Item7AABridgeOfGairnHousing20200293DET

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DEVEL­OP­MENT PRO­POSED: Erec­tion of 3 Dwell­ing­houses and Detached Gar­ages at Land To West Of Gairncliffe Bridge Of Gairn Bal­later Aber­deen­shire AB35 5UA

REF­ER­ENCE: 2020/0293/DET

APPLIC­ANT: Trust­ees Of Cpt Farquharson’s

DATE CALLED-IN: I Decem­ber 2020

RECOM­MEND­A­TION: Approve sub­ject to conditions

CASE OFFICER: Stephanie Wade Plan­ning Officer

CNPA Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Applic­a­tion Site

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

SITE DESCRIP­TION, PRO­POS­AL AND HISTORY

Site Descrip­tion

1. The applic­a­tion site com­prises open grass­land loc­ated at Bridge of Gairn, with the A93 to the south of the site and the A939 to the west. The site bound­ary runs west­wards to provide a new/​upgraded access from the A939 to serve the site. This access cur­rently serves the Bridge of Gairn Water Treat­ment Plant which is loc­ated to the north west of the main site area.

2. A num­ber of res­id­en­tial prop­er­ties bound the site includ­ing: the Old Mill to the north east; Gairn Cliffe, the Old Smiddy and the old bothy (sub­ject to a plan­ning applic­a­tion for its replace­ment with a new dwell­ing) to the east; and North Bel­gairn Stead­ing to the west of the site. Bey­ond the hous­ing to the east is the River Gairn which is a trib­u­tary to the River Dee. Bey­ond the house and water treat­ment plant to the west, lies open graz­ing land and the A939 bey­ond. Fur­ther res­id­en­tial dwell­ings can be found to the south of the site and along the A93, on either side of the bridge itself. The applic­a­tion site is fairly flat but in an elev­ated pos­i­tion over the sur­round­ing ground to the south, which includes the A93.

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=QK3IZZSI0CH00

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
Plan — Site Loc­a­tion Plan And Sections	2018/108/PΟΙ	01/03/21	01/12/20
Plan — Site And House Lay­out- Plot 1	2018 – 108/P02 (A)	01/02/21	08/03/21
Plan — Site And Gar­age Lay­out- Plot 1	2018 – 108/P03 (A)	01/02/21	08/03/21
Plan — Site And House Lay­out- Plot 2	2018 – 108/P04 (A)	01/02/21	08/03/21
Plan — Site And Gar­age Lay­out- Plot 2	2018 – 108/P05 (A)	01/02/21	08/03/21
Plan — Site And House Lay­out- Plot 3	2018 – 108/P06 (A)	01/02/21	08/03/21

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

Plan — Site And Gar­age Lay­out- Plot 3 | 2018 – 108/P07 (A) | 01/02/21 | 08/03/21 Plan — Land­scap­ing Scheme- Plot I | 2018/108/PII (A) | 01/02/21 | 08/03/21 Plan — Land­scap­ing Scheme- Plot 2 | 2018 – 108/P12 (A) | 01/02/21 | 08/03/21 Plan — Land­scap­ing Scheme- Plot 3 | 2018 – 108/P13 (A) | 01/02/21 | 08/03/21 Plan — Act­ive Travel Facil­it­a­tion Plan | | | 08/03/21 Plan — Site Sur­vey Lay­out Plan | TS 227 T‑01 | 18/04/16 | 01/12/20

SUP­PORT­ING DOCUMENTATION

Oth­er — Land­scap­ing And Eco­lo­gic­al Enhance­ment | REVI­SION A | 01/03/21 | 08/03/21 Oth­er — Agent Response To Neigh­bour Com­ments | SAM/1666/16 | 03/03/21 | 08/03/21 Oth­er — Amended Design State­ment | | 01/11/20 | 01/12/20 Oth­er — Daikin Spe­cific­a­tions Table | ERLQ-CV3 | 11/12/20 | 01/12/20 Oth­er — Tree Sur­vey And Arbor­i­cul­tur­al Impact Assess­ment | | 19/06/20 | 01/12/20 Oth­er — Drain­age Report | ¹⁶⁶⁶⁄₁₆ | 24/03/20 | 01/12/20

*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 detached dwell­ing­houses and three gar­ages togeth­er with the con­struc­tion of vehicu­lar access and ser­vi­cing arrange­ments. The pro­posed dwell­ings of Plots I and 3 com­prise a one and a half storey cot­tage ele­ment of a more tra­di­tion­al design and rendered elev­a­tions, with a tim­ber clad porch on the prin­cip­al elev­a­tion and a rear single storey ele­ment of ver­tic­al tim­ber clad­ding to provide a more mod­ern ele­ment to the over­all design.

