CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DEVEL­OP­MENT PROPOSED: Erec­tion of 12no. houses at Former Aviemore Primary School Milton Park Aviemore High­land PH22 1RR

REF­ER­ENCE: 2023/0056/DET APPLIC­ANT: The High­land Coun­cil — Hous­ing DATE CALLED-IN: 13 Feb­ru­ary 2023 RECOM­MEND­A­TION: Approve, sub­ject to Con­di­tions CASE OFFICER: Stephanie Wade, Plan­ning Officer

2

CNPA Plan­ning Committee

Applic­a­tion Site

0 12.5 25 50 Meters N

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHOR­ITY Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

SITE DESCRIP­TION, PRO­POS­AL AND HISTORY

Site Descrip­tion

1. The applic­a­tion site is the former Aviemore Primary School. It is accessed from the B9152 Grampi­an Road, through the exist­ing ter­raced hous­ing of Milton Park. The site con­tains some derel­ict struc­tures of the former school includ­ing some found­a­tions, hard stand­ings, and met­al fen­cing. The site is being reclaimed by rough veget­a­tion includ­ing small scots pine and birch, and there is a line of trees includ­ing birch, cherry, and wil­low on the east­ern bound­ary. The Aviemore Burn runs par­al­lel to the west­ern site bound­ary, with heav­ily wooded land bey­ond this, steeply slop­ing up towards the A9 trunk road. The site is sur­roun­ded by res­id­en­tial hous­ing on the oth­er three bound­ar­ies. The school build­ings were demol­ished sev­er­al years ago, and the site has remained vacant since. The site is iden­ti­fied as hav­ing a flu­vi­al flood risk, and oth­er poten­tial con­straints include below ground peat and estab­lished trees along the east­ern site boundary.

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​P​I​F​H​A​S​I​OCP00

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
PLANS
Plan — Loc­a­tion Plan	DIHD2102 8_C0017_ZZ_ZZ_DR_A_00.90.01 Rev.01	23/11/2022	10/02/2023
Plan – Pro­posed Site Plan	DIHD2102 8_C0017_ZZ_ZZ_DR_A_00.02.01 Rev.04	29/06/2023	29/06/2023

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
Plan – House Type 01 – 2B3P Flats Pro­posed GA Plans & Elevations	DIHD2102 8_C0017_ZZ_ZZ_DR_A_01.02.01 Rev.01	23/11/2022	02/05/2023
Plan – House Type 02 – 2B4P Semi Pro­posed GA Plans & Elevations	DIHD2102 8_C0017_ZZ_ZZ_DR_A_02.02.01 Rev.01	23/11/2022	02/05/2023
Plan — Cross Sections	217012 – 02 Rev.B	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan — Stand­ard Details	217012 – 05	17/11/2022	02/05/2023
Plan — Deten­tion Basin Details	217012 – 06 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan- Pre-Devel­op­ment Areas-(Existing Imper­meable) Areas	217012 – 07 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan – Pre-Devel­op­ment Areas Green­field areas to be developed	217012 – 08 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan – Post-Devel­op­ment Areas (Imper­meable)	217012 – 09 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan — Sur­face Water Sew­er Long Section	217012 – 10 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan – Flood Route Layout	217012 – 14 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan – Areas for Adoption	217012 – 13 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Plan – Road and Kerbing Layout	217012 – 12 Rev.B	04/07/2023	11/07/2023
Plan – Drain­age Details	217012 – 11 Rev.B	05/07/2023	11/07/2023
Plan – Pro­posed 3D Visuals	DIHD2102 8_C0017_ZZ_ZZ_DR_A_00.02.02 Rev.3	31/07/2023	31/07/2023

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

Title	Draw­ing Num­ber	Date on Plan*	Date Received
SUP­PORT­ING INFORMATION
Oth­er — Design and Access Statement	2094 Rev.A	01/07/2023	28/07/2023
Oth­er — Tree Survey	675584/GM/001		10/02/2023
Oth­er — Flood Risk Assessment	9982	18/01/2023	02/05/2023
Oth­er – Drain­age Impact Assessment	217012 Rev.A	03/04/2023	02/05/2023
Oth­er – Com­pens­at­ory Flood Storage	13155 Rev.A	06/04/2023	02/05/2023
Oth­er — Eco­lo­gic­al Survey	675584/EM/004	14/12/2022	05/05/2023

