff accom­mod­a­tion on site and the Estate would like to cre­ate its replace­ment in a loc­a­tion more suit­able to the oper­a­tions to which the staff relate. The applic­a­tion also looks to demol­ish Lyn­voan Cot­tage and again erect a new dwell­ing to make up for the loss of accom­mod­a­tion but on a site fur­ther north and fur­ther away from the A9 dualling. The sup­port­ing doc­u­ment­a­tion con­firms that the

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 exist­ing cot­tage is unin­hab­it­able, and it is uneco­nom­ic to bring up to a stand­ard to com­ply with build­ing stand­ards and cli­mate change requirements.

1. Policy 1.5 Afford­able Hous­ing requires pro­pos­als for few­er than four mar­ket dwell­ings to con­trib­ute towards afford­able hous­ing by way of a mon­et­ary pay­ment which will be used towards meet­ing hous­ing need in the loc­al com­munity. The applic­ant has con­firmed they will pay the afford­able hous­ing con­tri­bu­tion. On this basis the pro­posed erec­tion of new dwell­ings for staff accom­mod­a­tion is accept­able, in accord­ance with Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment, sub­ject to com­pli­ance with oth­er rel­ev­ant Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan policies.

Land­scape Impacts, Lay­out and Design

1. Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 pre­sumes against devel­op­ment which does not con­serve and enhance the land­scape char­ac­ter and spe­cial qual­it­ies of the Nation­al Park and in par­tic­u­lar the set­ting of the pro­posed devel­op­ment. Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment and Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seek to rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of the exist­ing set­tle­ment and encour­age new devel­op­ment to be sym­path­et­ic to the tra­di­tion­al pat­tern and char­ac­ter of the area, whilst encour­aging innov­at­ive design and finishes.

2. The pro­pos­al is for three new houses loc­ated in two groups, on elev­ated hill slopes above Lyn­voan, with a link­ing access track and the demoli­tion of the exist­ing Lyn­voan Cot­tage. The exist­ing land­scape char­ac­ter of the wider area includes extens­ive wood­land upon the strath slopes, with improved fields and inter­spersed farm hold­ings and some lar­ger lodges. The devel­op­ment of the dwell­ings would res­ult in a slight increase in dens­ity of dis­persed houses upon the strath side, but the devel­op­ment is con­sidered to fit with the broad land­scape pat­tern, account­ing for the pro­posed mit­ig­a­tion of sens­it­ive land­scap­ing and addi­tion­al wood­land plant­ing. The pro­posed dwell­ings would there­fore be sym­path­et­ic to the tra­di­tion­al pat­tern of the area in accord­ance with Policy 5: Land­scape and Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorm Nation­al Park 2021.

3. The design of the dwell­ings has a con­tem­por­ary feel using mod­ern fin­ishes includ­ing tim­ber clad­ding, zinc, and large glazed detail­ing. The design and fin­ishes relate to the recent changes to the oth­er dwell­ings on the Estate which have bene­fit­ted from con­tem­por­ary refurbishments.

4. The Land­scape Officer con­siders the con­crete sur­face of the pro­posed access roads to houses 1 – 3 would be out of char­ac­ter where dis­tant from the farm, but their effects could be mit­ig­ated with care­ful design and wood­land plant­ing. Con­versely the pro­posed con­crete road high­er up the hill than the houses, link­ing across the hill­side far away from the farm below, would appear more incon­gru­ous and it is advised that the pro­posed sur­fa­cing for this road is amended to be more low-key and befit­ting of its rur­al, hill­side loc­a­tion with­in the Nation­al Park. The agent has con­firmed that the track is to be used for agri­cul­tur­al pur­poses in addi­tion to the res­id­en­tial vehicles and that the use of con­crete is to ensure a robust sur­face is provided with a long-life ser­vice cap­able of with­stand­ing the weath­er con­di­tions whilst requir­ing min­im­al main­ten­ance. The vertical

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 align­ment of the access track has been designed to fol­low exist­ing con­tours min­im­ising earth­works as far as pos­sible whilst provid­ing appro­pri­ate road gradi­ents. A plan­ning con­di­tion is recom­men­ded to agree the final sur­face fin­ish of the access track.

1. The pro­pos­al does include the remov­al of trees to accom­mod­ate the devel­op­ment how­ever, com­pens­at­ory plant­ing above the num­bers to be removed is pro­posed. The pro­posed wood­land plant­ing and tree spe­cies mix has been sim­pli­fied to bet­ter reflect the loc­al land­scape char­ac­ter. The extent of the pro­posed wood­land east of house site I has been amended to be fur­ther south to avoid con­trast­ing to the char­ac­ter­ist­ic field pat­tern. Addi­tion­al wood­land plant­ing is also shown in-between the pro­posed the pro­posed road and exist­ing wood­land to the south, and this is welcomed.

