Item6AACaravanParkDinnetDET

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DEVEL­OP­MENT PROPOSED:

Change of Use of Agri­cul­tur­al Land to Form Cara­van Park Erec­tion of Stor­age Shed and Install­a­tion of Deck­ing and Hot Tubs and Form­a­tion of Access at Land Adja­cent To Old Hall Din­net Bridge Din­net Aboyne Aberdeenshire

REF­ER­ENCE: 2021/0035/DET

APPLIC­ANT: Mr A Buchanan

DATE CALLED-IN: 8 Feb­ru­ary 2021

RECOM­MEND­A­TION: Approve sub­ject to conditions

CASE OFFICER: Stephanie Wade, Plan­ning Officer

CNPA Plan­ning Committee

Applic­a­tion Site 0 35 70 N 140

Meters

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

SITE DESCRIP­TION, PRO­POS­AL AND HISTORY

Site Descrip­tion

1. The applic­a­tion site com­prises an agri­cul­tur­al field loc­ated approx­im­ately 1.1km south- east of Din­net, in-between the B976 road and River Dee to the north and exist­ing wood­land to the south. The field is cur­rently laid to grass with a line of mature trees along the north edge (along­side the B976) and also across part of the centre of the field, run­ning south west north east. The north of the site is bound by a dry­stone wall and the applicant’s res­id­en­tial dwell­ing is loc­ated adja­cent to the east of the site. Firmounth Road also runs along the east­ern site boundary.

2. The site is not covered by any spe­cif­ic envir­on­ment­al des­ig­na­tions, although it is with­in the vicin­ity of the River Dee SAC and adja­cent to the Din­net Oak­wood SAC, Nation­al Nature Reserve and Din­net Oak­wood SSSI. The core path UDE4 is also with­in the vicin­ity of the site.

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=QNULUZSI0CH00

Title Draw­ing Date on Date Received Num­ber Plan*

Plans Plan- Loc­a­tion Plan ⁰⁰⁸⁄₁₁₀ 27/01/2021 08/02/2021 Plan- Pro­posed Site Plan ⁰⁰⁸⁄₁₀₁ 10/05/2021 10/05/2021 Plan- Floor Plan- Pro­posed stor­age ⁰⁰⁸⁄₁₁₀ 27/01/2021 08/02/2021 shed plan and elev­a­tions Plan- Swept Path Ana­lys­is 008 – 103 21/12/2020 08/02/2021 Plan- Old Hall Water Source Waste 06/05/2021 Plan Map Plan- Swept path ana­lys­is using a 2434-001 07/05/2021 10/05/2021 lux­ury 4×4 and twin axle cara­van Rev.A Plan- Pro­posed vis­ib­il­ity splays and 008 – 102 10/05/2021 10/05/2021 entrance area Plan- Tree pro­tec­tion Plan OHDB- 10/05/2021 10/05/2021 2105-TP Plan- Per­col­a­tion Test Site Plan 06/05/2021

Sup­port­ing Doc­u­ment­a­tion Oth­er- Road Safety Assess­ment D00074- 08/04/2021 10/05/2021 RSI

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

Oth­er- Tree and Envir­on­ment­al OHDB- 10/05/2021 12/05/2021 Walkover Sur­vey Report 2105-TR Oth­er- Drain­age Pro­pos­als 27/11/2021 08/02/2021 Oth­er- Design and Sus­tain­ab­il­ity 08/02/2021 State­ment Oth­er- Site Licence Let­ter 921391 05/04/2021 06/05/2021 Oth­er- Let­ter regard­ing field water 09/04/2021 10/05/2021 drain­age Oth­er- Applic­ant response to 30/04/2021 06/05/2021 CNPA Out­door Access Officer Oth­er- Old Hall Water Sup­ply 08/04/2021 06/05/2021 Report Oth­er- Applic­ant response to Mid 30/04/2021 06/05/2021 Deeside Com­munity Coun­cil Oth­er- Applic­ant response to Flood 30/04/2021 06/05/2021 Pro­tec­tion Officer Oth­er- Field Water Drain­age 2345/BPW 09/04/2021 06/05/2021 Oth­er- Agent response to 30/04/2021 06/05/2021 Envir­on­ment­al Health Oth­er- Envir­on­ment­al Health 04/02/2021 06/05/2021 Ques­tion­naire Oth­er- Invest­ig­a­tion and Design of 06/04/2021 06/05/2021 Infilt­ra­tion Sys­tem Oth­er- Agent response to 30/04/2021 06/05/2021 con­tam­in­ated land officer Oth­er- Cara­van Sup­ply Water 30/04/2021 06/05/2021 Treat­ment Oth­er- Cara­van Club Site Rules 06/05/2021 Oth­er- Pot­able Private Water 10215291 07/04/2021 06/05/2021 Sample Oth­er- Pot­able Water Sample 10215290 07/04/2021 06/05/2021 Oth­er- Response to eco­logy officer 30/04/2021 10/05/2021 Oth­er- Invest­ig­a­tion and design of 06/04/2021 10/05/2021 infilt­ra­tion sys­tem for dis­pos­al of wastewa­ter and sys­tem for dis­pos­al of sur­face water Oth­er- Water sup­ply- risk 10611 07/04/2021 10/05/2021 assess­ment report Oth­er- Response to Land­scape 30/04//2021 10/05/2021 Officer Oth­er- Con­struc­tion Meth­od 10/05/2021 Statement

