Cairngorms Nation­al Park

Devel­op­ment Plan Scheme 2021

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Plan­ning Author­ity Septem­ber 2021

Con­tents

Introduction……………………………………………….2

The Devel­op­ment Plan…………………………………….3

The Cur­rent LDP………………………………………….4

LDP Sup­port­ing Documents………………………………5

The Legis­lat­ive Framework………………………………..7

Pro­ject Plan Summary……………………………………8

Changes to the LDP Plan Process…………………………9

Par­ti­cip­a­tion Statement…………………………………10

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

Intro­duc­tion: The Devel­op­ment Plan Scheme

Every Loc­al Author­ity must pro­duce a Devel­op­ment Plan Scheme (DPS), at least annu­ally, as required by sec­tion 20B of the Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 1997 (as amended by the Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 2006), the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Devel­op­ment Plan­ning) (Scot­land) Reg­u­la­tions 2008 and the Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 2019. It sets out the pro­gramme for pre­par­ing and review­ing the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP).

It includes:

• Updates on the pos­i­tion of the pro­posed or cur­rent plan.

• Inform­a­tion about the pro­cess and times­cales for the adop­tion of the LDP2 or/​and the pre­par­a­tion of the forth­com­ing LDP3.

• High­lights changes, or pro­posed changes to the Plan­ning Act that may affect the devel­op­ment of the LDP3.

• A par­ti­cip­a­tion state­ment which sets out how and when pub­lic con­sulta­tion will take place. The steps taken to ensure suf­fi­cient com­munity and stake­hold­er engage­ment is achieved in the devel­op­ment of the next LDP.

• In addi­tion to an explan­a­tion of what a Devel­op­ment Plan is, and how it will guide the right devel­op­ment in the right place.

This is Ist edi­tion of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Plan­ning Author­ity Devel­op­ment Plan Scheme for the LDP3 and includes:

• An update on the legis­lat­ive frame­work in line with the intro­duc­tion of the 2019 Act, and

• The pro­posed timeline for the cre­ation of the next LDP (LDP3)

The Devel­op­ment Plan

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

The Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (the Devel­op­ment Plan) sets out the stat­utory basis for guid­ing any devel­op­ment with­in the Nation­al Park that is con­sidered to be sig­ni­fic­ant to the Aims of the Nation­al Park.

The plan­ning sys­tem in Scot­land is a ​‘plan-led’ sys­tem dic­tat­ing the need for a plan to be pro­duced that sets out the strategy for future devel­op­ment. The cur­rent plan, adop­ted in 2021, focuses on the peri­od 2021 – 2025. It also includes devel­op­ment pro­pos­als for the 10 year peri­od to 2030, as well as longer term aspir­a­tions for devel­op­ment as far as 20 years into the future.

The LDP for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity cov­ers the areas of the Nation­al Park encom­passing part of the five adjoin­ing Loc­al Author­it­ies: High­land, Aber­deen­shire, Moray, Angus and Perth & Kinross which over­lap the Parks boundaries.

The Cairngorms Nation­al Park (Stra­tegic Settlements)

The Cur­rent LDP

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

On 26^th March 2021 the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity (CNPA) Board adop­ted the Pro­posed Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan (LDP2) repla­cing the pre­vi­ous LDPI (2015).

Under the cur­rent sys­tem out­lines in the NPF3 the recently adop­ted plan has gone through the fol­low­ing stages of devel­op­ment pri­or to being adopted:

Ι. Main Issues Report – set­ting out the Nation­al Parks social, eco­nom­ic and envir­on­ment­al issues

1. Pre­par­a­tion of the LDP by the policy plan­ners, then approv­al of the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee to pub­lish the pro­posed plan for pub­lic consultation

2. Tak­ing into account and after respond­ing to all the pub­lic con­sulta­tion responses the plan was then sub­mit­ted to Scot­tish Min­is­ters for Examination.

3. The Report­er (appoin­ted by Scot­tish Min­is­ters) then made recom­mend­a­tions (if any) for changes to the LDP. The changes were Imple­men­ted and the Plan returned to Scot­tish min­is­ters to request approv­al for adoption.

4. An appeal from Trans­port Scot­land (a con­sul­tee) to include spe­cif­ic labelling and ref­er­ence inform­a­tion on the maps that included the A9 was made to Scot­tish Min­is­ters and it was sub­sequently includes sub­ject to their approval.

5. Finally the LDP was presen­ted to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee to receive per­mis­sion to adopt at which point it was leg­ally adop­ted and replaced the pre­vi­ous LDP.

The plan cov­ers the geo­graph­ic area of the Cairngorms Nation­al Park (CNP). The five Loc­al Author­it­ies that over­lap with the Parks bound­ar­ies must adhere to the CNP LDP 2021 in plan­ning decisions for the areas of their Author­it­ies with­in the Nation­al Park boundary.