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

1. This applic­a­tion seeks plan­ning per­mis­sion for the erec­tion of 12 units of afford­able hous­ing, togeth­er with the cre­ation of asso­ci­ated park­ing, access, ser­vi­cing, and land­scap­ing works. The new units look to be con­struc­ted on raised ground to the east­ern site area, on land formerly used for the primary school. All units are pro­posed as afford­able hous­ing with four ground floor, wheel­chair access­ible flats. The hous­ing accom­mod­a­tion sched­ule is as follows:

Num­ber of Units	Design Type	Type of Afford­able Hous­ing	Num­ber of Bedrooms
8	Cot­tage flat in two storey building.	Social rent	2
4	Semi-detached, two storey houses	Social rent	2

1. The dwell­ings and cot­tage flats take form from two-storey, semi-detached build­ings, with dual pitched roofs and spa­cing between each cluster to break up mass­ing. The design includes lean-to entrance can­op­ies and porches and a simple palette of extern­al fin­ishes com­pris­ing white, rendered elev­a­tions with ele­ments of char­coal col­oured, tim­ber-effect clad­ding, dark grey con­crete roof tiles and fea­ture col­oured doors. Win­dows are pro­posed to be dark grey col­oured alu-clad.

2. Vehicu­lar access will util­ise the exist­ing road net­work from Grampi­an Road through Milton Drive to the site, with car park­ing for the new dwell­ings provided along the west­ern side of the access road. A total of 18 park­ing spaces have been indic­ated on the plan to serve the dwell­ings. On the eastern

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

side of the access road, the pro­pos­al includes upgrades to the former primary school over­flow park­ing area which is cur­rently open tar­mac. The pro­pos­al seeks to form­al­ise park­ing spaces with­in this area installing 55 marked vehicu­lar park­ing spaces, togeth­er with land­scap­ing and path upgrades. Elec­tric Vehicle char­ging pro­vi­sion is provided at a ratio of 1 park­ing space per prop­erty. A series of paths includ­ing stepped and ramp accesses are pro­posed to be installed with­in the raised land area to provide access from the car park­ing to the dwell­ings. A SUDs deten­tion basin is pro­posed to be installed to the imme­di­ate south of the dwell­ings, with vehicu­lar access and a ped­es­tri­an path link­ing the devel­op­ment to the south.

1. Each unit of accom­mod­a­tion is served by a private garden, with each flat hav­ing a min­im­um 1.7m clothesline for out­door dry­ing facil­it­ies. Cycle stor­age for each unit of accom­mod­a­tion can be catered for with­in each of the private garden areas serving the units. 1 cycle hoop is to be installed for vis­it­or cycles adja­cent to the flats. The private garden spaces will also provide refuse bin stor­age for each unit. Heat­ing is pro­posed to be provided by air source heat pumps.

2. Regard­ing drain­age, the scheme looks to con­nect to the pub­lic sew­er infra­struc­ture for foul drain­age. For sur­face water, new imper­meable areas will be col­lec­ted and dir­ec­ted to the pro­posed SUDs atten­u­ation basin pri­or to dis­charge at a con­trolled rate to an exist­ing Scot­tish Water sew­er. The scheme includes a lim­ited land­scap­ing pro­pos­al which com­prises the plant­ing of sev­en new trees and areas of grass.

3. A detailed flood risk assess­ment high­lighted that the pro­posed devel­op­ment at the former Aviemore Primary School site is loc­ated with­in the func­tion­al flood­plain of the Aviemore Burn. To align with the require­ments of plan­ning policy and con­sulta­tion, the res­id­en­tial devel­op­ment plat­form will be raised to a safe elev­a­tion above the design flood level, includ­ing free­board allow­ance. To off­set the effect of flood­wa­ter dis­place­ment, a com­pens­at­ory flood stor­age area has been iter­at­ively tested and designed, res­ult­ing in a pre­dicted neut­ral or bet­ter effect on flood risk to the site and sur­round­ing area. An out­line design has been pre­pared, pro­pos­ing to lower the open area of ground to the west of the pro­posed hous­ing, cre­at­ing a nat­ur­ally vary­ing ground sur­face, sup­port­ing a vari­ety of nat­ur­al grass­land and wet­land hab­it­ats, and optim­ising land­scape and amen­ity value.

