Policy 3: Sustainable Design Non-statutory Guidance

PLAN­NING

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan POLICY 3 — SUS­TAIN­ABLE DESIGN Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guidance

Cairngorms NATION­AL PARK Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Policy 3 – Sus­tain­able Design Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guidance

This non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance provides fur­ther inform­a­tion and detail on how to com­ply with Policy 3 – Sus­tain­able Design in the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan 2015.

This doc­u­ment is avail­able in large print on request. Please con­tact the Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity on 01479 873535. It is also avail­able to view at www​.cairngorms​.co​.uk

Pub­lished by Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity 14 The Square Grant­own-on-Spey PH26 3HG

Email: planning@​cairngorms.​co.​uk Tel: 01479 873535 Fax: 01479 873527

www​.cairngorms​.co​.uk

© CNPA 2015. All rights reserved.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance — Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design Plan­ning Guidance

Policy Require­ments	Inform­a­tion Required
All devel­op­ments
Min­im­ise effects on cli­mate change	• Details of the devel­op­ments lay­out to demon­strate how you are tak­ing advant­age of sol­ar gain • Details of energy effi­ciency meas­ures included in the design and meth­od of con­struc­tion – includ­ing use of power and water
Sym­path­et­ic to loc­al ver­nacu­lar, loc­al dis­tinct­ive and tra­di­tion­al pat­tern and character	• Details of the exist­ing topo­graphy and ver­nacu­lar built form found in the sur­round­ing area • Reasoned jus­ti­fic­a­tion for your site selec­tion to show how your pro­pos­al is sym­path­et­ic to the loc­al vernacular/​character
Use com­ple­ment­ary materials	• Details of all con­struc­tion mater­i­als to be used in all extern­al parts of the pro­pos­al includ­ing assess­ment of loc­al mater­i­als found in sur­round­ing area
Make sus­tain­able use of resources	• Lay­out details which demon­strate how the use of land has been min­im­ised • Details of design and mater­i­als used which max­im­ise energy effi­ciency include energy, waste, water • Details of any recycled mater­i­als to be used
Facil­it­ate recycling	• Details in lay­out plan to show where recyc­ling facil­it­ies will be sited
Pro­mote sus­tain­able transport	• Details in lay­out plan of options for stor­ing bicycles • Assess­ment of how your devel­op­ment links to the pub­lic trans­port net­work • Assess­ment of efforts made to reduce the need to travel for users of the development
Improve pro­vi­sion of open space	• Lay­out details of open space asso­ci­ated with devel­op­ment and inform­a­tion of links to pub­lic open space
Max­im­ise oppor­tun­it­ies to link to exist­ing paths	• Annot­ated site map of exist­ing paths sur­round­ing the devel­op­ment site • Details of meth­ods to link to these • Demon­strate com­pli­ance with the Core Paths Plan

3

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance – Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design

Policy Require­ments	Inform­a­tion Required
All devel­op­ments continued
Pro­tect amen­ity of neighbours	• Assess­ment of impact of devel­op­ment on all neigh­bours • Meth­ods of access­ing the site both dur­ing con­struc­tion and on completion
Pro­vi­sion of private amen­ity space	• Site plan to indic­ate amount of open space suf­fi­cient to meet the needs of the form of devel­op­ment • Details of park­ing arrange­ments for users and visitors
Enhance biod­iversity	• Meas­ures taken to enhance oppor­tun­it­ies for wild­life and biodiversity
Replace­ment buildings
Unsuit­ab­il­ity of exist­ing building	• Full struc­tur­al sur­vey or con­firm­a­tion of meth­od of construction
Not a lis­ted building	• Con­firm­a­tion that the build­ing is not listed
Use of ori­gin­al footprint	• Site plan to indic­ate the part of the ori­gin­al foot­print to be incor­por­ated; or • Reasoned jus­ti­fic­a­tion for altern­at­ive site
Con­ver­sions
Exist­ing use	• Eco­nom­ic jus­ti­fic­a­tion to cla­ri­fy efforts made to retain the ori­gin­al use
Design require­ments	Descrip­tion of how your pro­pos­al reflects the design of the ori­gin­al building
Alter­a­tions
Design require­ments	Descrip­tion of how your pro­pos­al reflects the design of the ori­gin­al building
Main­ten­ance of private amen­ity space	• Site plan to indic­ate exist­ing and pro­posed open space • Details of cur­rent and pro­posed park­ing arrangements