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

Oth­er- Responses to pub­lic 10/05/2021 con­sulta­tion Oth­er- Response to Waste 05/04/2021 10/05/2021 Man­age­ment Officer Oth­er- Sep­tic Tank details 24/05/2021 24/05/2021 *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 change of use of agri­cul­tur­al land to provide eight cara­van pitches for use as a tour­ing caravan/​motorhome site. The pitches are pro­posed to be cre­ated of sub-base and gran­ite chip top to provide the hard­stand­ings. Two hot tubs are pro­posed to be sited on tim­ber deck­ing serving two pitches. The pitches are pro­posed to be well spaced around the site and no form­al vehicu­lar or ped­es­tri­an tracks are pro­posed to be con­struc­ted with­in the site apart from the access junc­tion from the road into the site. Any vehicu­lar access areas around trees are to be con­struc­ted of a cel­lu­ar con­fine­ment sys­tem over the root pro­tec­tion areas. The remain­ing vehicle routes to the pitches will be main­tained as mown grass. The pro­posed site access from the B976 is pro­posed as a pri­or­ity junc­tion with a sep­ar­ate entrance and exit around the exist­ing trees along the bound­ary. A tim­ber stor­age shed is pro­posed to be erec­ted on site, with a shal­low, dual pitched roof. This is to be loc­ated next to the cara­van waste dis­pos­al area which is to be formed of a tim­ber fenced compound.

2. Waste water is to be dis­posed of by a sep­tic tank and soakaway, with the soakaway also tak­ing sur­face water (from the stor­age shed roof) and hot tub water. Hot tub water will be pumped into a port­able extern­al stor­age tank between guests, which is recycled through a 3 stage fil­ter and pumped back for reuse. After one month this water is dis­posed of to the soakaway via the 3 stage fil­ters first. The sep­tic tank is pro­posed to be emp­tied annu­ally and is designed for cara­van toi­let waste which uses form­al­de­hyde free chem­ic­als only, of which cus­tom­ers of the site are to be made aware of at booking.

3. Regard­ing land­scap­ing works, the applic­ants pro­pose the plant­ing of 50 nat­ive trees along the north peri­met­er between Firn­mounth Road and the start of the row of tall Douglas fir to provide screen­ing. The soakaways are pro­posed to be planted with wild flower seed mixes.

4. The applic­ants look to oper­ate the site under the Cara­van and Motorhome Club Cer­ti­fied Site Scheme which per­mits a max­im­um of five caravans/​motorhomes on the site at any one time. They pro­pose to have six stand­ard pitches with one always out of use and in rota­tion for main­ten­ance and repair if required. They will also have two lux­ury pitches with hot tubs which are included with­in the five pitch oper­a­tion lim­it. Fol­low­ing site estab­lish­ment over a couple of years, the applic­ants would look either con­tin­ue oper­a­tion at five pitches or apply for a Cara­van Site Licence from Aber­deen­shire Envir­on­ment­al Health to run eight pitches dur­ing peak periods.

5. Dur­ing the pro­gres­sion of the applic­a­tion, the applic­ant has provided addi­tion­al inform­a­tion in response to quer­ies raised dur­ing the con­sulta­tion pro­cess. The fol­low­ing sum­mary con­tains ori­gin­al doc­u­ment­a­tion sub­mit­ted and additional

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inform­a­tion submitted:

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

1. Site Licens­ing- A let­ter from Aber­deen­shire Envir­on­ment­al Health con­firms that should the applic­a­tion site gain cer­ti­fic­a­tion by the Cara­van and Motorhome Club, a Cara­van Site Licence would not be required. Sec­tion 2 of the 1960 Act provides for the exemp­tion from licens­ing require­ments under cir­cum­stances spe­cified in Sched­ule I of the same Act. The Cara­van and Motorhome Club may issue a cer­ti­fic­ate hav­ing effect for no more than one year and per­mit­ting the use of the land as a cara­van site for no more than 5 cara­vans at any one time. A copy of the eight basic Club Rules has been provided in sup­port of the application.

