I almost never watch TV but last week, in the middle of the first week of the Extinction Rebellion protest, I did watch the BBC documentary “Climate Change – the Facts” narrated by David Attenborough. The footage of forest fires burning out of control and the evidence that not only have the numbers of fires…
Author: Nick Kempe
Yesterday, Flamingo Land’s media consultants issued a New release on their revised Planning Application at Balloch. This received widespread media coverage and appeared designed to deceive. Most of the media did not fall for the attempt to rename the proposed development Lomond Banks and continued to refer to it as Flamingo Land. No-one, however, questioned…
This is the second, in a series of posts (see here), about HIE’s mismanagement of Cairn Gorm based on their latest response to my questions about the procurement process which led to CairnGorm Mountain Ltd being outsourced to “Natural Retreats”. In 2013 Highlands and Islands Enterprise excluded Cairngorms Snowsports, a sound local company with a…
After announcing a “major application” update last week (see here), the revisions to the Flamingo Land planning application appeared yesterday evening. There are about 40 new documents on the planning portal (see here), all dated 5th April rather than the 17th April when they were made public by the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National…
A couple of weeks ago the Environment Secretary, Roseanna Cunningham, announced the Scottish Government would create a new law to make it illegal to throw litter out of cars (see here). Funny, I had thought that littering was already an offence, whether or not thrown out a car window. It was also announced that…
At the end of last week Highlands and Islands Enterprise provided me with a number of documents relating to their decision to “appoint” “Natural Retreats” to “operate” Cairngorm Mountain Ltd. To give HIE credit, they have not tried to delay release of the information and relatively little of it is redacted. The documents confirm there…
Every time I travelled along the A82 last year I spotted people camping in breach of the camping byelaws in the tent free zone the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority has created between Inveruglas and the Falls of Falloch. The northern part of this was not included originally within the Loch Lomond West…
Following Dave Morris’ post (see here) on how the Cairngorms National Park Authority are trying to restrict access to paths, parkswatch has been sent some more photos of unlawful signs by readers. When a National Park, which has a privileged place on the National Access Forum, believes its alright to issue a news release telling…
In my view there is no justification for a Public Authority to commission research and then to keep this secret. That, however, has been what the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority has been doing for the last five years. Unlike the Cairngorms National Park, which has a Research Strategy and a dedicated website…
Scotland has fewer democratically elected representatives and a more centralised system of government than anywhere else in Europe, including England (see here) and (here). More and more power is exercised directly by the Scottish Government, . While the Scottish Parliament has, since it was set up, reviewed or created a number of new Public Authorities,…
Almost the first thing Highland and Islands Enterprise did after it bought back Cairn Gorm Mountain was to inform the Cairngorms National Park Authority that it wished to proceed with the Planning Application to redevelop the Ptarmigan building near the summit of Cairn Gorm (see here for background). About a month ago stories appeared in…
Apologies for the belated blog on the last Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Board Meeting (see here for papers) which took place on Monday 18th March – and, no, this isn’t an April Fool! As predicted (see here) the agenda was far too long and by 1.30pm, when I had to leave and the…
I’d like to apologise to readers for reporting that all four cases the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority reported to the Procurator Fiscal last year involved campervans. The LLTNPA is now claiming that none of the cases involve campervans and, if that is the case, it has implications both for my post yesterday…
[NB the part of this post which dealt with how the camping byelaws affect campervannsers has been corrected today. The reasons for this are explained here] The Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority is keeping pretty quiet about its consultation with campervanners and motorhomers. The “consultation” (see here) has not been advertised on…
The posts on parkswatch last week by Graham Garfoot (see here) and Alan Brattey (see here) coincided with the excellent coverage from the BBC about Highland and Islands Enterprise’s disastrous management of Cairn Gorm. This appeared on both radio and TV and while I had been interviewed for the story a few weeks ago I…
Last week the full Highland Council decided to approve the remaining three Glen Etive hydro schemes (see here). It was clear during the debate that a number of Councillors voted for the proposals because they believed the impacts of construction could be mitigated and the landscape restored to close to its existing state. While that…
Its no wonder the Loch Lomond and National Park Authority are disappointed by the collapse of the Great Scottish Swim. For the last few years they have told everyone who would listen – particularly gullible civil servants and Scottish Ministers – what a success mass commercial events events have been: Now, the Park’s most prestigious…
“Our landscape is a national asset and we believe that it should be treated with care and respect so that future generations have the opportunity to enjoy it. We encourage the Highland Council to help protect the wild nature of the glen and reverse the decision to approve these three hydro schemes.” (Mountaineering Scotland see…
Its the muirburn season (1st October to 15th April). Following my post on muirburn at Mar Lodge (see here), REVIVE has released film footage of muirburn in the Cairngorms National Park (see here). This was covered by the Ferret yesterday (see here). Parkswatch can add to the concerns about the impact of muirburn on the…
A lot has happened since my posts last month on the Glen Etive hydro schemes (see here) and (here). For almost the first time in Scotland hydro schemes are being subject to detailed scrutiny by locally elected members, informed by their knowledge and skills and the considerable public debate that has been taking place. This…
Most people travelling north over the Drumochter pass will have noticed the terrible scars across the hillside on the right after the summit. Many probably realise they are a consequence of the construction of the Beauly Denny powerline. Few will realise, unless they have read previous parkswatch posts, that this destruction has taken place in…
The papers for the next Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority Board meeting on Monday 18th March were published last week (see here). There are some good things in them, particularly the papers on “Wild Park” and a new Forest Strategy (see here), which I will consider further in due course. There are also…
This being the muirburn season – I spotted four examples in the Cairngorms National Park on my way up to Aviemore 12 days ago – it was very interesting to see how the Scottish media picked up on the fire damage caused by a dropped cigarette rather than all the fires deliberately started by landowners. …
Last year parkswatch covered Fergus Ewing’s intervention on behalf of the owner of the Carrbridge Hotel, Mr Watt, to create a new car park in an area outside the village settlement boundary where trees had been illegally felled (see here). This has been followed up by the environmental journalist, Rob Edwards, who published the…
After Friday’s post (see here) about the legal quagmire that the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Authority has created for itself through the camping bye-laws, its good to be able to report on progress from the Park’s excellent Access Team. Strange as it may seem, my understanding is that the Access Team, like the Local…