4

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance – Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Meet­ing the require­ments of the policy

1. All devel­op­ment must adopt a sus­tain­able approach to design in order to min­im­ise long-term dam­age to the nat­ur­al envir­on­ment and to sup­port the social and eco­nom­ic fab­ric of the Nation­al Park. To ensure this, a design state­ment must be included as part of your applic­a­tion which addresses the fol­low­ing issues. Min­im­ise effects on cli­mate change
2. The chan­ging weath­er, rising energy costs and a glob­al accept­ance that a more con­sidered approach to cli­mate change is needed, means that new devel­op­ment must be designed in an envir­on­ment­ally-con­scious way. Thought needs to be giv­en to incor­por­at­ing design fea­tures that can help adapt to and mit­ig­ate the impacts of cli­mate change.
3. To enhance energy per­form­ance, you should look to util­ise nat­ur­al ways of optim­ising energy effi­ciency through the design and pos­i­tion of your pro­pos­al. This can be done by ensur­ing the build­ing takes advant­age of pass­ive heat­ing and light­ing from sol­ar gain as well as cool­ing and vent­il­a­tion. Keep­ing the main glazed ori­ent­a­tion of the build­ing to with­in 30 degrees of south will max­im­ise the poten­tial for the sun to heat and light the build­ing or for example to pos­i­tion sol­ar pan­els. Intern­al lay­out can also take advant­age of sol­ar gain — for example by pla­cing the most used rooms on the south side of the building.
4. In addi­tion, incor­por­at­ing com­pon­ents of green infra­struc­ture with­in a devel­op­ment can fur­ther sup­port cli­mate change adapt­a­tion and mit­ig­a­tion. Green infra­struc­ture com­prises wood­land and indi­vidu­al trees, open space, parks, core paths, as well as green roofs and Sus­tain­able Urb­an Drain­age Sys­tems (SuDS) which can facil­it­ate nat­ur­al flood man­age­ment, car­bon sequest­ra­tion, shad­ing and cool­ing, improve water qual­ity, pro­mote act­ive travel and enhance biodiversity.
5. Energy per­form­ance has become an increas­ingly import­ant factor for prop­erty own­ers. Improv­ing stand­ards of energy effi­ciency can reduce car­bon emis­sions as well as energy costs for both domest­ic and com­mer­cial premises. Incor­por­at­ing pass­ive designs and low car­bon tech­no­lo­gies are a sig­ni­fic­ant attrac­tion for poten­tial pur­chasers, provid­ing improved energy per­form­ance and secur­ity for the life­time of the development.
6. All new devel­op­ments must meet the min­im­um energy stand­ards set out by the Build­ing (Scot­land) Reg­u­la­tions in the Build­ing Stand­ards Tech­nic­al Hand­book. It is man­dat­ory for all build­ings to achieve a bronze level of the sus­tain­ab­il­ity labelling scheme, how­ever oppor­tun­it­ies to achieve bronze act­ive and above through good design and the use of low and zero car­bon gen­er­at­ing tech­no­lo­gies (LZCGT) are act­ively encouraged.
7. There are oth­er envir­on­ment­al assess­ment meth­ods that require high­er energy per­form­ance stand­ards in build­ings. BREEAM is one of the most widely used and accred­it­a­tion by the scheme demon­strates improved stand­ards of energy effi­ciency and 5

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance – Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design per­form­ance which are act­ively encour­aged. Fur­ther inform­a­tion can be found at: www​.breeam​.org.