2. Water sup­ply doc­u­ment­a­tion- The doc­u­ment­a­tion con­firms that there is no water mains with­in a reas­on­able dis­tance of the devel­op­ment and a private water sup­ply will serve the devel­op­ment. The loc­a­tion of the water sources is on rough dis­used ground, grid ref­er­ence NO 465975. The loc­a­tion of the water stor­age tank is on the edge of a grazed field, grid ref­er­ence NO 468976. There are 4 No. cur­rent water sources which com­prise of 600mm well pipe all approx­im­ately 2m in depth and have fiber­glass access lids, all of which are fenced off from any live­stock. The sup­ply is then fed by 32mm mdpe pipe­work to a con­crete water stor­age tank, approx­im­ately 8000 litres in size, with fiber­glass access lid. The pipe­work from the stor­age tank to Old Hall is 63mm mdpe pipe and pres­sure was found to be 4.2 bar. There are no sep­tic tanks loc­ated with­in 50 metres of the water sup­ply. This sup­ply cur­rently serves Old Hall and Fasnadar­roch. Regard­ing quant­ity, dis­charge to waste was found to be 23 litres/​minute = 1380 litres /​hour = 33,120 litres/​day. The doc­u­ment con­cludes that this quant­ity is more than adequate for any pro­posed devel­op­ment. To secure quant­ity should a short­age of water occur, the under­ground stor­age reser­voir can be topped up by means of water bow­ser. The report recom­mends water treat­ment to be con­firmed by envir­on­ment­al health stand­ards. The pro­posed water treat­ment to be fit­ted would com­prise a 20” big blue particle fil­ter at 5 micron, which removes any debris etc and also a 40-megaju­le UV ster­il­iser, which is rated at 49 litres/​minute. Ser­vi­cing of the water treat­ment would be required annu­ally, togeth­er with chlor­in­a­tion of the pipe­work. The water sup­ply was inspec­ted and tested by Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil in April 2021 and a copy of the inspec­tion report has been provided with this application.

3. Road Safety Assess­ment- The report states that the B976 is a rur­al single car­riage­way road with no foot­way and is sub­ject to a 60mph speed lim­it. The main traffic use on the road is light, how­ever it is a main route for tim­ber lor­ries con­nect­ing the A93 (via Din­net Bridge) to their des­tin­a­tion site to the east. No col­li­sions have occurred in the last 5 years in the vicin­ity of the site with the most recent col­li­sion recor­ded in 2002. The report states road safety prob­lems and makes the fol­low­ing recommendations:

a) Absence of want­ing signs for new junc­tion could res­ult in an increased risk of side impact and rear shunt col­li­sions: Pro­posed access junc­tion: warn­ing signs are to be placed in advance of the junc­tion on both approaches on the B976 in con­sulta­tion with Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil. Mark­er posts should also be provided either side of the access to help high­light the pres­ence of the access at night; b) Absence of sig­nage and road mark­ings: give way signs and road mark­ings are to be provided along with no-entry signs across the egress. Hatched mark­ings in the

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

area between the access could also assist drivers in tak­ing the cor­rect path into and out of the site. c) Poten­tially gated access: although a gated access is not cur­rently being pro­moted, any gate pro­vi­sion should be set back from the car­riage­way to allow a car and cara­van to wait fully off the car­riage­way. d) Absence of a foot­path and cross­ing facil­it­ies between the site and Din­net Bridge: it is recom­men­ded that path improve­ments are provided with a link to the junc­tion at Din­net Bridge.

1. The report con­cludes that sub­ject to improve­ments being imple­men­ted, the pro­posed devel­op­ment would not cre­ate an adverse impact on the safety of the road network.