4. Plans of the pro­pos­al can be found at Appendix 1.

His­tory

1. The site has remained vacant for sev­er­al years fol­low­ing the demoli­tion of the former primary school.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

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. The European sites poten­tially affected are the River Spey Spe­cial Area of Con­ser­va­tion and the Kin­veachy Forest Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Area.

2. For the Kin­veachy Forest SPA, and its caper­cail­lie qual­i­fy­ing interests, the doc­u­ment con­cludes that there will be no dir­ect or indir­ect effects on the hab­it­ats, their struc­tures or func­tion or sup­port­ing pro­cesses, due to the loc­a­tion of the pro­posed devel­op­ment on a brown­field site with­in a set­tle­ment, remote from the Spe­cial Pro­tec­tion Area. For the River Spey SAC, the doc­u­ments con­cludes that a Pol­lu­tion Pre­ven­tion Plan should be secured by con­di­tion to ensure there would not be an adverse effect on site integ­rity of the River Spey arising from the con­struc­tion works.

DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN CONTEXT

Policies

Nation­al Policy	Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4) Scot­land 2045
POLICY 1	Tack­ling the Cli­mate and Nature Crises
POLICY 2	Cli­mate Mit­ig­a­tion and Adaptation
POLICY 3	Biod­iversity
POLICY 4	Nat­ur­al Places
POLICY 5	Soils
POLICY 6	Forestry, Wood­land and Trees
POLICY 9	Brown­field, Vacant and Derel­ict Land, and Empty Buildings
POLICY 12	Zero Waste
POLICY 13	Sus­tain­able Transport
POLICY 14	Design, Qual­ity and Place
POLICY 15	Loc­al Liv­ing and 20 Minute Neighbourhoods
POLICY 16	Qual­ity Homes
POLICY 22	Flood Risk and Water Management
Stra­tegic Policy	Cairngorms Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan 2022 – 2027
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	X
POLICY 2	SUP­PORT­ING ECO­NOM­IC GROWTH
POLICY 3	DESIGN AND PLACEMAKING	X
POLICY 4	NAT­UR­AL HERITAGE	X

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

Loc­al Plan Policy
POLICY 5	LAND­SCAPE	X
POLICY 6	THE SIT­ING AND DEISGN 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 OBLIG­A­TIONS	X

1. All new devel­op­ment pro­pos­als require to be assessed in rela­tion to policies con­tained in the adop­ted Devel­op­ment Plan which com­prises Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work 4 (NPF4) and the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021. The full word­ing of policies can be found at:

https://www.gov.scot/publications/national-planning-framework‑4/documents/

and at:

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

1. The red line bound­ary includes land alloc­ated with­in the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan for Com­munity Uses under alloc­a­tion C2: Former School Play­ing Fields. The LDP states that ​“the land at the former school play­ing fields should be pro­tec­ted from inap­pro­pri­ate devel­op­ment. The land adja­cent to the old primary school is there­fore alloc­ated for com­munity use.” It also con­firms that the site has a medi­um to high prob­ably of flood risk.

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	Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance
Policy 1	Hous­ing Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance	X
Policy 2	Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth Non-Stat­utory Guidance
Policy 3	Design and Place­mak­ing Non-Stat­utory Guidance	X
Policy 4	Nat­ur­al Her­it­age Non-Stat­utory Guidance	X
Policy 5	Land­scape Non-Stat­utory Guidance	X
Policy 7	Renew­able Energy Non-Stat­utory Guidance
Policy 8	Open Space, Sport and Recre­ation Non-Stat­utory Guidance
Policy 9	Cul­tur­al Her­it­age Non-Stat­utory Guidance

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

Policy	Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance
Policy 10	Resources Non-Stat­utory Guidance	X
Policy 11	Developer Oblig­a­tions Sup­ple­ment­ary Guidance	X

CON­SULTA­TIONS

Sum­mary of the main issues raised by consultees

1. NatureScot are sat­is­fied with the con­clu­sions of the HRA that con­cludes there will be no effect on the integ­rity of pro­tec­ted sites.

2. Scot­tish Water has no objec­tions to the pro­pos­als but sug­gest the applic­ant com­pletes a Pre-Devel­op­ment Enquiry form ensur­ing that the devel­op­ment can be ser­viced for wastewa­ter and drink­ing water. They con­firm that the devel­op­ment would be fed from Aviemore Water Treat­ment Works, and there is cur­rently suf­fi­cient capa­city to serve the development.