2. The prin­cip­al elev­a­tion of the main ele­ment of the dwell­ing would be sym­met­ric­al with the cent­ral tim­ber clad porch and bal­anced dormers above the ground floor win­dows, rep­lic­at­ing a tra­di­tion­ally designed storey and a half dwell­ing typ­ic­ally found with­in the area. The roof of the main part of the dwell­ing is pro­posed to be clad in nat­ur­al slate and the single storey sec­tion to the rear is pro­posed with pro­filed met­al sheet roof­ing col­our ter­ra­cotta. Win­dows and doors are pro­posed to be tim­ber col­oured dark grey.

3. The pro­posed dwell­ing at Plot 2 looks to util­ise the same extern­al mater­i­al palette but with­in a slightly dif­fer­ent lay­out to respond bet­ter to its site. This design fea­tures a lar­ger one and half storey ele­ment to the design with smal­ler single storey, tim­ber clad exten­sions on the north and south elev­a­tions. Each prop­erty is also designed with the inclu­sion of two pitched roof dormer win­dows on the prin­cip­al elev­a­tions of each house and the install­a­tion of roof­lights with­in the roofslopes.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

1. Each dwell­ing is pro­posed to be served by a detached double gar­age with a dual pitched roof and stor­age space with­in the upper ele­ment of the gar­ages. The gar­ages are pro­posed with rendered elev­a­tions, under a nat­ur­al slate roof with tim­ber gar­age doors and win­dows painted dark grey. Free drain­ing hard­core drive­way and park­ing areas with­in each plot allow vehicles to turn around with­in each plot to egress in a for­ward gear onto the shared drive. The pro­posed shared drive runs in a north­erly dir­ec­tion along the east­ern site bound­ary and then heads west­erly along the north­ern site bound­ary to join the A939 to the west. No spe­cif­ic works are pro­posed to the exist­ing access track as it is under­stood to be in a suit­able con­di­tion to serve the devel­op­ment and adja­cent prop­er­ties. The shared drive­way has a hard­core sur­face and the bell­mouth junc­tion onto the A939 is tar­macked. A paved area out­with the vis­ib­il­ity splay is pro­posed to be con­struc­ted at the road access to provide a bin uplift area.

2. An air source heat pump is pro­posed to be installed adja­cent to each gar­age on the plots to serve each dwell­ing and foul drain­age is pro­posed by the install­a­tion of high per­form­ance pack­age sewage treat­ment plants with­in the garden areas of each plot with soakaways for the foul water and for the sur­face water. The water sup­ply shall be from the pub­lic supply.

3. Each plot will be enclosed by 1.2metre high post and wire fen­cing, and will include a simple land­scap­ing scheme of beech bound­ary hedges, lawn and the inclu­sion of nat­ive spe­cies trees such as: row­an, holly, hazel and aspen, and fruit trees, such as plum wild cherry and apple. Small areas of wild mead­ow flower­beds are also pro­posed with­in each plot. A beech hedge is also pro­posed along the east­ern site bound­ary adja­cent to the access drive for the three dwellings.

4. Fol­low­ing com­ments received by the neigh­bour­ing prop­er­ties to Plot I and Plot 3, the ori­ent­a­tions of both dwell­ings have been slightly amended to reduce their poten­tial impact on the adja­cent prop­erty as recom­men­ded by the neighbours.