1. The design, use of green infra­struc­ture and LZCGT’s need to be tailored to the indi­vidu­al cir­cum­stances of the building/​s to optim­ise energy per­form­ance. Factors such as the site, topo­graphy, aspect, pro­posed use, scale and mater­i­als should all be taken into account. In addi­tion, the avail­ab­il­ity of dif­fer­ent tech­no­lo­gies and their prac­tic­al applic­a­tion to dif­fer­ent scales and types of devel­op­ment will also influ­ence what may be pos­sible. Sym­path­et­ic to loc­al ver­nacu­lar, loc­al dis­tinct­ive and tra­di­tion­al pat­tern and character
2. What we build today will still be here long after we are gone, if it is well designed and built well. This means ensur­ing that all new devel­op­ment makes a pos­it­ive con­tri­bu­tion to its loc­a­tion. Build­ings which are respons­ive to con­text and loc­al dis­tinct­ive­ness and which under­stand the loc­al land­scape can be designed to work with, rather than against, the nat­ur­al environment.
3. Each site should be looked at as a series of spaces which relate to the exist­ing topo­graphy and sur­round­ings. These spaces then dic­tate where access, land­scap­ing and build­ings fit togeth­er with­in an over­all framework.
4. Build­ings should be sited to reflect the gradi­ent and topo­graphy of the land­scape and the scale of the land­scape fea­tures. Tra­di­tion­ally, build­ings were loc­ated with­in the nat­ur­al con­tours of the land­scape. Exist­ing ground levels should be main­tained wherever pos­sible in order to avoid the devel­op­ment appear­ing intrus­ive and more exposed to the elements.
5. Flex­ib­il­ity is also import­ant in sus­tain­able design — build­ings which are built to be adapt­able to future uses will provide a good long-term fin­an­cial and social invest­ment. The way we live and work is chan­ging, as is the way we access ser­vices and com­munity facil­it­ies. Address­ing this in the design and loc­a­tion of new devel­op­ment is essen­tial to main­tain­ing and enhan­cing the Nation­al Park’s var­ied and dis­tinct­ive com­munit­ies. Build­ings should there­fore be fit for pur­pose but able to func­tion effect­ively, even when our life­styles change.
6. You should there­fore demon­strate how your pro­posed devel­op­ment is sited and designed to allow for future changes to intern­al lay­out or extern­al exten­sions which will res­ult in a longer, more use­ful lifespan of the build­ing. Using con­struc­tion tech­niques which enable sig­ni­fic­ant changes to be made eas­ily to the build­ing will help to extend the building’s use for example non- struc­tur­al par­ti­tions which can be eas­ily removed or re-posi­tioned to cre­ate new spaces.
7. Some build­ings are delib­er­ately built for short-term use. In this case the build­ing should be designed to enable effect­ive re-use or recyc­ling of its components.
8. Flex­ible design should also allow for home work­ing, wheth­er in tra­di­tion­al indus­tries and sup­port­ing ser­vices or from new oppor­tun­it­ies which are pos­sible with the increas­ing range of com­mu­nic­a­tion tech­no­logy now avail­able. 6