3. SEPA has no objec­tion sub­ject to the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion. The Team requests the con­di­tion to ensure that the Com­pens­at­ory Stor­age area is pro­tec­ted from devel­op­ment in per­petu­ity with any modi­fic­a­tions to the design being agreed in con­sulta­tion with SEPA and the Council’s Flood Team. SEPA also request to be con­sul­ted should any amend­ments be made to the Com­pens­at­ory Stor­age Out­lined Design Doc­u­ment, as sub­mit­ted. The Team also high­lights that there will be no dry access dur­ing the 1 in 200 year includ­ing cli­mate change flood event. They note there is dry access up to this point and max­im­um depths on the accesses at the high­er return peri­od event are 0.3m with low velo­cit­ies and for an estim­ated 1hr dur­a­tion. They also note that the flow path­ways through the urb­an area dur­ing this event are com­plex and rep­res­ent­a­tion of risk may be conservative.

4. High­land Coun­cil Con­tam­in­ated Land team note that records indic­ate the site formerly included the Aviemore Primary School which has been demol­ished. The Team request evid­ence that the asbes­tos con­tain­ing mater­i­al was appro­pri­ately removed and dis­posed of pri­or to demoli­tion. In the absence of this evid­ence, an assess­ment for asbes­tos across the site where demoli­tion mater­i­al may be present will be required. Fur­ther inform­a­tion on the heat­ing sys­tem is also required. The Officer recom­mends the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion for the pri­or agree­ment of a scheme to deal with poten­tial con­tam­in­a­tion on site.

5. High­land Coun­cil Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team has no objec­tion to the scheme sub­ject to the inclu­sion of plan­ning con­di­tions. The Team note that the devel­op­ment is adja­cent to the Aviemore Burn and so is poten­tially at medi­um to high risk of flu­vi­al flood­ing. The applic­a­tion is sup­por­ted by a Flood Risk Assess­ment [FRA] and a Sup­port­ing Com­pens­at­ory Stor­age Out­line Design Report. The devel­op­ment is on raised ground to ensure that the

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

houses are not at risk of flood­ing dur­ing a 1 in 200 year plus cli­mate change flood event. To ensure that there is no increase in flood risk to oth­ers, com­pens­at­ory stor­age will be provided with­in the site to ensure there is no loss in flood­plain capa­city. The FRA demon­strates that this can be achieved without increas­ing flood risk to oth­ers. The Team requests a plan­ning con­di­tion for the pri­or agree­ment of the final com­pens­at­ory stor­age design.

1. Regard­ing drain­age mat­ters, the Team has no objec­tions sub­ject to the inclu­sion of a plan­ning con­di­tion that the final sur­face water drain­age design is sub­mit­ted for review and approval.

2. High­land Coun­cil Envir­on­ment­al Health Officer has no objec­tion to the devel­op­ment sub­ject to con­di­tions being attached to any con­sent. The con­di­tion is for the pre-com­mence­ment agree­ment of meas­ures to reduce con­struc­tion noise and dust suppression.

3. High­land Coun­cil Forestry Officer notes the exist­ing juven­ile and poorly formed mixed broadleaves along the east­ern edge of the site. The Officer notes that the scheme looks to remove these trees to accom­mod­ate the devel­op­ment. The Officer also notes that the pro­posed path link to the south will also affect two exist­ing trees and recom­mends that fur­ther land­scap­ing and main­ten­ance details, tree pro­tec­tion details and addi­tion­al plant­ing in line with NPF4 should be provided.

4. High­land Coun­cil Trans­port Plan­ning Team has no objec­tions to the scheme sub­ject to the inclu­sion of plan­ning con­di­tions and inform­at­ive, as out­lined below. The Team requests a con­di­tion for the agree­ment of a Con­struc­tion Traffic Man­age­ment Plan. They note that the full extent of the road adop­tion will need to be agreed through the cor­res­pond­ing Road Con­struc­tion Con­sent and an Inform­at­ive is recom­men­ded to high­light this require­ment to the applic­ant. They state that the new foot­way between the park­ing and the hous­ing would not be adopt­able as its remote from the car­riage­way. This area would there­fore need to be main­tained by the applic­ant but can be resolved through the RCC pro­cess. The Team wel­comes the enhan­cing and form­al­ising of the exist­ing res­id­en­tial park­ing area to provide an addi­tion­al 55​.No park­ing spaces and notes that the spaces serving the dwell­ings them­selves meets the min­im­um stand­ards and that the car­ry­ing dis­tances between the bin stores and uplift points com­plies with the car­ry­ing dis­tance guidance.