5. The applic­a­tion is sup­por­ted by the fol­low­ing information:

a) Design State­ment- out­lines the site con­text, policy con­text and the eth­os behind the chosen design solutions.

b) Spe­cific­a­tions for Air Source Heat Pump- iden­ti­fies the size, spe­cific­a­tions and out­put from the range of poten­tial heat pumps.

c) Ground Assess­ment and Drain­age Report- iden­ti­fies the ground con­di­tions and suit­able soakaway type, size and loc­a­tions to deal with both sur­face water and foul water disposal.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

d) Tree Sur­vey and Arbor­i­cul­tur­al Impact Assess­ment- con­firms that there are no trees with­in the site bound­ary although the site bor­ders a bank of trees above the A93 on its south­ern bound­ary; a row of trees bor­ders the west­ern bound­ary in the grounds of North Bal­gairn Stead­ing and one tree is loc­ated to the east in the garden of Gairncliff. The report con­firms 40 trees were sur­veyed and were cat­egor­ised as B, C or U qual­ity. The report con­firms that the devel­op­ment res­ults in the loss of zero trees and that the pro­posed land­scap­ing and tree plant­ing at each prop­erty will enhance the hab­it­at locally.

e) Amended Land­scape and Eco­lo­gic­al Enhance­ment- iden­ti­fies hab­it­ats and spe­cies present on site, and iden­ti­fies the eco­lo­gic­al enhance­ments which include: the install­a­tion bat and bird bricks/​boxes, and the plant­ing of nat­ive trees, shrubs and hedges. These spe­cies include: row­an, holly, hazel, aspen for nat­ive spe­cies and fruit trees includ­ing plum, cherry and apply with beech hedges and wild­flower meadows.

f) Agent Response to Neigh­bours- provides responses to neigh­bour­ing con­cerns relat­ing to leak­age and likely envir­on­ment­al haz­ard and con­tam­in­a­tion poten­tially arising from the pro­posed soakaways.

i. Pro­posed Private Sewage Treat­ment- The doc­u­ment con­firms that all plots with­in the devel­op­ment are to be served by high per­form­ance pack­age sewage treat­ment plants which are highly effect­ive and treat the sewage to more than 95% clean water and will have EN12566‑3 Cer­ti­fic­a­tion. The doc­u­ment con­firms that all of the treat­ment plants installed will meet or exceed the min­im­um cri­ter­ia of the standard.

ii. Soil Per­col­a­tion- the doc­u­ment ref­er­ences the soil per­col­a­tion value classing it as a gen­er­ally fast per­col­a­tion denot­ing a gen­er­ally down­ward or ver­tic­al per­col­a­tion through the under­ly­ing sub-soils rather than a lat­er­al per­col­a­tion and the pro­posed soakaway sizes have been applied in accord­ance with this and with SEPA standards.

iii. Foul Water Dis­charge- the foul water dis­charge is reg­u­lated by SEPA under the Water Envir­on­ment (Con­trolled Activ­it­ies) (Scot­land) Reg­u­la­tion and the doc­u­ment con­firms that the dis­charge design com­plies with SEPAs Reg­u­lat­ory Meth­od (WAT-RM-04) Indir­ect Sewage Dis­charges to Groundwater.

iv. Poten­tial Con­tam­in­a­tion Con­cerns- the doc­u­ment con­firms that the install­a­tion of high per­form­ance treat­ment plants and the fur­ther ​‘pol­ish­ing’ provided by the soakaway and the nat­ur­al under­ly­ing sands and gravels mit­ig­ate the poten­tial of the dis­charges to the ground of being contaminated.

1. Plans of the pro­pos­al are includes with­in Appendix 1.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

His­tory

1. Adja­cent to the land to the north-east of the site and util­ising the same access arrange­ment, plan­ning per­mis­sion has recently been gran­ted by Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil for applic­a­tion ref: APP/2020/2286 for the erec­tion of a dwell­ing­house and gar­age in place of the exist­ing derel­ict cot­tage on that site.

DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN CONTEXT

Policies

Policy Cat­egory	Policy
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 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	OEN SPACE, SPORT AND RECREATION
POLICY 9	CUL­TUR­AL HERITAGE
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​0​/​1​1​/​C​N​P​A​-​L​D​P​-​2​0​2​0​-​a​s​-​M​o​d​i​fied- for-web.pdf

CON­SULTA­TIONS

Sum­mary of the main issues raised by consultees

1. Scot­tish Water has no objec­tion to the pro­pos­al but this does not con­firm that the pro­posed devel­op­ment can cur­rently be ser­viced and advises that although Ballater

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

Water Treat­ment works a form­al applic­a­tion must be sub­mit­ted to Scot­tish Water. An inform­at­ive is recom­men­ded stat­ing that the applic­ants should sub­mit a form­al con­nec­tion applic­a­tion to Scot­tish Water fol­low­ing the grant­ing of any plan­ning per­mis­sion for review of the avail­ab­il­ity of capacity.