2. Sub­ject to plan­ning con­di­tions being included for a land­scape main­ten­ance scheme and exter­i­or light­ing details, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Envir­on­ment­al Impacts

1. Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to ensure that there is no adverse impact upon des­ig­nated areas, pro­tec­ted spe­cies, or biod­iversity whilst Policy 10: Resources sets out the need to fully con­sider impacts on flood­ing and water resources.

2. A Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al has been under­taken which con­cludes that sub­ject to the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion for the agree­ment of a con­struc­tion meth­od state­ment, includ­ing pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures, the con­ser­va­tion object­ives of the lis­ted European Sites (Appendix 2) will be met and there will not be an adverse effect on site integ­rity. NatureScot agree with the con­clu­sions of the HRA.

3. Regard­ing pro­tec­ted spe­cies and hab­it­ats, the CNPA Eco­logy Officer has no objec­tion to the scheme, con­firm­ing that the pro­pos­al will not have an adverse impact on eco­lo­gic­al interests of the site. The mit­ig­a­tion included with­in the bat spe­cies pro­tec­tion plan is con­sidered suf­fi­cient and at an appro­pri­ate level for the status of roost and impact. Eco­lo­gic­al enhance­ments include the plant­ing of nat­ive tree spe­cies. Sub­ject to the inclu­sion of the recom­men­ded plan­ning con­di­tions, for an updated con­struc­tion meth­od state­ment, and a rep­tile sur­vey, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

4. Regard­ing oth­er envir­on­ment­al mat­ters, it is con­firmed that the site is not at risk of flood­ing from any source, nor will it impact on any neigh­bour­ing res­id­en­tial prop­er­ties in terms of flood­ing. The High­land Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land Team con­firms there are no known con­tam­in­ated land issues, and they have no objec­tion. The pro­pos­al is there­fore con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 Servicing

1. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 sets out the need for new devel­op­ment to be sat­is­fact­or­ily ser­viced and without harm to resources or the environment.

2. Regard­ing water con­nec­tions, the pro­pos­al would be con­nec­ted to the mains water in the area, of which Scot­tish Water have no objec­tions but require the applic­ant to sub­mit a form­al applic­a­tion to them fol­low­ing the grant­ing of any per­mis­sion to review capacity.

3. For foul drain­age arrange­ments, House I will con­nect to the fil­ter sys­tem and sep­tic tank approved for the farm com­plex which has suf­fi­cient capa­city to accom­mod­ate both devel­op­ments and a sep­ar­ate fil­ter sys­tem and sep­tic tank would serve Houses 2 and 3. Sur­face water would be dealt with via fil­ter drains con­nect­ing to a SuDS deten­tion basin and park­ing areas for the dwell­ings are to be cre­ated of per­meable sur­fa­cing. The High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team have no objec­tions to the scheme and an inform­at­ive is recom­men­ded to high­light that the drain­age arrange­ment would be sub­ject to SEPA licens­ing. On this basis the pro­posed sur­face water and foul water drain­age meas­ures are accept­able in accord­ance with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing and Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Access

1. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 states that all new devel­op­ment must include an appro­pri­ate means of access, egress and space for off street parking.

2. The devel­op­ment will be sat­is­fact­or­ily accessed by a private access track which will be privately owned and main­tained, situ­ated out­with the land required for the A9 Dualling pro­ject. The dwell­ings are served by adequate park­ing areas. Trans­port Scot­land and the High­land Coun­cil Trans­port Plan­ning Team have no objec­tions to the scheme. The pro­pos­al com­plies with vehicu­lar access require­ments of Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

3. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing also sets out that new devel­op­ment should be designed to main­tain and max­im­ise all oppor­tun­it­ies for respons­ible out­door access includ­ing links into the exist­ing path net­work. It is noted that there is a core path with­in the vicin­ity of the devel­op­ment which fol­lows part of the vehicle track near Lyn­voan Cot­tage (LBS146). The agent has con­firmed that the devel­op­ment will have no impact on the core path and the exist­ing access arrange­ments will remained unaffected.

Impact on Neigh­bour­ing Amenity

1. In terms of res­id­en­tial amen­ity Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to ensure that new devel­op­ment pro­tects amen­ity cur­rently enjoyed by neigh­bour­ing occu­pants to sites and affords suf­fi­cient private amen­ity ground and off-street park­ing with the devel­op­ment. There are

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 no prop­er­ties with­in the imme­di­ate area of the devel­op­ment which would be affected by the pro­pos­al in terms of amen­ity impacts. With regards to the amen­ity for the occu­pants of the pro­posed dwell­ings, it is con­sidered this will be improved with staff dwell­ings being loc­ated fur­ther away from the A9 than the exist­ing hous­ing stock on the Estate.

