First Local Plan for a Scottish National Park moves a step closer

The first Local Plan for a Scottish National Park is a step closer after the Planning Committee of the Cairngorms National Park Authority (CNPA) agreed no further changes are necessary before it is adopted.

The Local Plan sets out detailed planning policies to guide development in the Park over the coming years and all planning applications within the Park will need to relate to it.

The Cairngorms National Park Local Plan will replace the current Local Plans covering the four local authority areas within the Park: Aberdeenshire, Angus, Highland and Moray.

Responses following a public consultation on modifications to the Local Plan have been analysed and considered by the Planning Committee, meeting in Boat of Garten today (Friday, 20 August 2010). The Committee decided no further changes are needed and Scottish Ministers will be notified that it is intended the Local Plan will be adopted on 29 October 2010.

CNPA Director of Strategic Land Use, Hamish Trench, said: “Public consultation has been an important part of the Local Plan process. It has helped us to shape the Local Plan for the Cairngorms National Park. Since the formal stages of the plan preparations started we have produced four versions of the Plan which have all been changed to take account of responses received. During the process, 546 individuals, community groups, organisations, and developers responded.”

CNPA Planning Committee Convener Duncan Bryden said: “This is a significant day for the Cairngorms National Park with this being the first Local Plan for a Scottish National Park. We have been working towards this day since 2004 – it has been a long and not always straight-forward journey but we have listened to what people have said and feel we have a Local Plan which aims to achieve a consensus between people’s needs for housing, recreation, economic development and the special environment of the Park.”

In addition, the committee agreed that a Working Group will be set-up of local people, planners, landowners and others to look at affordable housing in Boat of Garten.

The CNPA has produced supplementary planning guidance which expands on the detail of some of the policies in the Local Plan as well as providing additional information and guidance. Some of this guidance is open to public consultation which ends on 24 September 2010.

Details of the Supplementary Planning Guidance and comment forms are available here or by contacting the CNPA offices in Grantown-on-Spey or Ballater. Further information is available from the Cairngorms National Park Authority Planning Office, Albert Memorial Hall, Station Square, Ballater, AB35 5QB. Tel: 013397 53601.