1. They also con­firm there is no pub­lic waste infra­struc­ture with­in the area.

2. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Flood Team has no spe­cif­ic com­ments on the scheme.

3. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land Officer has no objec­tions to the scheme. The Officer notes that there is no indic­a­tion of any past uses which might have caused contamination.

4. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Roads Depart­ment ini­tially provided the fol­low­ing comments:

a) It is noted that while the applic­ant shows suf­fi­cient park­ing with­in the indi­vidu­al plots each plot should also provide the oppor­tun­ity to turn with­in each plot.

b) It should be noted that this devel­op­ment takes access via a private road, not main­tained by the Roads Author­ity. Grant­ing this devel­op­ment will res­ult in an increase in usage. Accord­ingly there may be an increased liab­il­ity on those respons­ible for the main­ten­ance of the private road.

c) It should be noted that the vis­ib­il­ity splay required for this res­id­en­tial devel­op­ment may be less than that already provided for the exist­ing com­mer­cial use.

1. Fol­low­ing the agent’s sub­mis­sion of revised plans, the Roads Team con­firm their remov­al of their hold­ing objection.

2. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Envir­on­ment­al Health Officer notes that the pro­pos­al includes an air source heat pumps and there­fore requests a con­di­tion to ensure the pro­pos­al com­plies with the pro­tec­tion to amen­ity afforded by per­mit­ted devel­op­ment rights.

3. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Archae­olo­gist has no objec­tion to the scheme.

4. Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Developer Oblig­a­tions Officer con­firms that con­tri­bu­tions are required towards afford­able hous­ing with­in the area and the con­tri­bu­tion must be paid pri­or to the issu­ing of any decision notice.

5. CNPA Land­scape Officer con­firms that in gen­er­al, the pro­pos­al looks sound and would fit in fairly well with key land­scape char­ac­ter­ist­ics and the SLQs of the Park.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

1. The houses would be upon slightly elev­ated ground com­pared to sur­round­ing build­ings and the A93, and they are likely to seem slightly sep­ar­ated from these spa­tially and this sep­ar­a­tion would be amp­li­fied by the screen­ing effect of exist­ing mature trees along the A93 and to the west and east of the site. The design state­ment does describe how sit­ing and design meas­ures have been incor­por­ated to address this issue.

2. The pro­posed house designs are not con­tem­por­ary or remark­able in style but they would non­ethe­less relate to sur­round­ing tra­di­tion­al houses in form and mater­i­als and include some pos­it­ive details.

3. The Officer recom­mends tree pro­tec­tion is erec­ted on site to pro­tect trees neigh­bour­ing the site from con­struc­tion works.

4. Giv­en the open char­ac­ter of the field, the pro­posed peri­met­er beech hedge would be very import­ant to help integ­rate the houses with their sur­round­ings and lim­it land­scape visu­al effects on people trav­el­ling along the UDE28 path. It is recom­men­ded that this pro­posed hedge is also exten­ded along the east­ern side of the access track.

5. Fol­low­ing the sub­mis­sion of revised land­scap­ing plans show­ing an exten­sion to the beech hedge, the Officer is con­tent that the applic­ant has exten­ded the pro­posed hedge along the east­ern bound­ary. The Officer notes that at Plot 3, a com­plete line of hedge is not shown on the west­ern bound­ary of the plot, although it does include a line of four trees in the same loc­a­tion which would con­trib­ute suf­fi­cient land­scape benefits.

6. CNPA Out­door Access Officer con­firms that path UDE28 forms part of the Bal­later Com­munity Paths Net­work and requests con­firm­a­tion as to how the pro­pos­al would link into the exist­ing net­work. The Officer notes that the devel­op­ment does not impact dir­ectly on this route.