5. Regard­ing road drain­age mat­ters, the Team note that the Flood Risk Man­age­ment Team has not raised objec­tion to the drain­age arrange­ments for this development.

6. CNPA Eco­logy Officer ori­gin­ally reques­ted fur­ther sur­vey­work to be sub­mit­ted to include tree pro­tec­tion inform­a­tion and a bat poten­tial roost

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

sur­vey of the gar­age build­ing with­in the applic­a­tion site. Fol­low­ing this, the gar­age has been removed under a sep­ar­ate High­land Coun­cil pro­pos­al and the tree con­tain­ing the bat box is not due to be felled. A pre-con­struc­tion check of the bat box is required by con­di­tion as well as pre-con­struc­tion sur­veys for red squir­rel, pine marten and breed­ing birds. Tree pro­tec­tion meas­ures and the pro­duc­tion of a pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion plan are also to be conditioned.

1. CNPA Land­scape Officer notes the exist­ing site con­text, which includes derel­ict struc­tures and self-seed­ing rough veget­a­tion. The Officer con­siders that the design, scale, and mass­ing of the hous­ing is appro­pri­ate for its set­ting. The hous­ing is set in a line which would enclose the res­id­en­tial area form­ing a street char­ac­ter. The devel­op­ment of the former school site and the asso­ci­ated former over­flow park­ing area will com­prise an improve­ment in the char­ac­ter of the site. The con­nec­tion with the core path net­work will be main­tained and the size of the hous­ing devel­op­ment is mod­est and in char­ac­ter with­in its con­text. The Officer con­siders that the land­scap­ing pro­posed would bene­fit from fur­ther plant­ing and the SUDs ele­ment provides an oppor­tun­ity for a wet­land land­scape scheme. The Officer there­fore requests the agree­ment of a land­scape plan and main­ten­ance scheme, light­ing inform­a­tion and a con­struc­tion meth­od statement.

2. CNPA Out­door Access Officer notes the inclu­sion of a path link from the pro­posed development’s SUDs basin to the core path LBS41 which runs along the south­ern site bound­ary. The Officer wel­comes its inclu­sion and fol­low­ing the sub­mis­sion of addi­tion­al inform­a­tion the Officer con­firms that adequate inform­a­tion has now been provided regard­ing its con­struc­tion and maintenance.

3. Aviemore and Vicin­ity Com­munity Coun­cil sup­port the applic­a­tion not­ing that the intro­duc­tion of new loc­al author­ity hous­ing in an area suf­fer­ing from a chron­ic hous­ing short­age is very much wel­comed. The pro­posed site is con­sidered an eye­sore, at present, and the devel­op­ment will enhance the wider area. The Com­munity Coun­cil also note the con­cerns from some res­id­ents regard­ing the impact of addi­tion­al traffic and loss of car park­ing and hope that these issues can be addressed. A copy of their full com­ments can be found at Appendix 3.

REP­RES­ENT­A­TIONS

1. The applic­a­tion was advert­ised when first sub­mit­ted. A total of eight pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tions have been received in respect of this applic­a­tion. This includes six let­ters of objec­tion and two let­ters not­ing gen­er­al remarks about the scheme. Cop­ies of all the third-party rep­res­ent­a­tions can be found at Appendix 4. The fol­low­ing com­ments have been made:

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

a) Con­cern regard­ing the ground­works and con­struc­tion works and the poten­tial impacts of this on the struc­tur­al integ­rity of the sur­round­ing prop­er­ties. b) Con­cern regard­ing the prox­im­ity of the dwell­ings to the exist­ing homes to the north of the site. c) Con­cern regard­ing con­struc­tion tak­ing place with­in a known flood area. d) Ref­er­ence to pre­vi­ous flood­ing. e) Con­cern regard­ing the height of the pro­posed dwell­ings being over­bear­ing due to the land rais­ing required. f) Con­cern regard­ing poten­tial loss of light to homes and gar­dens to the north. g) Con­cern regard­ing park­ing with­in the area espe­cially for those who do not have an alloc­ated park­ing space, and the dis­place­ment of vehicles. h) Con­cern regard­ing noise impacts arising from the devel­op­ment. i) Ref­er­ence to the site’s alloc­a­tion as a com­munity use. j) Pro­posed flats would be out of char­ac­ter. k) Dwell­ings would over­shad­ow exist­ing houses. l) Con­cern regard­ing vehicu­lar access for emer­gency and lar­ger vehicles to the site. m) Con­cern regard­ing the increase in traffic and the asso­ci­ated noise, light and air pol­lu­tion as well as safety concerns.

