CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DEVEL­OP­MENT PROPOSED:

Form­a­tion of access hill tracks adja­cent to (1) Base Sta­tion and (2) Shiel­ing at Land 1200M Né Of Coire Cas Car Park Cairngorm Moun­tain Glen­more Aviemore

REF­ER­ENCE: 2022/0023/DET

APPLIC­ANT: Cairngorm Moun­tain (Scot­land) Limited

DATE CALLED-IN: 24 Janu­ary 2022

RECOM­MEND­A­TION: Approve sub­ject to conditions

CASE OFFICER: Ed Swales Mon­it­or­ing and Enforce­ment Officer

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CNPA Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Applic­a­tion Site

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

SITE DESCRIP­TION, PRO­POS­AL AND HISTORY

Site Descrip­tion

1. The applic­a­tion sites site beside the exist­ing build­ings at the Funicu­lar Base Sta­tion at Cairngorm and the Sheil­ing build­ing beneath the Funicu­lar mid sta­tion. The Base Sta­tion track runs from the top car park north to south on the east­ern side of the base sta­tion build­ing and will be approx­im­ately 150 metres in length. The Shiel­ing track runs from the north to south, going under the funicu­lar rail line and again is approx­im­ately 150 meters in length.

2. Both tracks lie with­in the Cairngorms Nation­al Scen­ic Areas, but is not covered by any oth­er spe­cif­ic envir­on­ment­al des­ig­na­tions. The Glen­more Nation­al Nature Reserve lies approx­im­ately 200 metres west of the applic­a­tion site. The Cairngorms Wild Land Area No.15 as iden­ti­fied in Scot­tish Nat­ur­al Heritage’s wild land area map lies around 700 metres west of the base sta­tion site at its closest and 1500 metres south of the Shiel­ing 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​l​i​n​e​-​a​p​p​l​i​c​a​t​i​o​n​s​/​a​p​p​l​i​c​a​t​i​o​n​D​e​t​a​i​l​s​.​d​o​?​a​c​t​i​v​e​T​a​b​=​s​u​m​m​a​r​y​&​k​e​y​V​a​l​=​R​5​U​P​K​I​S​I​0C100

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
PLANS
Plan — Loc­a­tion plan	2317-110	05/01/22	24/01/22
Plan — Access lay­out plan — shiel­ing access track	101	14/09/21	24/01/22
Plan — Access track long sec­tions — shieling	102	14/09/21	24/01/22
Plan — Access track cross sec­tions — shieling	103	14/09/21	24/01/22
Plan — Pro­posed base track plan	105	01/10/21	24/01/22
Plan — Pro­posed base track long section	106	01/10/21	24/01/22
Plan — Pro­posed base track cross section	107	01/10/21	24/01/22
SUP­PORT­ING DOCUMENTATION
Oth­er — Response by applic­ant (CMSL) to com­ment in land­scape con­sulta­tion response		01/02/22	09/03/22

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

Title	Date on Plan*	Date Received
Oth­er — View­point Daylodge track at Daylodge Poma drive station	02/03/22	08/03/22
Oth­er — View­point from the Shiel­ing Build­ing show­ing full length of pro­posed Shiel­ing track	01/03/22	08/03/22
Oth­er — UAV Sur­vey 2018 aer­i­al visualisation	01/03/22	08/03/22
Oth­er — View­point A — Daylodge track at Car Park entry View­point B — Daylodge track at upper end	02/03/22	08/03/22
Oth­er — UAV Sur­vey 2018 aer­i­al visu­al­isa­tion Shiel­ing Track	01/03/22	08/03/22

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

1. The pro­pos­al is for the form­a­tion of 2 no. access tracks, one adja­cent to the base sta­tion build­ing and one adja­cent to the Shiel­ing build­ing fur­ther up the hill.

2. The pur­pose of the pro­posed tracks are to ration­al­ise the track net­work around the two build­ings in light of the recent changes to the funicu­lar and oth­er devel­op­ments, some tracks will be restored as a res­ult of these new tracks.