7. CNPA Eco­logy Officer con­firms that a Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al and Appro­pri­ate Assess­ment are not required as the pro­pos­al is not con­sidered to have a likely effect on the River Dee SAC. The Officer con­firms that the devel­op­ment will res­ult in the loss of semi-improved grass­land although notes that it is unlikely to be of value for plants or grass­land fungi. There are no pro­tec­ted spe­cies con­straints asso­ci­ated with the site itself. The Tree Sur­vey con­firmed that there are no trees with­in the site. Those that are adja­cent to the site bound­ary are out­side of the devel­op­ment foot­print and their root zones can be pro­tec­ted, as indic­ated in the Tree Sur­vey and asso­ci­ated Tree Pro­tec­tion Plan. The Officer con­firms the pro­pos­al will have a neg­li­gible eco­lo­gic­al impact. The Officer sug­gests that some addi­tion­al tree or hedge plant­ing could take place along the access track.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

1. The Officer recom­mends the inclu­sion of plan­ning con­di­tions for: the erec­tion of tree pro­tec­tion meas­ures pri­or to con­struc­tion works com­men­cing, the pres­ence of an eco­lo­gist to over­see the install­a­tion of bat and swift bricks and the restric­tion of con­struc­tion hours to min­im­ise dis­turb­ance to otter.

2. Regard­ing the SUDs, the per­col­a­tion tests con­firm that infilt­ra­tion is suit­able for sur­face run-off. Pre-cast con­crete ring soakaways will ensure ver­tic­al infilt­ra­tion and reduce lat­er­al fil­tra­tion towards neigh­bour­ing prop­er­ties and water­courses. Per­meable park­ing areas will provide treat­ment of these areas pri­or to ground infiltration.

3. Bal­later and Crath­ie Com­munity Coun­cil have not provided any com­ments on the scheme.

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS

1. The applic­a­tion was advert­ised when first sub­mit­ted. A total of three let­ters have been received from/​on behalf of occu­pants of neigh­bour­ing prop­er­ties provid­ing com­ments on the ori­gin­al sub­mis­sion doc­u­ments. Full cop­ies of the responses can be found at Appendix 2. One of the rep­res­ent­a­tions provides gen­er­al obser­va­tions on the scheme, which are sum­mar­ised as:

a) The erec­tion of three houses is broadly con­sist­ent with Policy I of the LDP 2015 and LDP 2021.

b) Pro­pos­al seems gen­er­ally sym­path­et­ic to the loc­al area.

1. The two oth­er rep­res­ent­a­tions raise points of con­cern, as summarised:

a) Con­cern regard­ing the loc­a­tions of the pro­posed foul treat­ment plants and soakaways in rela­tion to ground levels and neigh­bour­ing properties;

b) Loss of pri­vacy and over­look­ing of the pro­posed dwell­ing of Plot I to the neigh­bour­ing prop­erty to the west;

c) Con­cern regard­ing the pro­posed palette of extern­al fin­ishes for the dwell­ings and their com­pat­ib­il­ity with the exist­ing tra­di­tion­al mater­i­als used in the imme­di­ate area;

d) Con­cern regard­ing loss of views;

e) Con­cern regard­ing the neg­at­ive impact the pro­pos­al would have on the adja­cent dwell­ing which is cur­rently used as an AirB­nB let;

f) Loss of Light and over­look­ing con­cern from Plot 3 to neigh­bour­ing prop­erty to the east.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

APPRAIS­AL

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

Prin­ciple of Development

1. Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 states inter alia that new hous­ing devel­op­ment which adds to an exist­ing rur­al group (three or more build­ings, where at least one of which is a dwell­ing house) will be con­sidered favour­ably where:

a) They con­nect to rein­force and enhance the char­ac­ter of the group integ­rat­ing with exist­ing built form, and pat­tern of exist­ing devel­op­ment; and

b) Do not add more than one third to the exist­ing num­ber of build­ings in the group with­in the plan period.

1. The pro­pos­al looks to erect three dwell­ing­houses with­in the hous­ing group at Bridge of Gairn. With­in this, there are nine exist­ing res­id­en­tial prop­er­ties with three of these being imme­di­ately adja­cent to, and sur­round the applic­a­tion site. The applic­a­tion site would have once been part of a lar­ger area of agri­cul­tur­al land, how­ever has been encroached upon and segreg­ated from that lar­ger land unit by the exist­ing devel­op­ments with­in the area such as the water treat­ment works, res­id­en­tial cur­til­ages of neigh­bour­ing prop­er­ties to its site bound­ary and vehicu­lar access tracks. The applic­a­tion site would there­fore appear as more of an infill devel­op­ment and is con­sidered appro­pri­ate for devel­op­ment in this case. The prin­ciple of the pro­posed res­id­en­tial devel­op­ment is con­sidered to accord with Policy 1: New Hous­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 sub­ject to com­pli­ance with oth­er rel­ev­ant Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan policies as out­lined in more detail below.