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance – Policy 3 Sustainable

1. With­in the devel­op­ment site you must include inform­a­tion on access, egress of vehicles, amen­ity space and oth­er open space. Use com­ple­ment­ary materials
2. New devel­op­ment should reflect the tra­di­tion­al mater­i­als and work­man­ship evid­ent in the Nation­al Park, and take on board innov­a­tion, con­tem­por­ary design and mod­ern meth­ods of con­struc­tion, In choos­ing the mater­i­als for your devel­op­ment you will need to strike a bal­ance between sourcing mater­i­als loc­ally and bring­ing in spe­cial­ised products which will optim­ise the sus­tain­ab­il­ity and long- term per­form­ance of the development.
3. Whilst new devel­op­ments do not need to copy past styles, the impos­i­tion of stand­ard off-the-shelf designs (found across the coun­try) will increas­ingly erode the unique char­ac­ter­ist­ics for which the Nation­al Park is renowned. New devel­op­ment with­in the Nation­al Park should there­fore be designed with its set­ting firmly in mind.
4. You should demon­strate that your devel­op­ment will include low impact build­ing mater­i­als. This may include recycled or pre­vi­ously used mater­i­als, for example sec­ond­ary aggreg­ates, or new mater­i­als which have used min­im­al energy in their pro­duc­tion and trans­port­a­tion to the site such as loc­al tim­ber. Make sus­tain­able use of resources
5. All new devel­op­ment should incor­por­ate the most sus­tain­able sys­tems of energy, water and waste man­age­ment to reduce pres­sure on the infra­struc­ture with­in the Nation­al Park. Most import­antly this means redu­cing use of resources through the design of the devel­op­ment, and min­im­ising reli­ance on resources dur­ing the life of the building.
6. Using devel­op­ment land effi­ciently is an import­ant part of this. You should there­fore site and design your pro­pos­al in a way which does not waste the land avail­able. Facil­it­ate recycling
7. Scotland’s Zero Waste Plan seeks to min­im­ise waste in gen­er­al and reduce the amount of waste going to land­fill. Developers are there­fore required to provide for the segreg­a­tion of waste and space should there­fore be provided for the stor­age of appro­pri­ate waste con­tain­ers. You should also con­sider options to carry out com­post­ing with­in the devel­op­ment site. Pro­mote sus­tain­able transport
8. New devel­op­ment usu­ally cre­ates the need to travel, includ­ing the deliv­ery of mater­i­als to a con­struc­tion site or the need for res­id­ents to travel to reach ser­vices and com­munity facilities.
9. New devel­op­ment should be loc­ated to allow people to use exist­ing sus­tain­able trans­port ini­ti­at­ives (both motor­ised and non- motor­ised ini­ti­at­ives), and to cre­ate new multi-use links where appro­pri­ate. Con­sid­er­a­tion should be giv­en to loc­al and nation­al cycle action plans and Act­ive Travel Audits where avail­able (such as the HITRANS Aviemore Act­ive travel Audit). It may also be pos­sible to cre­ate a design which helps reduce the need to travel – for example incor­por­at­ing fea­tures to allow home- work­ing. You should also con­sider innov­at­ive options, for example through ​‘com­munity cars’ and car shar­ing, or mak­ing it easy for users of the devel­op­ment to recharge elec­tric vehicles at con­veni­ent points. 7

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance – Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design

1. When con­sid­er­ing approaches to trans­port for any devel­op­ment, per­son­al travel should be placed in a hier­archy which puts motor­ised modes of travel after walk­ing, cyc­ling and pub­lic trans­port. Your pro­pos­al should also include adequate con­sid­er­a­tion of means to store cycles, either with­in the build­ing, or with­in the amen­ity space asso­ci­ated with it.
2. A Trans­port Assess­ment pre­pared in con­sulta­tion with Trans­port Scot­land will be required, where trans­port impacts of the devel­op­ment are con­sidered significant.
3. If a new or improved made-up pub­lic road is required then the pro­posed devel­op­ment must not be occu­pied until the road is con­struc­ted to a stand­ard which sat­is­fies the rel­ev­ant roads author­ity. It is there­fore recom­mend that you dis­cuss the access require­ments for the pro­posed devel­op­ment at an early stage with the rel­ev­ant roads author­ity to ensure that the appro­pri­ate design cri­ter­ia are addressed in your pro­pos­al. 28. Improve pro­vi­sion of open space Where your pro­pos­al impacts on exist­ing pub­lic or oth­er open space, you must con­sider how best to link to this, and take all oppor­tun­it­ies to improve exist­ing pro­vi­sion. This may include design­ing your pro­pos­al to allow easy access to exist­ing space; pro­tect­ing that space from adverse impacts as a res­ult of the new devel­op­ment; and where pos­sible, adding to exist­ing pro­vi­sion with any land which is not required by the development.
4. In the case of res­id­en­tial devel­op­ment, a typ­ic­al stand­ard of 20 per cent of the over­all site area will be required for open space. The actu­al types and mix­tures of open space for a par­tic­u­lar devel­op­ment will depend on the poten­tial and needs of the site and the most appro­pri­ate way of com­ple­ment­ing or improv­ing what already exists.
5. The required open space should be care­fully designed to ensure that it is integ­ral to the over­all design concept. This should include ensur­ing that it com­ple­ments exist­ing land­scape char­ac­ter, is access­ible and incor­por­ates appro­pri­ate pro­vi­sion for chil­dren and wild­life. Max­im­ise oppor­tun­it­ies to link to exist­ing paths
6. You must demon­strate that you have con­sidered how you will link your pro­pos­al to the exist­ing path net­work. This should include an assess­ment of the cur­rent net­work, includ­ing core paths, the dis­tance of your site to it, and the means by which users of the devel­op­ment would access the exist­ing paths, includ­ing any extern­al links from the site. Your pro­pos­al must be con­sist­ent with the Scot­tish Out­door Access Code and the Core Paths Plan. Core path network
7. The Core Paths Plan iden­ti­fies a net­work of paths which offer a wide range of high qual­ity out­door access oppor­tun­it­ies. 8