His­tory

1. There have been numer­ous plan­ning applic­a­tions with­in the wider Cairngorm Moun­tain area. On 14 Octo­ber 2021, High­land Coun­cil gran­ted con­sent (21/03808/S42) for the con­tin­ued tem­por­ary sit­ing of a double snow fact­ory unit on ground between the tube slides and the Day Lodge and Funicu­lar Base Sta­tion, repeat­ing con­sents gran­ted by both High­land Coun­cil and the CNPA in pre­vi­ous years, the latest renew­al being Novem­ber 2021.

2. An applic­a­tion for install­a­tion of car park bar­ri­ers (2020/0097/DET) at the entrance to the upper Coire Cas car park was gran­ted con­sent by the CNPA on 16 June 2020. In May 2020, plan­ning per­mis­sion was gran­ted by the CNPA for engin­eer­ing works related to strength­en­ing the funicu­lar via­duct (ref­er­ence 2020/0076/DET).

3. In 2019, plan­ning per­mis­sion was gran­ted by the CNPA for engin­eer­ing works to smooth and re-grade land (ref­er­ence 2019/0247/DET) and for the renov­a­tion and erec­tion of exten­sion to the Ptar­mig­an Res­taur­ant build­ing (ref­er­ence 2018/0177/DET).

Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Appraisal

1. A Hab­it­ats Reg­u­la­tions Apprais­al has been under­taken (Appendix 2) regard­ing the proposal’s impacts on the des­ig­nated sites of the Cairngorms SPA and River Spey SAC. It was con­cluded that the track will have no dir­ect impact on the hab­it­at sup­port­ing SPA spe­cies due to the type and loc­a­tion of the pro­posed devel­op­ment. How­ever there is the poten­tial for sed­i­ment release enter­ing the Allt a choire chais water­course that

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

flows into the River Spey SAC dur­ing con­struc­tion. It is there­fore pro­posed to impose a con­di­tion requir­ing a Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment detail­ing the pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures to be sub­mit­ted pri­or to com­mence­ment of development.

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 1	NEW HOUS­ING DEVELOPMENT
POLICY 2	SUP­PORT­ING ECO­NOM­IC GROWTH X
POLICY 3	DESIGN AND PLACEMAKING
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
POLICY 10	RESOURCES X
POLICY 11	DEVELOPER CON­TRI­BU­TIONS

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 1	New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance (2015)
Policy 2	Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance X
Policy 3	Sus­tain­able Design Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance (2015)
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
Policy 10	Resources Non-Stat­utory Guid­ance X
Policy 11	Developer Con­tri­bu­tions Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance (2015)

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

CON­SULTA­TIONS

Sum­mary of the main issues raised by consultees

1. NatureScot sug­gest it is unlikely that the pro­pos­al will have a sig­ni­fic­ant effect on any qual­i­fy­ing interests either dir­ectly or indir­ectly. An appro­pri­ate assess­ment is there­fore not required provided that that stand­ard pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures are put in place. They com­ment that the pro­pos­al is con­sist­ent with con­tin­ued imple­ment­a­tion of the VMP as required by the S50 agree­ment, and advise there are no asso­ci­ated implic­a­tions for the Cairngorms SAC and SPA.

2. CNPA Eco­logy Advisor states that the tracks are to be con­struc­ted with­in areas that have pre­vi­ously been dis­turbed (includ­ing pri­or to the tem­por­ary works asso­ci­ated with the repair of the funicu­lar) and there­fore the impacts on hab­it­at are neg­li­gible. A Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment will be required con­firm­ing details of edge res­tor­a­tion to ensure any impacts are minimised.

3. CNPA Land­scape Advisor states that a major factor likely to affect the pre­dicted land­scape and visu­al effects of the pro­posed tracks is the influ­ence of exist­ing ski build­ings, infra­struc­ture and activ­ity on the baseline land­scape and visu­al con­di­tions. They sug­gest that a Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment be sub­mit­ted that addresses the land­scape and visu­al sens­it­iv­it­ies of the site, this should also be a con­di­tion on any approv­al of this application.