Under the cur­rent sys­tem a Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan must be cre­ated or updated every 5 years and the next plan will be due by April 2026.

LDP Sup­port­ing Documents

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

Sup­ple­ment­ary and Non-Stat­utory Guidance

To sup­port the devel­op­ment man­agers and Plan­ning Com­mit­tee in their decisions based on the LDP2 the author­ity also pro­duces a range of guid­ance that sup­port the inter­pret­a­tion and gives fur­ther detail on the policies it contains.

These doc­u­ments are pro­duced by the Policy Plan­ners and then fol­low­ing per­mis­sion by the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee pub­lished in a pro­posed form for pub­lic con­sulta­tion for 6 weeks. The plan­ners will then review and respond to every con­sulta­tion response before sub­mit­ting the (revised) guid­ance to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee for adop­tion. The fol­low­ing Non-stat­utory Guid­ance (NSG) doc­u­ments have been adop­ted to sup­port the LDP2 (2021):

• Sup­port­ing Eco­nom­ic Growth

• Nat­ur­al Heritage

• Land­scape

• Renew­able Energy

• Open Space, Sport and Recreation

• Cul­tur­al Heritage

• Resources

The fol­low­ing doc­u­ments have been pre­pared and are await­ing con­sent by the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee to pro­ceed to the pub­lic con­sulta­tion stage:

• Hous­ing Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance– expec­ted to be sub­mit­ted for con­sulta­tion to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee in June 2021

• Developer Oblig­a­tions Sup­ple­ment­ary Guid­ance — expec­ted to be sub­mit­ted for con­sulta­tion to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee in June 2021

• Design and Place­mak­ing NSG – expec­ted to be sub­mit­ted for con­sulta­tion to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee in August 2021

At present the fol­low­ing guid­ance sup­port­ing the LDPI (2015) remains in place until replaced:

• New Hous­ing Devel­op­ment Non-stat­utory Guidance

• Sus­tain­able Design Non-stat­utory Guidance

• Developer Con­tri­bu­tions Non-stat­utory Guidance

For the pre­par­a­tion of the LDP3 in line with the new Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 2019 sup­ple­ment­ary guid­ance will no longer be pro­duced as part of the LDP. The CNPA is expec­ted con­tin­ue to pro­duce Non-stat­utory Guid­ance to sup­port the deliv­ery of the LDP’s Policies

LDP Sup­port­ing Documents

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

Action Pro­gram

The CNPA is cur­rently pre­par­ing the annu­ally pro­duced Action Pro­gramme (a stat­utory require­ment under the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Devel­op­ment Plan­ning) (Scot­land) Reg­u­la­tions 2008).

The Action pro­gramme gives an update of the pro­gress or pos­i­tion of the LDP and aims to sup­port its deliv­ery. At present the focus of work will be on the pre­par­a­tion of the NPPP. It will cov­er the adop­tion of the LDP3 and sup­port­ing guid­ance that has been adop­ted or is expec­ted to be adop­ted after pub­lic con­sulta­tion. Under the cur­rent NPF3 the Action Pro­gram will reflect the most-to-date pos­i­tion on sig­ni­fic­ant devel­op­ments with the deliv­ery of the LDP. It will list:

• The actions required to deliv­er the LDP2’s policies and proposals

• Des­ig­nate the organ­isa­tion that will be respons­ible for car­ry­ing out a spe­cif­ic action.

• Give the expec­ted times­cales for com­plet­ing each action.

Under the cur­rent frame­work (NPF3) the Action Pro­gram 2021 aims ​“to drive deliv­ery of planned devel­op­ments: to align stake­hold­ers, phas­ing, fin­an­cing and infra­struc­ture invest­ment over the long term” (para. 31).

Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (NPPP)

As a des­ig­nated Nation­al Park the CNPA is also leg­ally required to pro­duce a NPPP set­ting out the man­age­ment plan for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park. It sets out the plan for all those respons­ible for the Park to coordin­ate and work togeth­er to tackle the most import­ant issues.

At present the CNPA is engaged in pre­par­ing the next NPPP which will be pub­lished in 2022. This provide the oppor­tun­ity for pub­lic con­sulta­tion and engage­ment from res­id­ents and stake­hold­ers on the main issues in the Park which will also inform the cre­ation of the LDP3 engage­ment pro­gram. Along­side the pub­lic par­ti­cip­a­tion and engage­ment the CNPA is cur­rently engaged in research that will also for the basis of the evid­ence papers for the LDP3.

The Legis­lat­ive Framework

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

In July 2019, The Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 2019 was gran­ted Roy­al Assent which brought with it sig­ni­fic­ant changes to the imple­ment­a­tion of the Town and Coun­try Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 1997, in par­tic­u­lar changes to the sys­tem of devel­op­ment planning.