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. This is rein­forced by Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing, which seeks to ensure that all new devel­op­ment is sym­path­et­ic to the tra­di­tion­al pat­tern and char­ac­ter of the sur­round­ing areas, loc­al ver­nacu­lar and loc­al dis­tinct­ive­ness. It is there­fore clear that policy requires all new devel­op­ment to enhance and com­ple­ment both the Nation­al Park and the char­ac­ter of the set­tle­ment itself, using land­scape to com­ple­ment the setting.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

1. The pro­posed devel­op­ment site is an area of open grass­land sur­roun­ded by pre­vi­ous devel­op­ments. There are lim­ited views afforded into the site from the adja­cent road net­work due to the change in topo­graphy and exist­ing veget­a­tion provid­ing screen­ing. Views into the site would be gained by users of the loc­al foot­path net­work how­ever these have been mit­ig­ated by the inclu­sion of the beech hedge along the east­ern site bound­ary, as recom­men­ded by the CNPA Land­scape Officer. The inclu­sion of the pro­posed peri­met­er beech hedge is con­sidered to help integ­rate the houses with their sur­round­ings and the land­scap­ing is con­sidered to be simple but effect­ive, with the inclu­sion of nat­ive spe­cies for tree plant­ing and wild­flower mead­ow areas. The lay­out of the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to be accept­able with three gen­er­ous sized plots provid­ing good amen­ity space for occu­pi­ers of each of the dwell­ing­houses and align­ing pos­it­ively with those with in the exist­ing group­ing at Bridge of Gairn.

2. In terms of design, Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021, requires that all new devel­op­ment deliv­ers a high stand­ard of design and place­mak­ing con­trib­ut­ing to mak­ing a sense of place and improv­ing qual­ity of life. It should min­im­ise the effect of cli­mate change and make sus­tain­able use of resources. The pro­pose house designs are of tra­di­tion­al scale and pro­por­tions, reflect­ive of the dom­in­ant design char­ac­ter present in the area and the pro­posed mater­i­als are con­sidered to be wholly appro­pri­ate to the loc­al archi­tec­tur­al ver­nacu­lar. The scale, design and mater­i­als are con­sidered to accord with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

3. On this basis, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to accord with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing and Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Res­id­en­tial Amenity

1. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to ensure that new devel­op­ment pro­tects the amen­ity cur­rently enjoyed by neigh­bours and affords suf­fi­cient private amen­ity ground and off street park­ing. Each prop­erty will be set with­in good sized plots with suf­fi­cient dis­tance between them and exist­ing prop­er­ties. A couple of let­ters of con­cern haven been received from neigh­bour­ing prop­er­ties to Plots I and 3 relat­ing to the poten­tial impact these dwell­ings would have on their amen­ity. Revised plans for plot I have been sub­mit­ted in response to the neigh­bour objec­tion, which now show the house re- ori­ent­ated in accord­ance with the neighbour’s recom­mend­a­tion, and thus alle­vi­at­ing any con­cerns regard­ing dir­ect line of sight issue between the prop­er­ties. Regard­ing Plot 3, revised plans also show the dwell­ing has been re-ori­ent­ated to ensure fur­ther pri­vacy to Gairncliffe occu­pants and the inclu­sion of the beech hedge to the access road peri­met­er provides addi­tion­al screen­ing between the prop­er­ties. The revised

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

ori­ent­a­tions are not con­sidered to give rise to any sig­ni­fic­ant over­shad­ow­ing impacts tak­ing into account the pos­i­tion­ing, land­form, sep­ar­a­tion dis­tance and exist­ing screen­ing on the neigh­bour­ing properties.

1. Regard­ing poten­tial noise impacts which could arise from the use of the Air Source Heat Pumps, the Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Envir­on­ment­al Health Officer recom­mends the inclu­sion of a con­di­tion ensur­ing that the pro­pos­al com­plies with the pro­tec­tion to amen­ity afforded by per­mit­ted devel­op­ment rights. Whilst there will inev­it­ably be a degree of dis­turb­ance and noise dur­ing con­struc­tion, this can be min­im­ised by good con­struc­tion practises.