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance – Policy 3 Sustainable

1. In ensur­ing your devel­op­ment is con­sist­ent with the Core Paths Plan you must con­sider how you can con­trib­ute to its vis­ion and object­ives by: • tak­ing oppor­tun­it­ies to link and expand the exist­ing path net­work to the wider coun­tryside and help to provide safe off-road access to loc­al ser­vices; • avoid mov­ing or re-rout­ing core paths where pos­sible. If your pro­pos­al will affect the line of a core path you must dis­cuss altern­at­ives with the Access Author­ity pri­or to the sub­mis­sion of your plan­ning application.
2. The Core Paths Plan can be found at: www​.cairngorms​.co​.uk Pro­tect amen­ity of neighbours
3. A new build­ing should be a good neigh­bor to exist­ing build­ings in two ways. Firstly, its sit­ing should take account of and be sym­path­et­ic to the exist­ing lay­out of oth­er build­ings in the area. Secondly, the new build­ing should not detract from the set­ting, aspect or pri­vacy of exist­ing build­ings. This is par­tic­u­larly import­ant where hous­ing devel­op­ment is pro­posed near to exist­ing farm build­ings which are in use because of pos­sible prob­lems of nuisance.
4. It is import­ant that new devel­op­ment is com­pat­ible with the exist­ing uses on and adja­cent to the pro­posed devel­op­ment site.
5. You must con­sider the impact of the pro­posed devel­op­ment on the exist­ing and sur­round­ing prop­er­ties par­tic­u­larly in terms of over­look­ing and loss of pri­vacy. Whilst the major­ity of res­id­en­tial prop­er­ties are over­looked to a cer­tain degree the extent of this depends on a range of factors. You should con­sider these factors in your devel­op­ment pro­pos­al, ie the prox­im­ity, height and ori­ent­a­tion of oth­er prop­er­ties, vis­ib­il­ity from pub­lic spaces and the exist­ence of bound­ar­ies and poten­tial for screening.
6. To enable a reas­on­able level of pri­vacy and amen­ity to be achieved you should ensure that your pro­posed devel­op­ment is loc­ated with­in a reas­on­able dis­tance of the exist­ing prop­er­ties with­in a build­ing group. The space between the new devel­op­ment and exist­ing pro­pri­et­ies should com­ple­ment and be guided by the spa­cing between exist­ing prop­er­ties with­in the group. In the case of res­id­en­tial devel­op­ment, a min­im­um 18m pri­vacy zone should be main­tained between win­dows of prin­ciple rooms when dir­ectly oppos­ite. This dis­tance can be reduced when the 39. 40. 41. win­dows are at an angle to each oth­er. Where this dis­tance can­not be met then over­look­ing may be reduced by the erec­tion of screen­ing such as walls or fences, use of obscure glaz­ing to win­dows and doors, or using high level win­dows or roof lights. These dis­tances may also not be appro­pri­ate if your pro­posed devel­op­ment is set where dwell­ing front­ages are already exposed to pub­lic view. Any new devel­op­ment in such set­tings should fol­low the estab­lished line and spa­cing of exist­ing dwell­ings to com­ple­ment its set­ting. Over­look­ing and over­shad­ow­ing of adjoin­ing gar­dens can also impact on pri­vacy and enjoy­ment of amen­ity. You should take this into account when decid­ing on the loc­a­tion of your pro­posed dwell­ing on the devel­op­ment site. Access to sun­light is an import­ant con­sid­er­a­tion and dif­fers accord­ing to the time of day and year. Your devel­op­ment pro­pos­al 9