2. Eco­lo­gic­al Sur­veys and Tree Pro­tec­tion- The sub­mit­ted tree sur­vey and pro­tec­tion plan con­cludes that no trees are to be felled for the pro­pos­als, with 180 trees sur­veyed. The cara­van stances and water treat­ment area are all installed out­with the root pro­tec­tion area and can­opy of the trees. Cel­lu­lar con­fine­ment sys­tem will be used to access the cara­van site and also to pass through the diag­on­al strip of trees, pre­vent­ing dam­age to trees and their roots. Regard­ing the eco­lo­gic­al sur­vey work under­taken, the report con­cludes that no pro­tec­ted spe­cies are affected by the pro­pos­als and an area of ruderal/​wetland veget­a­tion lies out­with the mown grass area and will be retained and man­aged to remove brack­en. Whilst the site is imme­di­ately adja­cent to the Din­net Oak Wood SSSI, access is pre­ven­ted by a deer fence run­ning the length of the south­ern bound­ary. No pro­tec­ted spe­cies liv­ing with­in the SSSI will be affected by the pro­pos­als. The river Dee SAC and its derog­ated spe­cies will be unaf­fected by the proposals.

3. Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment- a con­struc­tion meth­od state­ment has been sub­mit­ted out­lining the pro­cesses and pro­ced­ures asso­ci­ated with the con­struc­tion phase of the development.

4. Drain­age Sys­tem Inform­a­tion- includes tri­al pit loc­a­tions and per­col­a­tion test­ing sur­vey work togeth­er with inform­a­tion of the pro­posed waste water and sur­face water drain­age sys­tems to be installed and treat­ment and soakaway details.

5. Applic­ant responses, Design and Sus­tain­ab­il­ity doc­u­ment and Busi­ness Plan- The applic­ant has provided a num­ber of indi­vidu­al responses to the stat­utory and pub­lic con­sulta­tion quer­ies raise dur­ing the ori­gin­al con­sulta­tion peri­od. The design doc­u­ment out­lines the eth­os behind the final design solu­tion for the devel­op­ment. The applic­ants have sub­mit­ted a busi­ness case for the pro­pos­al not­ing their pre­vi­ous exper­i­ence of work­ing with­in the tour­ist accom­mod­a­tion sec­tor with example occu­pancy rat­ings from their oth­er busi­ness provided. The doc­u­ment states that the Cara­van Club are pos­it­ive about the pro­pos­al due to the lack of smal­ler cer­ti­fied sites in the area and that stayc­a­tion demand will be fuelled fur­ther by the implic­a­tions and restric­tions of Brexit and Cov­id-19. Regard­ing wider eco­nom­ic bene­fits, the doc­u­ment states that the con­struc­tion of the devel­op­ment will provide employ­ment oppor­tun­it­ies and the cus­tom­ers of the site will util­ise the loc­al tour­ist attrac­tions and businesses.

6. Cop­ies of the plans which accom­pany the applic­a­tion can be found at Appendix I.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

His­tory

1. There is no recent his­tory relat­ing to the site.

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 as lis­ted with­in the doc­u­ment- attached at Appendix 2.

2. Regard­ing the Din­net Oak­wood SAC, the Apprais­al con­cludes there would be no likely sig­ni­fic­ant effect due to the exist­ing 7 foot deer fence sur­round­ing the SAC that bounds the pro­pos­al site pre­vent­ing access oth­er than through form­al access points out­with the pro­pos­al site, on form­al exist­ing paths there­fore there would be no effect on habitat.

3. Regard­ing the River Dee SAC, there is con­sidered to be a likely sig­ni­fic­ant effect to Atlantic sal­mon and fresh water pearl mus­sel due to the increase in nutri­ents from the pro­posed waste water sep­tic tank and soakaway arrange­ments affect­ing the water qual­ity in the SAC approx­im­ately 50metres away. Regard­ing otter, a likely sig­ni­fic­ant effect is also con­sidered to occur due to the dis­turb­ance if occu­pants of the pro­pos­al go down to the river caus­ing an increase in human activ­ity with­in that area.

4. Although there will be a poten­tial increase in human activ­ity at the river oppos­ite the access to the pro­pos­al devel­op­ment, this would be for a max­im­um of 16 people (assum­ing 2 people per cara­van). There is an exist­ing fish­ing lodge at this loc­a­tion and there­fore exist­ing level of dis­turb­ance. People from the pro­posed devel­op­ment are more likely to go down there dur­ing the day and early even­ing which is when fish­er­men would be present and the time of day when river is in less use by otter. There­fore due to low levels of addi­tion­al activ­ity and exist­ing levels of dis­turb­ance. Dis­tri­bu­tion of otter will not be affected.