1. Fol­low­ing the sub­mis­sion of the amended scheme that reduced the num­ber of units on site, a fur­ther com­ment mak­ing gen­er­al remarks was received. The respond­ent con­siders that the prox­im­ity of the hous­ing to the closest row of houses at Milton Park leave very little access at the rear of the prop­er­ties, where the path is planned. They con­sider the pre­vi­ous width of the school car park to have been a more appro­pri­ate amount of space and would help ongo­ing park­ing issues in the area. They con­sider that the planned park­ing spaces do not fit with the real­ity of sporad­ic vehicle park­ing. They also con­sider the access to the site is dif­fi­cult in winter snow.

APPRAIS­AL

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

2. The main plan­ning con­sid­er­a­tions are the prin­ciple of devel­op­ment, the impact upon land­scape, sit­ing and design, the envir­on­ment­al impacts, flood­ing, access and ser­vi­cing, and impacts on amenity.

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

Prin­ciple

1. Policy 9: Brown­field, Vacant and Derel­ict Land and Empty Build­ings of NPF4 sup­ports devel­op­ment pro­pos­als which res­ult in the sus­tain­able reuse of brown­field land includ­ing vacant and derel­ict land. In determ­in­ing wheth­er the reuse is sus­tain­able, the biod­iversity value of the brown­field land which has nat­ur­al­ised should be taken into account.

2. The applic­a­tion site cov­ers an area of approx­im­ately 1.7 ha and is loc­ated with­in the set­tle­ment of Aviemore. The site is the former loc­a­tion of Aviemore Primary School which was demol­ished and remained vacant ever since. The site includes former found­a­tions and has been reclaimed in places by rough veget­a­tion and juven­ile tree growth around the peri­phery which are of poor form. The pro­posed redevel­op­ment of this site is there­fore con­sidered to accord with Policy 9 of NPF4 tak­ing to account the presently low biod­iversity value.

3. Policy 16(f): Qual­ity Homes of NPF4 states that devel­op­ment pro­pos­als for new homes on land not alloc­ated for hous­ing with­in the LDP will only be sup­por­ted in lim­ited cir­cum­stances where:

a) The pro­pos­al is sup­por­ted by an agreed times­cale for build out; and b) The pro­pos­al is oth­er­wise con­sist­ent with the plan spa­tial strategy and oth­er rel­ev­ant policies includ­ing loc­al liv­ing and 20-minute neigh­bour­hoods; and c) The pro­pos­al is for the deliv­ery of less than 50 afford­able homes as part of a loc­al author­ity sup­por­ted afford­able hous­ing plan.

1. Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021, sup­ports pro­pos­als for hous­ing where they are located:

a) On an iden­ti­fied alloc­ated site; or b) With­in an iden­ti­fied set­tle­ment boundary.

1. The policy fur­ther requires that hous­ing meets the needs of the set­tle­ment, and it rein­forces and enhances the char­ac­ter of the set­tle­ment. The applic­a­tion site is in the iden­ti­fied set­tle­ment bound­ary of Aviemore and the red line bound­ary includes land alloc­ated with­in the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan for Com­munity Uses under alloc­a­tion C2: Former School Play­ing Fields. The LDP states that ​“the land at the former school play­ing fields should be pro­tec­ted from inap­pro­pri­ate devel­op­ment. The land adja­cent to the old primary school is there­fore alloc­ated for com­munity use”. The pro­posed use of the site looks to provide fur­ther afford­able hous­ing to the com­munity as delivered by the Loc­al Author­ity as part of their afford­able hous­ing plan. This site is suit­ably loc­ated for new hous­ing, in prin­ciple, being in an existing

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

res­id­en­tial area. The site is sus­tain­ably loc­ated in terms of prox­im­ity to the facil­it­ies and amen­it­ies of Aviemore.

1. Policy Cri­terion 1.5: Afford­able Hous­ing requires devel­op­ments of 4 or more dwell­ings with­in Aviemore to provide 45% of the total num­ber of dwell­ings on the devel­op­ment site as afford­able hous­ing units. The prin­ciple of intro­du­cing hous­ing on this brown­field site, will ful­fil a com­munity hous­ing need, deliv­er 100% afford­able hous­ing on an under­used par­cel of land and the pro­pos­al is there­fore con­sidered to be com­pat­ible with the pro­posed com­munity use allocation.