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan Non-stat­utory Plan­ning Guid­ance – Policy 3 Sus­tain­able Design should not res­ult in a sig­ni­fic­ant loss of sun­light to exist­ing build­ings at any time of year. Pro­vi­sion of private amen­ity space

1. The amen­ity space asso­ci­ated with your devel­op­ment should be suf­fi­cient to meet the needs arising from the spe­cif­ic devel­op­ment pro­pos­al. It should be integ­ral to the design of the built ele­ments of the pro­pos­al, and should not be designed as an afterthought.
2. New houses in build­ing groups and in infill situ­ations must be sited and designed to provide adequate cur­til­ages, to ensure both an appro­pri­ate ​‘fit’ with the group and the pro­vi­sion and main­ten­ance of an adequate level of res­id­en­tial amen­ity for the exist­ing and new dwellings.
3. In the case of hous­ing devel­op­ment, the amount of private out­door space provided should reflect the size of the pro­posed dwell­ing. As a guide for a 3‑bedroomed dwell­ing, 70 – 90 square metres is required; for a 2‑bedroomed prop­erty 40 – 60 square metres will be required.
4. The design and land­scap­ing of the amen­ity space can also help ensure a good fit with the land­scape, and can improve shel­ter on exposed sites.
5. It must have a site suf­fi­cient to provide adequate park­ing and man­oeuv­er­ing of vehicles to allow for­ward facing egress from the access. The amount required will be depend­ent on the nature of the devel­op­ment. You must there­fore ensure that you have con­sidered this pri­or to the sub­mis­sion of any applic­a­tion, and incor­por­ated the require­ment into the over­all design of the site.
6. In the case of hous­ing devel­op­ments, each single house should have a min­im­um of two car park­ing spaces. A gar­age will not be accep­ted as con­trib­ut­ing to the num­ber of park­ing spaces for the devel­op­ment. Where access is dir­ect on to a clas­si­fied road, a turn­ing space will also be required with­in the site and a lay-by may be required for vis­it­ing ser­vice vehicles where the pub­lic road might oth­er­wise be obstructed.
7. Where an access is to serve five or more houses, the stand­ard of access must be con­struc­ted or upgraded to that of a pub­lic road. As part of this stand­ard, street light­ing will nor­mally be required. How­ever, your devel­op­ment pro­pos­al should seek to min­im­ise light pol­lu­tion and oth­er visu­al impacts from light­ing infrastructure.
8. For all hous­ing devel­op­ments you must demon­strate that your design provides for amen­ity and neigh­bour­li­ness. It must accom­mod­ate appro­pri­ate pub­lic open space and private amen­ity space includ­ing garden ground, space for dry­ing clothes and stor­age of refuse and recyc­ling bins. It must also include the required park­ing and turn­ing areas. Enhance biodiversity
9. There are often oppor­tun­it­ies in, on and around a devel­op­ment site to enhance biod­iversity. Some can be quick and simple, oth­ers more com­plex and require design and con­struc­tion. Ideas range from the pro­vi­sion of a pond on site to cre­ation of per­man­ent nest­ing for bats, birds and invertebrates.
10. Your pro­pos­al must con­sider how best to exploit the oppor­tun­it­ies which come as a res­ult of the devel­op­ment, and what meas­ures are to be included to fur­ther biod­iversity. 10