Sup­port­ing legis­la­tion for the full imple­ment­a­tion of the changes out­lined in the 2019 Act are in the pro­cess of being released, how­ever due to the set­backs in deliv­ery due to the Coronavir­us Pan­dem­ic the expec­ted com­ple­tion date is likely to be in 2022. In the Cairngorms Nation­al Park we have begun the pre­par­a­tion of the next Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan (NPPP) which will be adop­ted in 2022. Upon it adop­tion the focus will shift to the pre­par­a­tion of the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2026. There will how­ever be an expec­ted over­lap in the data used for the NPPP and the next plan as these plans will run con­cur­rent for 2 years. This expec­ted start date for the LDP3 will coin­cide with the expec­ted deliv­ery of the new recom­mend­a­tions set out in legis­la­tion sup­port­ing the 2019 Act that will guide the deliv­ery and pre­par­a­tion of the new style LDP’s early in 2022.

Due to the expec­ted changes and great­er weight giv­en to place­mak­ing and devel­op­ment deliv­ery the LDP3 will bene­fit from its ini­tial pre­par­a­tion com­men­cing in 2022 to ensure it adheres to and reflects the new legis­lat­ive framework.

The Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 2019

The Act when fully adop­ted through the sub­sequent reg­u­la­tions will include a range of changes to the cur­rent sys­tem of man­aging devel­op­ment in the Cairngorms including:

• Changes to the way the Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan is produced.

• Intro­duc­tion of a Region­al Spa­tial Strategy cov­er­ing the area of the Nation­al Park

• A clear­er and more defined focus on deliv­ery and improv­ing performance

• A move towards a more pro­act­ive approach to mas­ter planning

Nation­al Plan­ning Frame­work (NPF)

The cur­rent NPF3 (pub­lished in June 2014) sets out the long term vis­ion and broad spa­tial strategy for devel­op­ment in Scot­land. It rep­res­ents Scot­tish Min­is­ters pri­or­it­ies for devel­op­ment with­in its adop­ted peri­od. This is frame­work with­in which the recently adop­ted LDP has been created.

The LDP3 will be cre­ated with the new emer­ging frame­work set out by the NPF4. The NPF4 has suffered delays due to the Coronavir­us Pan­dem­ic with a draft pro­pos­al set to be sub­mit­ted to Par­lia­ment in Autumn 2021, with a final form approved in 2022.

The NPF4 will incor­por­ate SPP being part of the Devel­op­ment Plan sub­ject to Par­lia­ment­ary approv­al. The require­ment for Stra­tegic Devel­op­ment Plans (not cur­rently a require­ment for the Cairngorms Nation­al Park area) are due to be with­drawn and replaced with Region­al Spa­tial Strategies (RSS). The Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 2019 states that NPF4 should be informed by the Region­al Spa­tial Strategy (RSS) which in the Park con­text is the NPPP.

Pro­ject Plan Summary

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

»> LDP Evidence

1. Adop­tion of NPPP (RSS)
2. Begin SEA Scop­ing & Mon­it­or­ing Reports.
3. Early engage­ment to seek public/​stake­hold­er views.

»> Sub­mis­sion & Approval

1. Evid­ence Report sub­mit­ted to Scot­tish Min­is­ters for approval.
2. Revise Evid­ence Report if required and resub­mit or begin work on Pro­posed Plan.

»> Adopt LDP

1. Changes (if required) impli­men­ted ‑resub­mit­ted to Scot­tish Min­is­ters for approval.
2. Approv­al from Com­mit­tee to adopt new LDP

»> RSS/NPPP

1. Evid­ence Gath­er­ing & Pro­posed NPPP.
2. NPPP Pub­lic Consulation.

»> Evid­ence Report

1. Pre­pare Evid­ence Report tak­ing into account LPP’s and public/​stake­hold­er views.

»> Pro­posed Plan

1. Pub­lish Pro­posed Plan for Pub­lic Consulation.
2. Pro­posed Plan (revised, tak­ing into account con­sulta­tion) sub­mit­ted to Scot­tish Min­is­ters with Com­mit­tee approval.

Changes to the LDP Plan Process

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

The Plan­ning (Scot­land) Act 2019 intro­duced changes to the pre-exist­ing pro­cess fol­lowed by Loc­al Author­it­ies in the pre­par­a­tion of the LDP. As already men­tioned the new LDP must have regard for the adop­ted RSS (in our case the NPPP).

The new LDP will have to include:

• Tar­gets for meet­ing loc­al hous­ing need, in par­tic­u­lar needs of spe­cif­ic groups: stu­dents, older people, dis­abled people; pro­vi­sion for those (lis­ted and recor­ded) seek­ing land for self-build in the Park.