4. Aviemore and Vicin­ity Com­munity Coun­cil gave no com­ments to sup­port or object to this application.

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS

1. One rep­res­ent­a­tion has been received stat­ing they are con­cerned that the CNPA should fully recog­nise the sens­it­iv­it­ies of the ground with­in the red line bound­ar­ies of this applic­a­tion and the sur­round­ing area. This area should be treated as likely to be sup­port­ing sig­ni­fic­ant biod­iversity interest. It is import­ant to recog­nise that this devel­op­ment will cause addi­tion­al adverse impacts to the sites. They urge that appro­pri­ate meas­ures are taken to both reduce these and strictly min­im­ise hab­it­at dam­age, and to ensure that best prac­tice is achieved dur­ing con­struc­tion and operation.

APPRAIS­AL

1. The main plan­ning con­sid­er­a­tions of this applic­a­tion are con­sidered to be the prin­ciple of devel­op­ment, the impact upon land­scape and the envir­on­ment­al impacts.

Prin­ciple

1. The pro­posed devel­op­ment is aimed at ration­al­ising some of the tracks with­in the Cairngorm Ski area fol­low­ing the works to the funicu­lar rail­way. Policy 2: Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 provides gen­er­al policy sup­port for pro­pos­als that sup­port the eco­nomy, where they are com­pat­ible with exist­ing busi­ness activ­ity and sup­port the viab­il­ity of the loc­al eco­nomy, sub­ject to hav­ing no adverse envir­on­ment­al or amen­ity impacts.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

1. The applic­ant has con­firmed there will be no fences, bol­lards or signs as a res­ult of these tracks as well some res­tor­a­tion of old, unused tracks once the new ones are in place. Sub­ject to com­pli­ance with oth­er rel­ev­ant loc­al devel­op­ment plan policies, the prin­ciple of the pro­posed works is con­sidered accept­able and to com­ply with Policy 2: Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

Land­scape

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. It also has a pre­sump­tion against new private roads and ways in open moor­land areas unless they are essen­tial for land man­age­ment pur­poses and are either designed to min­im­ise impacts, or are part of a pro­gramme of remov­al of oth­er tracks.

2. The pro­posed tracks are sited around exist­ing build­ings and infra­struc­ture, intend­ing to ration­al­ise the track net­work at Cairngorm Moun­tain ski centre, thus min­im­ising the impact of the new tracks. There will be remov­al of exist­ing tem­por­ary tracks as well as pro­posed mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures to lim­it­ing edge erosion and sourcing of mater­i­als loc­ally to ensure the top coat of the track matches that of the remain­ing track net­work. The addi­tion of a con­di­tion requir­ing sub­mis­sion and approv­al of a Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment set­ting out the details.

3. Based on the inform­a­tion cur­rently sub­mit­ted, as well as the required CMS, it is pre­dicted that the pro­posed tracks are unlikely to res­ult in sig­ni­fic­ant adverse land­scape and visu­al effects on the Nation­al Park com­pared to the baseline con­di­tions there­fore the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment 2021.

Eco­logy

1. Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to restrict devel­op­ment that would have an adverse impact on pro­tec­ted sites, spe­cies and hab­it­ats and where this can­not be avoided that appro­pri­ate mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures are provided. Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 seeks to main­tain water qual­ity and avoid impacts on the water environment

2. The tracks are to be sited in areas which have already been sub­ject to devel­op­ment and dis­turb­ance and it is con­sidered there will be neg­li­gible risk to the eco­logy of the area from the devel­op­ment once com­pleted. A Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment incor­por­at­ing stand­ard pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures will pre­vent harm to the water envir­on­ment dur­ing construction.