2. On bal­ance, the prin­ciple of the pro­pos­al is accept­able in accord­ance with the require­ments of Policies 9 and 16 of NPF4, togeth­er with Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021, sub­ject to the oth­er plan­ning con­sid­er­a­tions out­lined below.

Land­scape Impacts, Lay­out and Design

1. Policy 14: Design, Qual­ity and Place of NPF4, pro­motes well designed devel­op­ments that make suc­cess­ful places by tak­ing a design-led approach and apply­ing the Place Prin­ciple. Pro­pos­als should be con­sist­ent with the six qual­it­ies of suc­cess­ful places: healthy, pleas­ant, con­nec­ted, dis­tinct­ive, sus­tain­able, and adaptable.

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

3. The wider site is sub­ject to flood risk which has influ­enced the design and lay­out of the scheme to a develop­able area along the east­ern bound­ary only. The sit­ing of the dwell­ings takes a lin­ear form on land raised by approx­im­ately 1m. In this regard, the dens­ity of the devel­op­ment has been reduced from the ori­gin­al sub­mis­sion to con­sider the develop­able area of the site, fol­low­ing the flood sur­vey work. The design, scale, and mass­ing of the hous­ing is appro­pri­ate for its set­ting. The hous­ing is set in a line which would enclose the res­id­en­tial area form­ing a street char­ac­ter. The devel­op­ment of the former school site and the asso­ci­ated former over­flow park­ing area will com­prise an improve­ment in the char­ac­ter of the site. The con­nec­tion with the

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

core path net­work will be main­tained and the size of the hous­ing devel­op­ment is mod­est and in char­ac­ter with­in its context.

1. In accord­ance with Policy 16©: Qual­ity Homes of NPF4 the hous­ing mix of the scheme improves afford­ab­il­ity and choice by being adapt­able to chan­ging and diverse needs. This includes the pro­vi­sion of afford­able homes and access­ible units.

2. Regard­ing soft land­scap­ing works, the pro­pos­al includes a lim­ited plant­ing strategy as sub­mit­ted. In accord­ance with the CNPA Land­scape Officer’s response, and in accord­ance with Policy 3 (Biod­iversity) of NPF4, a plan­ning con­di­tion is recom­men­ded to be attached to any sub­sequent decision, seek­ing the agree­ment of a revised land­scap­ing scheme and main­ten­ance strategy to provide more biod­iversity enhance­ment with­in the site. Addi­tion­al tree plant­ing is also recom­men­ded by the Council’s Forestry Officer, which can be incor­por­ated into any revised land­scap­ing plan.

3. Sub­ject to the inclu­sion of the recom­men­ded plan­ning con­di­tions, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to accord with Policy 3: Design and Place­mak­ing, Policy 1: New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment and Policy 5: Land­scape of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 and Policies 3, 14 and 16 of NPF4.

Envir­on­ment­al Impacts

1. Policy 1: Tack­ling the Cli­mate and Nature Crises of NPF4 requires that sig­ni­fic­ant weight is giv­en to the glob­al cli­mate and nature crisis when con­sid­er­a­tion is giv­en to new devel­op­ment. Policy 3: Biod­iversity seeks to ensure that devel­op­ment will con­serve, restore and enhance biod­iversity. Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Places seeks to pro­tect, restore and enhance nat­ur­al assets includ­ing pro­tec­ted areas.

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

3. Regard­ing European sites, the HRA con­cludes that there would be no dir­ect or indir­ect effects on the Kin­veachy Forest SPA, and sub­ject to the secure­ment of a pol­lu­tion pre­ven­tion plan by way of a con­di­tion, the pro­pos­al would not have an adverse effect on site integ­rity of the River Spey SAC.

4. Regard­ing pro­tec­ted spe­cies and hab­it­ats, the CNPA Eco­logy Officer has no objec­tion to the scheme and the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to have a negligible

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

impact on eco­lo­gic­al interests. The Officer recom­mends pre-con­struc­tion eco­lo­gic­al checks which are to be included as plan­ning conditions.

