The proposed new town in the Cairngorms – the conservation and access implications of the An Camus Mor planning application

This just popped up on my facebook..

Thoughts?

It’s going ahead – that’s not in doubt. Whether or not it’s appropriate is another matter. Some expansion is necessary and desirable but restricting hard-fought for access rights seems to be an admission that the scale of it is beyond what is sustainable TBH if there were jobs for another 3,000 folk in the area then my thoughts on it would be a bit different. I can’t help seeing it as ending up being more holiday homes, though many of the locals think it’s going to all be “affordable housing” and encourage more young folk to stay in the area (but without a job?)

Definitely not black and white, regardless of Mr Park watch.

You think the restrictions will be noticeable to the occasional visitor like myself? See talk of away down to inshriach an that, they actually talking about closing paths or just discouraging new ones?

tbh I’ve just seen it so really don’t have much of an opinion, the article doesn’t read great though, but the cairngorms is a big area, so how much impact will it really have?

Town expansion I don’t really have a problem with either, but as you say if there’s no jobs that sounds a bit mental.

I’ve no idea about parkwatch either first i’ve heard of it.

tbh happy enough to sit back and let a discussion about this happen! 🙂

I know lots of locals are expecting affordable houses, but it’s far from clear to me that anything will prevent this turning into holiday home land, just like all the other developments.

Ah, the wealthy nobs are trying a new thin end of the wedge to steal our access rights from us and they’re going to try to fire up the green lobby to do the dirty work for them.

If it’s anything like the new estates/towns down here, the affordable housing will look like something from a 70’s new town council scheme, nothing like the big private houses that they exist next too.

One local estate, which is just a big long street surrounding a golf course, called, rather imaginitively ‘Fairways’ has all the affordable housing at the start, then the big stone-built ‘fairways’ sign at the end of them, as if to reinforce to the plebs that they’re not really a part of it…

Then the folks in the big hooses start a local newspaper campaign complaining about golf balls hitting their cars, ye couldn’t make it up…. 😆

It feels like one of those awkward things – is there the need for the *local*, *affordable* housing, with jobs and facilities to match?
Is this the *best* place for such a development around Aviemore, as it feels simply like a wealthy landowner deciding that a lump of land should be built on.
It feels a bit like Judy Murray’s folly in Dublane / Park of Kier – goodidea, wrong place perhaps, and not of benefit to the (normal/not millionaire) locals…
It seems to me that there are other spaces and places both in/around Aviemore, and other nearish villages, that the burden of extra housing and facilities would not only share but perhaps benefit from.
I kind of get the restrictions on paths/accessing all the space to keep an increased number of dog walkers/kids/bikers etc off the more sensitive areas – but at huge cost to the ethics of open access we currently enjoy.
Overall, its feels odd/wrong, but I am struggling for the detail to be able to express that strongly or formally.

Reads to me like rather than ‘access restrictions’ we are talking more about ‘impact mitigation’ and proactive access management. Promote some areas for access, make others more difficult to access (the biggest impact on protected wildlife is generally dog walking, closing car parks has a massive effect on this) – nobody appears to be suggesting the nuclear option of formal access restrictions, instead they are seeking to manage impact, entirely sensible, pragmatic and proportionate

Housing developments in other sensitive areas, such as close to SAC’s have SANGS (suitable areas of natural greenspace) built in as part of the planning permission, promoted access areas to minimise the impact of the housing development on protected species. It doesn’t remove anyone’s ‘right’ to access CROW land (which most of the protected heathlands are).

It worries me that it sets precedent for building in the park and also becomes a retirement complex pricing locals out of the area. My parents are from the Bute peninsula and any house built down there is snapped up by the sailing set. As a result the village pub/hotel is gone and folk have to move away so the school is in trouble.

same as matt. but the impact of their management extends way away from the proposed development, it seems – allowing trees to fall across informal trails (which is why folk travel to, visit and stay in Aviemore)…

I can’t figure out what everyone does for a living in Aviemore, there must have been hundreds of houses built there in the last ten years.

ninfan – Member
…nobody appears to be suggesting the nuclear option of formal access restrictions, instead they are seeking to manage impact, entirely sensible, pragmatic and proportionate…

That’s how you insert the thin edge of the wedge.

Educate, not ban.

Punish any malefactors, not the rest of us.

Reads to me like rather than ‘access restrictions’ we are talking more about ‘impact mitigation’ and proactive access management. Promote some areas for access, make others more difficult to access (the biggest impact on protected wildlife is generally dog walking, closing car parks has a massive effect on this) – nobody appears to be suggesting the nuclear option of formal access restrictions, instead they are seeking to manage impact, entirely sensible, pragmatic and proportionate

Just a shame that if this is taken at face value some of the best tracks in the strath (miles away from ACM) will be “discouraged”, by their *informal” access restrictions.

As others have said, if this provides actual affordable housing, and jobs, for locals then however annoying, it’s probably a price worth paying. But without formal controls for the housing …

I can’t figure out what everyone does for a living in Aviemore, there must have been hundreds of houses built there in the last ten years.

Don’t they just commute to Inverness? Buying a house in Inverness is no picnic. That’s what I assume all the people in those big houses at the foot of Burnside do.

I’ve been following this ever since the land selloff that was done under the radar last year over towards Glenmore (same land owner/family). Don’t know about that ? Have a look and decide for yourself.

Frankly 1500 houses seems somewhat overkill given the relative density of employment opportunities. I don’t doubt there is a requirement for affordable housing but I couldn’t find anywhere in the planning anything in the proposed deeds that would enforce minimum inhabitation days etc which is used to manage down ‘second house syndrome’. Doubtful then that these would actually meet those requirements and not just be a massive estate of half inhabited house, like Dalfaber which has a reasonable amount*
For me there’s a few warning signs – the cloak and dagger sale of land, the way the consent has now been varied to remove the single control at 600 houses and these wider access limitations.

* I could be wrong.

Don’t think you’re wrong about Dalfaber. Friend who lives there is pretty much the only resident in her street winter mid-week. Personally I think the whole thing is just Johnny wanting to make money, and he’s done a good job conning folk into supporting him. Hope I’m wrong.

Make new houses for local workers in a tourist based local economy then remove the access that brings the tourists in? Sounds like a recipe for success 🙄

The affordable housing this is a delusion, the houses don’t make any money for developers so they will put in the government required minimum and the rest will be low quality high cost homes.

The whole thing sounds like a bit of a mess, would this sort of development not be better with a smaller number of houses added to some of the surrounding towns and villages as well as Aviemore, with the majority built on farm fields that aren’t as important for the wildlife and won’t be profitable once the EU subsidies stop?

Without using a crystal ball i’d expect the planning change was to manage financiers capital investment/risk requirements given a stalling/falling housing market post brexit decision. If i was a betting man i’d say it won’t ever fly as the £ return will be too low.

I found the whole article difficult to read, and I’ll have to go back for another try. Right now I feel that Rothiemurchus are extracting the urine with the changes in conditions somewhere else. I’ve normally felt happy to support them, spending in their shop for instance, because I felt they cared for the landscape. That’s just ended. It’s a small amount for them, but the only action I can take.

I do wonder what jobs there are in Aviemore, and how this might change.