5. The applic­ant has pro­posed that foul waste from the devel­op­ment be treated and dis­posed of using a sep­tic tank and soakaway. The pro­posed sep­tic tank and soakaway arrange­ment appears to meet build­ing reg­u­la­tions and SEPA require­ments and is to be sided approx­im­ately 50 m from the River Dee SAC and there do not appear to be any oth­er water­courses con­nect­ing the devel­op­ment site to the SAC; and no dis­charge to any water­course is pro­posed. The HRA con­cludes that as it is cur­rently pro­posed by the applic­ant, the pro­pos­al will not adversely affect the integ­rity of the River Dee SAC or under­mine the site’s con­ser­va­tion object­ives, includ­ing the object­ive to restore the hab­it­ats sup­port­ing fresh­wa­ter pearl mussels.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

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 POLICY 2 SUP­PORT­ING ECO­NOM­IC GROWTH X POLICY 3 DESIGN AND 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) Policy 2 Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance X 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 Open Space, 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

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

CON­SULTA­TIONS

Sum­mary of the main issues raised by consultees

1. Scot­tish Water has no objec­tion. Regard­ing waste water, Scot­tish Water note that there is no pub­lic waste water infra­struc­ture with­in the vicin­ity and the applic­ant is advised to explore private treat­ment options.

2. NatureScot agrees with the con­clu­sions of the CNPA’s HRA that the pro­pos­al is unlikely to have a sig­ni­fic­ant effect on Din­net Oak­wood SAC and that it is likely to have a sig­ni­fic­ant effect on the River Dee SAC. In their view, the devel­op­ment, as it is cur­rently pro­posed by the applic­ant, will not adversely affect the integ­rity of the River Dee SAC or under­mine the site’s con­ser­va­tion object­ives, includ­ing the object­ive to restore the hab­it­ats sup­port­ing fresh­wa­ter pearl mus­sels. The applic­ant has pro­posed that foul waste from the devel­op­ment be treated and dis­posed of using a sep­tic tank and soakaway. NatureScot under­stand from the HRA that the pro­posed sep­tic tank and soakaway arrange­ment appears to meet build­ing reg­u­la­tions and SEPA require­ments. In addi­tion, the soakaway would be loc­ated approx­im­ately 50 m from the River Dee SAC and there do not appear to be any oth­er water­courses con­nect­ing the devel­op­ment site to the SAC; no dis­charge to any water­course is pro­posed. In their view, there­fore, while a sec­ond­ary treat­ment sys­tem will fur­ther reduce impacts on the envir­on­ment in gen­er­al, such a sys­tem is not likely to be neces­sary to avoid an adverse effect on the integ­rity of the River Dee SAC. Neither would the incor­por­a­tion a sec­ond­ary treat­ment sys­tem be neces­sary to allow the future res­tor­a­tion of the SAC.

3. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Infra­struc­ture Ser­vices Roads Devel­op­ment con­firms that fol­low­ing the sub­mis­sion of the addi­tion­al inform­a­tion, the Ser­vice does not object to the applic­a­tion sub­ject to the inclu­sion of plan­ning con­di­tions relat­ing to: access gradi­ent, access pav­ing, pro­vi­sion of 3 off-street park­ing spaces, pro­vi­sion of vis­ib­il­ity splays and turn­ing area. The Ser­vice notes that the applic­ant has provided updated inform­a­tion show­ing the access and exit man­oeuvres can be under­taken in a safe man­ner and that the draw­ings show the neces­sary park­ing spaces for the devel­op­ment scale.

4. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Envir­on­ment­al Health Officer ori­gin­ally reques­ted fur­ther inform­a­tion to be sub­mit­ted regard­ing the private water sup­ply. Fol­low­ing the sub­mis­sion of this doc­u­ment­a­tion, the Officer con­firms they have no objec­tions to the scheme and request the inclu­sion of a post determ­in­a­tion con­di­tion to ensure the private water sys­tem is installed in accord­ance with the approved details pri­or to the first use of the development.

5. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Flood Risk and Coast Pro­tec­tion Team ori­gin­ally reques­ted fur­ther inform­a­tion on the fol­low­ing points:

a) The Team reques­ted cla­ri­fic­a­tion of where the per­col­a­tion tests were car­ried out and the loc­a­tions of the pro­posed soakaways; b) The Team reques­ted details of the pro­posed sur­fa­cing of the traf­ficked areas of the pro­posed park. Defined tracks con­struc­ted of unbound mater­i­als may become effect­ively sealed over time and they require these to be treated as impermeable

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

for drain­age design pur­poses, how­ever the Team would accept a large area with no delin­eated tracks as free drain­ing depend­ent on the mater­i­als proposed.