3. With the mit­ig­a­tion meas­ures pro­posed in the plan­ning applic­a­tion and a detailed Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment incor­por­at­ing fur­ther pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures secured through con­di­tion, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age and Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment 2021.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

CON­CLU­SION

1. Sub­ject to a con­di­tion requir­ing a Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment to be sub­mit­ted pri­or to devel­op­ment the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to be accept­able and 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 Form­a­tion of access hill tracks adja­cent to (1) Base Sta­tion and (2) Shiel­ing at Land 1200M Né Of Coire Cas Car Park Cairngorm Moun­tain Glen­more Aviemore sub­ject to 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 a Con­struc­tion Meth­od State­ment has been sub­mit­ted to and approved in writ­ing by the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity act­ing as Plan­ning Author­ity. The works shall there­after be under­taken in strict accord­ance with the details and imple­men­ted in full pri­or to the first oper­a­tion of the devel­op­ment. The doc­u­ment shall include but not be lim­ited to: a) Details of the pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion meas­ures. b) Details of the fin­ish­ing of the edges of the tracks and pro­tec­tion of ground adja­cent to the track bound­ary. c) Details of the mater­i­al stor­age dur­ing con­struc­tion. d) Details of where con­struc­tion mater­i­al is to be obtained from, and if there is any to be won on site details of the bor­row pits includ­ing loc­a­tion and res­tor­a­tion of those bor­row pits.

Reas­on: To min­im­ise the eco­lo­gic­al land­scape and visu­al dis­turb­ance dur­ing con­struc­tion in accord­ance with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age and Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021.

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CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 7 22/04/2022

Inform­at­ives

1. The devel­op­ment hereby approved must com­mence with­in 3 years of the date of this decision notice. If devel­op­ment has not com­menced with­in this peri­od then this plan­ning per­mis­sion will lapse.

2. The per­son under­tak­ing the devel­op­ment is required to give the Plan­ning Author­ity pri­or writ­ten noti­fic­a­tion of the date which it is inten­ded to com­mence the devel­op­ment. Attached to this decision notice is a Notice of Ini­ti­ation of Devel­op­ment for com­ple­tion and sub­mis­sion. Sub­mis­sion of this inform­a­tion assists the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Mon­it­or­ing and Enforce­ment Officer in mon­it­or­ing act­ive work with­in the area to ensure com­pli­ance with the approved details and to identi­fy and cor­rect any poten­tial prob­lems, as they arise, rather than later when it may be more dif­fi­cult and more costly to rec­ti­fy. Fail­ure to give notice would con­sti­tute a breach of plan­ning con­trol which may res­ult in enforce­ment action being taken.

3. Fol­low­ing com­ple­tion of the devel­op­ment, a noti­fic­a­tion of com­ple­tion shall, as soon as prac­tic­able, be giv­en to the Plan­ning Author­ity. Attached to this decision notice is a Notice of Com­ple­tion of Devel­op­ment for com­ple­tion and sub­mis­sion. Sub­mis­sion of this form will assist the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Mon­it­or­ing and Enforce­ment Officer in mak­ing a final inspec­tion and check­ing com­pli­ance with the approved draw­ings and con­di­tions. If the devel­op­ment hereby approved is to be car­ried out in phases, then a notice of com­ple­tion should be sub­mit­ted at the com­ple­tion of each phase.

The map on the first page of this report has been pro­duced to aid in the stat­utory pro­cess of deal­ing with plan­ning applic­a­tions. The map is to help identi­fy the site and its sur­round­ings and to aid Plan­ning Officers, Com­mit­tee Mem­bers and the Pub­lic in the determ­in­a­tion of the pro­pos­al. Maps shown in the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Report can only be used for the pur­poses of the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee. Any oth­er use risks infringing Crown Copy­right and may lead to pro­sec­u­tion or civil pro­ceed­ings. Maps pro­duced with­in this Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Report can only be repro­duced with the express per­mis­sion of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity and oth­er Copy­right hold­ers. This per­mis­sion must be gran­ted in advance.