• Loc­al out­comes improve­ment plan (if necessary).

• Ful­fil­ment of Health and Edu­ca­tion need, includ­ing apprais­al of the edu­ca­tion ser­vices in district.

• Ana­lys­is of areas (rur­al) which are exper­i­en­cing sub­stan­tial decline in pop­u­la­tion and the land deemed to be required for resettlement/​repop­u­la­tion.

• The desirab­il­ity of ensur­ing the pro­tec­tion of exist­ing cul­tur­al facil­it­ies and com­munity need.

• Invest­ig­a­tion into the pre­ser­va­tion of the exist­ing but unused rail lines for future repurposing.

Evid­ence Report

The evid­ence report will replace the Main Issues Report and will be the first doc­u­ment, in the pro­cess, pro­duced by the CNPA reflect­ing the CNPA’s view on land use in the Park. This will include sub­stan­tial pub­lic and com­munity coun­cil engage­ment but most import­antly will not involve the devel­op­ment industry at this stage. Once approved by the plan­ning com­mit­tee we will sub­mit the Evid­ence Report to Scot­tish Min­is­ters for approv­al. Fol­low­ing suc­cess­ful approv­al from Min­is­ters we will move into the next stage of devel­op­ing the Pro­posed Plan.

Sum­mary

The main change in the pro­cess involve the replace­ment for the need for the Main Issues Report with an Evid­ence Report. There will be no pub­lic con­sulta­tion on the Evid­ence Report once it is com­pleted, shift­ing the engage­ment to the evid­ence gath­er­ing and Evid­ence Report pre­par­a­tion stage.

Deliv­ery Plans will replace Action Plans. RSS’s will be used to inform the Plan. In our case this will be sub­sti­tuted by the NPPP, which will be pro­duced pri­or to the start of the LDP3 devel­op­ment process.

The remainder of the pro­cess sur­round­ing the Pro­posed Plan, its pub­lic con­sulta­tion and approv­al by Min­is­ters before adop­tion remain unchanged.

Par­ti­cip­a­tion Statement

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

Con­sulta­tion and Engage­ment Programme

Key ten­ets to deliv­er­ing a suc­cess­ful plan be that the LDP or NPPP rely on suc­cess­ful engage­ment and con­sulta­tion. The CNPA will con­tin­ue to adhere to the Nation­al Stand­ards for Com­munity Engage­ment. The Stand­ards are good-prac­tice prin­ciples that aim to improve and sup­port effect­ive com­munity engage­ment which in turn improves the outcomes.

We are now in the early engage­ment and pub­lic and stake­hold­er par­ti­cip­a­tion stage of the pro­duc­tion for the NPPP, which as pre­vi­ously men­tioned will along­side the evid­ence papers for the basis for the determ­in­a­tion of the main issue to be addressed by the next NPPP. In place of the RRS, the NPPP will also inform the dir­ec­tion of the LDP3. This evid­ence will also be used to inform the evid­ence gath­er­ing and early engage­ment from 2022 when the CNPA will begin to draft the Main Issues Report for the LDP3.

Our Par­ti­cip­a­tion State­ment below out­lines how we com­mit­ted to in-volving you in the pre­par­a­tion of LDP3. The CNPA will:

• Ensure people and com­munit­ies are aware of the pro­cess and the oppor­tun­it­ies to com­ment at key stages in the pro­duc­tion of LDP2. We will dis­trib­ute con­sulta­tion inform­a­tion to coun­cil offices, Nation­al Park Author­ity offices and will also dis­sem­in­ate inform­a­tion through Com­munity Coun­cils, our com­munity liais­on officers, and com­munity plan­ning networks.

• Widely encour­age involve­ment using a range of meth­ods. We will pub­lish inform­a­tion on the CNPA web­site and pub­li­cise the con­sulta­tion pro­cesses through the media, news­pa­per adverts and articles.

• Pro­duce doc­u­ments which are access­ible, trans­par­ent and writ­ten in jar­gon-free lan­guage which avoids tech­nic­al terms.

• Pub­lish an updated Devel­op­ment Plan Scheme every year, set­ting out how and when people can get involved in the pre­par­a­tion process.

Con­tact Details

2021 DEVEL­OP­MENT PLAN SCHEME

If you want to be kept informed of pro­gress with the devel­op­ment of the LDP3, or if you have any ques­tions that you would like answered, please contact:

Plan­ning Team Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity 14 The Square Grant­own-on-Spey PH26 3HG

Tel: 01479 873535 Email: planning@​cairngorms.​co.​uk Web­site: www​.cairngorms​.co​.uk

Plan­ning Ser­vice Charter: www​.cairngorms​.co​.uk/​a​u​t​h​o​r​i​t​y​/​p​u​b​l​i​c​a​t​i​o​n​/362/

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