1. The Team have reviewed the addi­tion­al inform­a­tion and con­firms it addresses their pre­vi­ous points raised. The Team have no objec­tion to the proposal.

2. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Waste Man­age­ment Team has no objec­tion to the pro­pos­al sub­ject to the lay­out being designed to the sat­is­fac­tion of the Roads Team.

3. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land Officer has no com­ment on the applic­a­tion not­ing that there is no indic­a­tion of any past use of the site which may have caused contamination.

4. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Archae­olo­gist has no objec­tions to the scheme sub­ject to the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion for a pro­gramme of archae­olo­gic­al works due to the pro­posed depths of excav­a­tion at vari­ous loc­a­tions across the site between 300 – 1000mm (or great­er for e.g. Sep­tic tank), and due to the poten­tial for pre­vi­ously unre­cor­ded archae­ology to sur­vive with­in the pro­posed devel­op­ment area.

5. CNPA Access Officer has no objec­tions to the scheme fol­low­ing the applicant’s sub­mis­sion of fur­ther inform­a­tion relat­ing to the site’s links to the access routes with­in the wider area.

6. CNPA Eco­logy Officer con­firms that fol­low­ing the addi­tion­al inform­a­tion sub­mis­sion, the Officer has no objec­tions to the scheme. A Walkover sur­vey was under­taken dur­ing May 2021 and looked for evid­ence of pro­tec­ted spe­cies in and around the site that may be impacted from the change of use. No signs of otter were found either on site or between the site and the river. Evid­ence of some badger for­aging was found but no setts were loc­ated with­in 30m of the site. As no trees are to be removed there will be no impact on bats or squir­rel (many of the large mature trees have low suit­ab­il­ity for squir­rel) and the Officer con­cludes that the pro­pos­al will have no impact on badger, squir­rel, pine marten otter or bats. Regard­ing rep­tiles, the Officer con­cludes from the veget­a­tion sur­vey that any areas of longer grass that could sup­port rep­tiles will be retained on site and the cara­van loc­a­tions will be on areas of mown grass­land there­fore there will be no likely impact on reptiles.

7. No suit­able sites exist for ground nest­ing birds and no trees will removed for this pro­pos­al so no breed­ing bird sur­vey was under­taken and is not required. The pro­pos­al is not con­sidered to impact on breed­ing birds.

8. Regard­ing the River Dee SAC, it is noted that details of the recir­cu­la­tion and fil­tra­tion sys­tem and details of the sep­tic tank and soakaway sys­tem have been provided and there will be no impact on the River Dee SAC regard­ing the dis­pos­al of water from the pro­posed hot tubs and the waste water dis­pos­al. Regard­ing the Din­net Oak­wood SAC, the Officer notes that the site is largely bounded by a deer fence pre­vent­ing inform­al access to the wood­land there­fore there will be no impact on the site integrity.

।।

11

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

1. The tree pro­tec­tion plan and reten­tion sched­ule is wel­comed togeth­er with the fur­ther plant­ing of 50 trees on site. The Officer also wel­comes the sub­mis­sion of the Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment. The Officer ref­er­ences that no SUDs scheme is pro­posed as the hard stand­ing is pro­posed to be per­meable, with run-off from a small shed dir­ec­ted to a soakaway which is to be planted with wildflowers.

2. CNPA Land­scape Officer con­siders that the pro­posed devel­op­ment site is sens­it­ive to the devel­op­ment of a cara­van site, mainly due to its rur­al loc­a­tion, vis­ib­il­ity from the B976, and the poten­tial for cara­vans and asso­ci­ated infra­struc­ture to con­trast to the dis­tinct land­scape char­ac­ter and SLQs of the Nation­al Park (NP). Fol­low­ing assess­ment of addi­tion­al inform­a­tion sub­mit­ted (May 2021), the Officer con­siders that the pro­posed devel­op­ment would res­ult in some adverse land­scape and visu­al effects with­in the loc­al area. This would be mainly due to the prom­in­ence of the caravans/​motorhomes from the B976 and because these would be seen with­in a dis­tinct­ive open space encircled by trees/​wood­land and with­in a rur­al area. The applic­a­tion has, how­ever, incor­por­ated some design/​mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures to reduce these effects and it is pre­dicted that these effects would not be Sig­ni­fic­ant (in rela­tion to the baseline con­di­tions) or com­prom­ise the integ­rity of the Park SLQs. This judge­ment is sub­ject to the pro­vi­sion of some extra inform­a­tion regard­ing the pro­posed tree plant­ing, stor­age build­ing and fenced area. It is envis­aged that this inform­a­tion could be obtained through sub­stant­ive plan­ning conditions.