Impact on the His­tor­ic Environment

1. Policy 9: Cul­tur­al Her­it­age requires devel­op­ment that would affect the set­ting of a lis­ted build­ing to pre­serve the spe­cial qual­it­ies of the build­ing or struc­ture, and enhance the char­ac­ter, and the con­tri­bu­tion it makes to the cul­tur­al her­it­age of the Nation­al Park. The pro­posed dwell­ings are not with­in the imme­di­ate set­ting of the lis­ted build­ings on Bal­avil Estate and there­fore the devel­op­ment would not have a neg­at­ive impact on the exist­ing her­it­age assets, con­sid­er­ing the dis­tance between the site and the assets and the extens­ive agri­cul­tur­al land and wood­land inter­spersed between the sites.

2. Regard­ing archae­olo­gic­al interests, it is under­stood that Lyn­voan Cot­tage and asso­ci­ated build­ings are of his­tor­ic import­ance and the High­land Coun­cil Archae­olo­gist recom­mends the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion for the pho­to­graph­ic record­ing of the build­ing pri­or to its demoli­tion to provide a record of their cur­rent con­di­tion and set­ting. Sub­ject to this con­di­tion the pro­pos­al is not con­sidered to neg­at­ively impact on the his­tor­ic envir­on­ment in accord­ance with Policy 9: Cul­tur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Developer Con­tri­bu­tions

1. Policy 11: Developer Oblig­a­tions of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 states that where devel­op­ment cre­ates a need to increase or improve pub­lic ser­vices, facil­it­ies, or infra­struc­ture, or mit­ig­ate adverse effects, the developer will be required to make a fair and reas­on­able con­tri­bu­tion in cash or in kind towards addi­tion­al costs or require­ments. The Policy also requires con­tri­bu­tions to afford­able hous­ing where applic­able and where no afford­able hous­ing is provided on site.

2. The applic­ant has con­firmed their accept­ance to pay a developer con­tri­bu­tion towards afford­able hous­ing in accord­ance with policy pro­vi­sion. Sub­ject to its pay­ment, the devel­op­ment com­plies with Policy 11: Developer Con­tri­bu­tions of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Oth­er Issues Raised in Con­sulta­tions and Representations

1. All mat­ters raised by con­sul­tees have been addressed above. No pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tions have been received.

CON­CLU­SION

1. The applic­a­tion is for new hous­ing with­in the coun­tryside to meet a staff accom­mod­a­tion need for Bal­avil Estate. The site is con­sidered cap­able of being developed and ser­viced without any sig­ni­fic­ant land­scape or envir­on­ment­al impacts. Any remain­ing points of detail that have not been suf­fi­ciently addressed will be resolved

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 27/05/22 through the impos­i­tion of suit­able con­di­tions. Sub­ject to these recom­men­ded con­di­tions and the pay­ment of the afford­able hous­ing developer con­tri­bu­tion, the pro­posed devel­op­ment is con­sidered to com­ply with the policies con­tained with­in the adop­ted Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan and approv­al is there­fore recommended.

RECOM­MEND­A­TION That Mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee sup­port a recom­mend­a­tion to APPROVE the Change of use of land to form 3 staff (replace­ment) farm­houses includ­ing asso­ci­ated access, drain­age, land­scape, ground works, ser­vices and the demoli­tion of Lyn­voan Cot­tage and out­build­ings at Land 795M West Of Garden Cot­tage Kin­gussie sub­ject to:

a) the pay­ment of the developer con­tri­bu­tion for afford­able hous­ing; and b) the fol­low­ing con­di­tions: Those con­di­tions lis­ted below in bold text are sus­pens­ive con­di­tions, which require to be dis­charged pri­or to imple­ment­a­tion of the development.

Con­di­tions

1. No devel­op­ment shall com­mence on site until an updated Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment (CMS) and pro­gramme of works has been sub­mit­ted to and approved in writ­ing by the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity act­ing as Plan­ning Author­ity. The CMS shall include, but not be lim­ited to: a) The approach to site pre­par­a­tion, soils man­age­ment, res­tor­a­tion and rein­state­ment. b) Con­struc­tion stage SuDS. c) Ref­er­ence to the bat spe­cies pro­tec­tion plan, and any oth­er eco­lo­gic­al sur­vey and how these will be adhered to dur­ing demolition/​con­struc­tion. d) Con­struc­tion pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures. e) Pro­gramme of works includ­ing demoli­tion details.

The con­struc­tion of the devel­op­ment shall there­after be imple­men­ted in accord­ance with the approved details. Reas­on: A Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment must be agreed pri­or to the com­mence­ment of any works to ensure that work on site pro­ceeds without dam­age to the envir­on­ment, to ensure pol­lu­tion does not reach the Insh Marshes SAC, River Spey SAC and River Spey – Insh Marshes SPA, and so avoid an adverse