1. The Officer recom­mends eco­lo­gic­al enhance­ments which could be incor­por­ated into the scheme ran­ging from install­a­tion of bat boxes to enhance­ment of wood­land con­nectiv­ity and plant­ing of wild­flower mead­ows with­in the land­scape design. These recom­mend­a­tions are to be secured through the plan­ning con­di­tion seek­ing the revised land­scap­ing plan.

2. Regard­ing arbor­i­cul­tur­al impacts, the pro­pos­al would look to remove approx­im­ately 8 trees on site. These are a mix of mod­er­ate and low qual­ity. Remov­al of wood­land is only per­mit­ted where it com­plies with the Scot­tish Government’s Con­trol of Wood­land Remov­al Policy and where the remov­al of the wood­land would achieve clearly defined bene­fits. This Policy stance is reit­er­ated with­in Policy 6© of NPF4. None of the trees form part of any ancient semi-nat­ur­al wood­land or any wood­land recor­ded in the Ancient Wood­land Invent­ory. The pro­posed pub­lic bene­fit of provid­ing afford­able hous­ing to meet the com­munity needs, on an exist­ing, brown­field site, is con­sidered, on bal­ance to out­weigh the loc­al con­tri­bu­tion of the sub­ject trees and a plan­ning con­di­tion is recom­men­ded for com­pens­at­ory plant­ing is recom­men­ded, as part of the revised land­scap­ing scheme. In addi­tion, a con­di­tion is recom­men­ded to agree the tree pro­tec­tion meas­ures for the trees to be retained on site.

3. Giv­en this, the pro­pos­al is con­sidered to com­ply with Policy 4: Nat­ur­al Her­it­age and Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021, and policies 3 and 6 of NPF4.

Flood­ing, Drain­age and Water Issues

1. Con­cern has been raised by pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tions of con­struc­tion with­in a known flood area. Policy 10: Resources of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2021 requires that all devel­op­ment should be free from medi­um to high risk flood­ing, not increase the risk of flood­ing else­where, not add to the area of land requir­ing flood pre­ven­tion meas­ures and not affect the abil­ity of the func­tion­al flood plain to store or move flood waters. Devel­op­ments should incor­por­ate SUDs as pro­por­tion­ate to the scale and nature of the devel­op­ment. The policy also requires that all devel­op­ment should avoid unac­cept­able det­ri­ment­al impacts on the water environment.

2. Policy 2: Cli­mate mit­ig­a­tion and adapt­a­tion of NPF4 requires that devel­op­ment is sited and designed to adapt to cur­rent and future risks from cli­mate change. The pro­posed devel­op­ment is adja­cent to the Aviemore Burn and so is poten­tially at medi­um to high risk of flu­vi­al flood­ing. Con­cern has been raised by pub­lic rep­res­ent­a­tions regard­ing the flood impact arising from this devel­op­ment occur­ring on a known flood plain. The site is a former

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Item 8 11/08/2023

Primary School which under SEPA’s ​“Flood Risk and Land Use Vul­ner­ab­il­ity Guid­ance” is classed as a ​‘Most Vul­ner­able Use’, whilst the pro­posed change to hous­ing is classed as a ​‘Highly Vul­ner­able Use’. Under NPF4, devel­op­ment in at risk areas can be sup­por­ted if they are for ​‘redevel­op­ment of an exist­ing build­ing or site for an equal or less vul­ner­able use’, and in this case the pro­pos­al is of a less vul­ner­able use.

1. Policy 22 of NPF4 states that, in such cases it will be demon­strated by the applic­ant that:

a) All risks of flood­ing are under­stood and addressed; b) There is no reduc­tion in flood­plain capa­city, increased risk for oth­ers, or a need for future flood pro­tec­tion schemes; c) The devel­op­ment remains safe and oper­a­tion­al dur­ing floods; flood res­ist­ant and resi­li­ent mater­i­als and con­struc­tion meth­ods are used; d) And future adapt­a­tions can be made to accom­mod­ate the effects of cli­mate change.

1. The sub­mit­ted Flood Risk Assess­ment and Com­pens­at­ory Stor­age meas­ures demon­strates that the pro­pos­al meets the cri­ter­ia of NPF4 and both SEPA and the Council’s Flood Officer have not objec­ted to the pro­pos­al sub­ject to conditions.

2. Regard­ing drain­age mat­ters, Policy 22 of NPF4 requires devel­op­ment pro­pos­als to man­age all rain and sur­face water through sus­tain­able urb­an drain­age sys­tems (SUDS), which should form part of and integrate