3. The Officer notes that con­clu­sions of the Tree Sur­vey that states no trees are to be felled for the pro­pos­al and cara­van stances and water treat­ment area are all installed out­with the root pro­tec­tion area and can­opy of the trees. Cel­lu­lar con­fine­ment sys­tem will be used to access the cara­van site and also to pass through the diag­on­al strip of trees, pre­vent­ing dam­age to trees and their roots. In addi­tion, the applic­ant has con­firmed that elec­tri­city cables and water pipes would be con­struc­ted out­with the root pro­tec­tion areas. The Officer wel­comes this. The Officer recom­mends revi­sions are sought by way of plan­ning con­di­tion in rela­tion the design of the stor­age build­ing and fenced area to bet­ter reflect the rur­al char­ac­ter of the site by tak­ing a more tra­di­tion­al, agri­cul­tur­al appearance.

4. Inform­a­tion on pro­posed access across the site, both of vehicles and ped­es­tri­ans, has now been provided by the applic­ant. Giv­en the low num­ber of vehicles anti­cip­ated with up to 8 pitches, that access across the site will be inform­al, and the applic­ant has described how poten­tial erosion will be addressed, it is pre­dicted that the pro­posed access across the site is unlikely to res­ult in sig­ni­fic­ant land­scape and visu­al effects. The Officer wel­comes the sub­mis­sion of inform­al path link details, the con­struc­tion meth­od state­ment and the inform­a­tion on pro­posed grass­land man­age­ment and dry­stone dyke maintenance.

5. The Officer also recom­mends refine­ments are sought via plan­ning con­di­tion for the pro­posed plant­ing of 50 nat­ive trees so that the type and design of the pro­posed tree plant­ing is con­sidered fur­ther in rela­tion to the exist­ing trees on site as well as the details of pos­i­tions and meth­od of tree establishment.

6. Mid Deeside Com­munity Coun­cil are broadly sup­port­ive of the pro­pos­al, they raise con­cerns. In sup­port of the applic­a­tion, the devel­op­ment will provide a ser­vice to

12

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

the area which is cur­rently lack­ing, namely pitches for tour­ing cara­vans. This devel­op­ment may there­fore attract addi­tion­al tour­ism which could be advant­age­ous for loc­al busi­nesses. It may also be advant­age­ous for loc­al busi­nesses sup­ply­ing goods and ser­vices to the devel­op­ment. How­ever con­cern is raised on the fol­low­ing points:

a) In the absence of express plan­ning con­di­tions con­trolling the use of the site, the devel­op­ment could incre­ment­ally change over time, par­tic­u­larly if own­er­ship or man­age­ment of the site were to change, for example, increas­ing the num­ber of cara­vans, the type of cara­vans or expand­ing to include camp­ing, glamp­ing, lodges, yurts etc. This could cause com­pet­i­tion with exist­ing loc­al busi­nesses provid­ing lodges etc., and exacer­bate poten­tial oth­er impacts high­lighted below; b) There is lim­ited screen­ing of the site from the South Deeside Road. The cara­vans using the site and asso­ci­ated infra­struc­ture will be vis­ible from the road, as may parked cars, awn­ings and equip­ment brought by the cara­van users. Whilst the Com­munity Coun­cil recog­nise that the Cairngorms Nation­al Park is a diverse, liv­ing, work­ing land­scape, this may have a neg­at­ive visu­al impact on the area. There is also poten­tial for users of the site to cause a nuis­ance, e.g. by play­ing loud music; c) Owing to the loc­a­tion of the site, the Com­munity Coun­cil expect that ped­es­tri­ans will walk from the site over Din­net Bridge to the Loch Kinord res­taur­ant and bar and to the Holly Tree Inn. They are con­cerned for the safety of ped­es­tri­ans doing this, par­tic­u­larly at night, giv­en the absence of a foot­path serving most of the route from the site to the centre of Din­net. In par­tic­u­lar, the Com­munity Coun­cil are aware that the road is used by lor­ries to and from the loc­al sawmill.

1. The Com­munity Coun­cil recog­nise that it may be pos­sible to lim­it some of the poten­tial impacts high­lighted through plan­ning con­di­tions. The Com­munity Council’s full com­ments can be found at Appendix 3.