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 pro­tec­ted spe­cies or biod­iversity whilst Policy 10: Resources sets out the need to fully con­sider impacts on flood­ing and water resources.

2. Regard­ing des­ig­nated sites, the pro­pos­al is not con­sidered to have a likely effect on the River Dee Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion and a Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al is not required on this occa­sion. The pro­pos­al will res­ult in the loss of semi-improved grass­land which the CNPA Eco­logy Officer notes as being unlikely of hav­ing a high value hab­it­at for plants or grass­land fungi and there are no pro­tec­ted spe­cies con­straints asso­ci­ated with the site itself. The pro­pos­al will there­fore have a neg­li­gible eco­lo­gic­al impact and the pro­posed land­scap­ing works includ­ing the plant­ing of hedgerows, nat­ive tree spe­cies and wild­flower mead­ow mix areas are pro­posed to provide biod­iversity enhance­ments to the site.

3. Although there are no trees with­in the site, the Officer recom­mends pro­tec­tion meas­ures are included dur­ing con­struc­tion for those trees adja­cent to the site bound­ary to ensure their root zones are pro­tec­ted by way of plan­ning con­di­tion. The oth­er plan­ning con­di­tions recom­men­ded by the Officer relat­ing to the restric­tion of work­ing hours to min­im­ise otter dis­turb­ance and the pres­ence of an eco­lo­gist to over­see the install­a­tion of bat and swift bricks should also be included on any sub­sequent decision notice to min­im­ise the development’s envir­on­ment­al impact in accord­ance with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

4. Regard­ing oth­er envir­on­ment­al mat­ters, the Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Flood Team have no spe­cif­ic com­ments on scheme regard­ing flood­ing at this loc­a­tion and the Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land Officer also con­firms that there is no evid­ence of any pre­vi­ous uses which would cause con­tam­in­a­tion at the site. In these over­all cir­cum­stances, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 4: Natural

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

Her­it­age and Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Ser­vi­cing and Access

1. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 sets out the need for new devel­op­ment to sat­is­fact­or­ily ser­viced and without harm to recourses 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. They also con­firm there is no pub­lic waste infra­struc­ture with­in the area.

3. Regard­ing sur­face water meas­ures, the per­col­a­tion tests con­firm that infilt­ra­tion is suit­able for sur­face run-off. Pre-cast con­crete ring soakaways will ensure ver­tic­al infilt­ra­tion and reduce lat­er­al fil­tra­tion towards neigh­bour­ing prop­er­ties and water­courses. Per­meable park­ing areas will provide treat­ment of these areas pri­or to ground infilt­ra­tion. Turn­ing to foul water meas­ures, it is pro­posed to install pack­age sewage treat­ment plants in each plot to serve each dwell­ing with asso­ci­ated soakaway area with­in the grounds. Con­cern has been raised by a neigh­bour­ing occu­pant regard­ing the pro­posed drain­age meas­ures and the poten­tial impact on their prop­erty. Fur­ther inform­a­tion has been provided by the agent which con­firms that the pack­age sewage treat­ment plants meet industry stand­ards and SEPA reg­u­la­tions for foul water dis­charge and soakaway sizes. The doc­u­ment con­cludes that the pro­pos­al has been designed to mit­ig­ate the poten­tial of the dis­charges to the ground of being con­tam­in­ated. On this basis the pro­posed sur­face water and foul water drain­age meas­ures are con­sidered to be accept­able in accord­ance with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing and Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

4. Regard­ing off road park­ing and vehicu­lar access, the scheme looks to util­ise the exist­ing access track off the A939 which serves the adja­cent water treat­ment plant. The scheme has been revised to accord with the Aber­deen­shire Council’s Road Team’s advice to include vehicu­lar turn­ing pro­vi­sion with­in the cur­til­ages of each dwell­ing­house and on this basis the Team con­firmed they had no objec­tion to the scheme. Plan­ning con­di­tions are recom­men­ded to be attached to any sub­sequent decision relat­ing to road safety to include: details of the bin uplift area to ensure it does not impact on the vis­ib­il­ity splays.

5. Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing also seeks to ensure the cre­ation of safe and access­ible places with oppor­tun­it­ies for walk­ing and cyc­ling for both act­ive travel and recre­ation, with devel­op­ment main­tain­ing and max­im­ising all oppor­tun­it­ies for

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

respons­ible out­door access. Revised inform­a­tion has been sub­mit­ted includ­ing a path facil­it­a­tion plan which demon­strates how the occu­pi­ers of the pro­pos­al will access the nearby path net­work. The CNPA Out­door Access Officer con­firms that the pro­pos­al does not dir­ectly impact on any exist­ing routes.

1. In these over­all cir­cum­stances the pro­posed access and ser­vi­cing arrange­ments for the scheme are con­sidered to be accept­able and in accord­ance with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing and Policy 10: Resources 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. There is capa­city at both the catch­ment Primary and Sec­ond­ary schools to accom­mod­ate this devel­op­ment and as such no mit­ig­a­tion is neces­sary. No fur­ther improve­ments to exist­ing ser­vices and facil­it­ies have been iden­ti­fied. Regard­ing afford­able hous­ing pay­ment con­tri­bu­tions, the Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil Developer Oblig­a­tions Officer con­firms a con­tri­bu­tion is required to which the applic­ant has indic­ated their agree­ment with its pay­ment pri­or to the issu­ing of any decision notice.

3. The pro­pos­al is con­sidered to accord with Policy 11: Developer Oblig­a­tions sub­ject to the pay­ment of the afford­able hous­ing contribution.

Oth­er Issues Raised in Con­sulta­tions and Representations

1. All mat­ters raised by con­sul­tees and third parties have been addressed above. No com­ments have been received from the Com­munity Coun­cil on this occasion.

2. The Aber­deen­shire Council’s Archae­olo­gist has no objec­tion to the scheme.

CON­CLU­SION

1. The applic­a­tion is for new hous­ing with a rur­al hous­ing group situ­ated at Bridge of Gairn. 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 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.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

RECOM­MEND­A­TION

That Mem­bers of the Com­mit­tee sup­port a recom­mend­a­tion to Approve the Erec­tion of 3 Dwell­ing­houses and Detached Gar­ages at Land To West Of Gairncliffe Bridge Of Gairn Bal­later Aber­deen­shire AB35 5UA sub­ject to:

1) Con­clu­sion of an appro­pri­ate agree­ment or upfront pay­ment regard­ing developer con­tri­bu­tion in respect of Afford­able Hous­ing; and 2) 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 until the details of the refuse bin uplift store area have been sub­mit­ted to and approved in writ­ing by the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity, act­ing as Plan­ning Author­ity in con­sulta­tion with Aber­deen­shire Coun­cil. The area shall be con­struc­ted behind any vis­ib­il­ity splay and shall be designed so as to be access­ible for refuse bin uplift and to pre­vent empty bins from being wind-blown. The bin uplift store shall there­after be installed and retained in accord­ance with the approved details pri­or to the occu­pa­tion of any dwell­ing­house, hereby permitted.

Reas­on: To ensure the pro­vi­sion of an appro­pri­ate means of ser­vi­cing in the interests of road safety and in accord­ance with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

1. No devel­op­ment shall com­mence on site until the tree pro­tec­tion meas­ures have been installed on site in accord­ance with the approved Tree Pro­tec­tion Plan and main­tained in accord­ance with those details for the dur­a­tion of construction.

Reas­on: To ensure that trees adja­cent to the site, which con­trib­ute to the land­scape char­ac­ter and biod­iversity of the area are appro­pri­ately pro­tec­ted dur­ing con­struc­tion works in accord­ance with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age and Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2015.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 26/03/2021

1. The devel­op­ment, hereby approved shall be car­ried out in com­plete accord­ance with the recom­mend­a­tions con­tained with­in Sec­tion 3.0 of the approved Land­scap­ing and Eco­lo­gic­al Enhance­ment Report, Revi­sion A, dated 01 March 2021, car­ried out by Tay Ecology.

Reas­on: In the interests of hab­it­at and biod­iversity enhance­ment in accord­ance with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

1. The noise emis­sion res­ult­ing from the oper­a­tion of each of the air source heat pumps, indi­vidu­ally and func­tion­ing in isol­a­tion at each pro­posed hous­ing unit, shall not exceed a lim­it of 42dB L, (Aeq 5mins) at a pos­i­tion assessed one metre per­pen­dic­u­lar from the extern­al centre point of any door or win­dow serving a hab­it­able room of a neigh­bour­ing prop­erty, ignor­ing the effect of