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS

1. The applic­a­tion was advert­ised when first sub­mit­ted. A total of 10 let­ters of rep­res­ent­a­tion raise objec­tion to the scheme and three let­ters of rep­res­ent­a­tion note their sup­port for the scheme. The full cop­ies of the rep­res­ent­a­tions can be found at Appendix 4 and a sum­mary of these now follows:

2. The let­ters of sup­port include a response from the Cara­van and Motorhome Club. The respond­ents not­ing their sup­port include the fol­low­ing points:

a) Provides cara­van­ners with a small, less com­mer­cial­ised site in a quiet area; b) The lim­it­a­tion to cara­van club mem­bers only means that users of the site are com­mit­ted to uphold­ing the club stand­ards and respect­ing their sur­round­ings with rules adhered to such as no noise on site after 10pm at night; c) The pro­pos­al will con­trib­ute to tour­ist rev­en­ue for loc­al busi­nesses in the area; d) Due to the lim­it­a­tion of facil­it­ies of site and occu­pancy lim­it­a­tion, the traffic gen­er­a­tion would be lower than that typ­ic­ally asso­ci­ated with lar­ger com­mer­cial sites; e) By being a cer­ti­fied cara­van club site, the site would be sub­ject to rig­or­ous stand­ards set by the club which help to pro­tect neigh­bour­ing amenity;

13

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 6 25/06/2021

f) The pro­posed is to be oper­ated as a cer­ti­fied loc­a­tion which is a small, low impact 5 pitch site for cara­vans, motorhomes and trail­er tents for mem­bers of the cara­van and motorhome club to use for recre­ation­al pur­poses only; g) The cer­ti­fied loc­a­tion applic­a­tion is sub­ject to a 21 day con­sulta­tion peri­od which includes the imme­di­ate neigh­bours; h) Cara­van and Motorhome Club mem­bers spend over £310 mil­lion in loc­al eco­nom­ies every year and the Club works hard to sup­port the coun­tryside and people liv­ing and work­ing in it; i) By allow­ing landown­ers to set up small 5 van sites, it helps reduce the need for wild camp­ing and pre­serves the land for many gen­er­a­tions to come; j) Pro­pos­al meets a demand for this type of facil­ity; k) Addi­tion of hot tubs is innov­at­ive and adds a unique selling point to the busi­ness; l) Sup­port­ive of tour­ing cara­vans only and not stat­ic there­fore any per­mis­sion should be restric­ted to tour­ing caravans.

1. Regard­ing the object­ing respond­ents, the con­cerns are as follows:

a) The loc­a­tion is con­sidered unsuit­able with no dir­ect con­nec­tion to loc­al ser­vices in Din­net; b) Pro­pos­al will increase traffic with­in the area with asso­ci­ated noise and air qual­ity impacts; c) The road net­work is used by large lor­ries serving a nearby saw­mill and con­cern is raised for the safety of ped­es­tri­ans and cyc­lists from the applic­a­tion site using the road; d) Con­cern that the site does not form part of the alloc­ated sites with­in the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan and that no con­sulta­tion has been had with the loc­al com­munity on the pro­pos­al pri­or to its sub­mis­sion; e) There are altern­at­ive sites that are more suit­able for this type of devel­op­ment; f) Con­cern regard­ing the drain­age pro­pos­als and its impact on the River Dee SAC; g) Con­cern regard­ing the prox­im­ity of the pro­pos­al to Din­net Oak­wood SAC/SSSI/ Nation­al Nature Reserve and the impact of human dis­turb­ance to the hab­it­ats; h) Con­cern regard­ing noise pol­lu­tion arising from devel­op­ment; i) Con­cern regard­ing the impact of the pro­pos­al on pro­tec­ted spe­cies includ­ing otter, gos­hawk, pine mar­tin and the hab­it­ats of the oak­wood; j) Con­cern regard­ing the neg­at­ive eco­nom­ic impact arising from the devel­op­ment to exist­ing busi­nesses such as the Glen Tanar and Din­net Fish­ings; k) Con­cern that there are already 3 large cara­van sites with­in 15 minutes of the site; l) Pro­pos­al fails to con­serve and enhance the nat­ur­al and cul­tur­al her­it­age of the area; m) Con­cern regard­ing the poor vis­ib­il­ity from the site onto the B976; n) Insuf­fi­cient inform­a­tion relat­ing to land­scap­ing and light­ing; o) Cli­mate impacts arising from pro­pos­al includ­ing vehicu­lar pol­lu­tion; p) Pro­posed access will res­ult in the felling of large pine trees; q) Con­cern regard­ing the sur­vey work