Dear LLTNPA, I know at the behest of the Scottish Government both our National Parks have been promoting scenic routes and as part of this some interesting sculptures have been created over the last year or so including the structure at Inveruglas. To many people like myself though the natural beauty of the area speaks…
Category: Loch Lomond and Trossachs
Dear LLTNPA, I spotted these tents at Bein Glas campsite on Sunday 26th June at 9.30 am. They looked abandoned to me and sure enough they were still there late afternoon. When you published all those photos of abandoned tents by the lochshores you implied that banning camping outwith controlled areas would stop these problems…
One of the objections I submitted to the LLTNPA’s development plan Response – Development Plan and Camping was it used totally different terminology to describe campsites than what has been used in the Your Park consultation – a case of one part of the Park not talking to another. (See https://parkswatchscotland.co.uk/2016/06/07/park-authority-applies-planning-permission-unwanted-campsite-loch-chon/) I emailed the Park’s…
I was out last Sunday taking a look at the Glen Falloch hydro schemes which I had not yet visited. In an earlier post I was very critical of the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park for setting out no firm rules about what locations might be suitable for hydro schemes https://parkswatchscotland.co.uk/2016/05/24/glen-falloch-hydro-schemes-2/ . The…
On Friday I received a response (EIR 2016-018 Response) to the questions I had raised about the proposed north Loch Venachar campsite. This was approved in the Five Lochs Management Plan of 2012 but the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park had failed to deliver it as planned in 2013-14. (For background see https://parkswatchscotland.co.uk/2016/05/27/disappearing-campsites-loch-lomond-trossachs-national-park-development-plan/.) I…
The National Trust for Scotland, which owns two important properties in our National Parks, Ben Lomond and Mar Lodge, was in the news again last week because of its latest financial crisis (Herald “NTS faces death by 1000 cuts “). The script is wearily familiar: the need to re-organise to make ends meet and cut…
I was in the Lake District last weekend, camping in Borrowdale, where there are at least 8 campsites in the 12 kilometres south of Keswick with not a holiday chalet or caravan in site. The contrast with the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park, where the National Park Authority has granted provision for much of…
The Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority Board Meeting last Monday included a paper on “Your Park” after a request from a Board Member at the previous meeting for regular updates this year. That there is now some public reporting on how the Park is developing its camping proposals is a step forward. The…
I have now been observing Board Meetings for 18 months and the one on Monday was twice as long as usual (the shortest has been over in 45 minutes), all because there was some debate in public. A welcome development even if the meeting again demonstrated much of what is wrong about how the Loch…
Among the papers for the LLTNPA meeting today are three concerning the draft Annual Report and Accounts http://www.lochlomond-trossachs.org/looking-after/npa-board-meeting13/06/2016/menu-id-409.html For readers who are not aware these include statements about the governance of the Loch Lomond National Park Authority which are signed off by the Park’s external auditors, Audit Scotland. There is not a mention in…
The inclusion of a paper Agenda Item 9 – Reducing litter in the National Park for discussion at the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Board Meeing on Monday (13th June) is welcome. The paper makes a number of welcome statements, which are very relevant to the issues which have been raised on Parkswatchscotland by…
The Herald yesterday (8th June) carried a story that has now been recycled several times about the Mountains and People Project which is investing £6.1m in footpaths in our new National Parks. The new angle was hillwalkers are being asked to report footpath problems, far from a new idea but good stuff. What was new…
On 27th May the Loch Lomond and Trossachs Park Authority advertised a planning application to create a new 30 place campsite at Loch Chon. You can find all the papers through the Park planning portal http://eplanning.lochlomond-trossachs.org/OnlinePlanning/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=dates&keyVal=O79O0SSIJ6T00. It is bizarre that the LLTNPA is applying to itself for planning permission when the land is owned…
Cameron McNeish has some interesting comments to make on National Parks and the political priorities for the new Scottish Government in the latest Walkhighland newsletter http://www.walkhighlands.co.uk/news/political-priorities/0014950/ In it he states he believes the reason the SNP did not commit to more National Parks was lack of cash – or to put it another way because…
Following my last post on camping provision in the LLTNP https://parkswatchscotland.co.uk/2016/04/27/con-loch-chon-loch-lomond-trossachs-national-parks-disappearing-camping-plans/ I asked Gordon Watson, the Park’s Chief Executive once again about the outstanding campsites which had been agreed for the Trossachs back in 2012 and to clarify how the Park’s draft Development Plan would encourage new campsites email to Gordon Watson 28th April 2016 …
My thanks to Stella Bray who asked Patrick Harvie, Leader of the Greens, his view of the camping byelaws in an online question and answer session before the election https://www.facebook.com/ScottishGreens/videos/10154164579926170/ His response appears 39 mins and 39 seconds into the video and is worth listening to. He clearly states that there is no justification for…
Following my contribution concerning the condition of Duck Bay picnic area at 09.30 on Monday 16/05/2016. On returning to Argyll from Glasgow on the evening of Wednesday 18 May 2016 I looked at the area again. I was impressed, the bins were all empty and the overflowing garbage cleared up, the litter that had been…
The Scotsman three weeks ago http://www.scotsman.com/news/environment/loch-lomond-and-trossachs-named-top-of-uk-beauty-spots-1-4121929 carried an article on how the National Geographic Traveller magazine had voted Loch Lomond and the Trossachs Britain’s top National Park because of its stunning landscapes and called it a “Scottish Haven”. One wonders if anyone voting has passed through Glen Falloch in the past year and witnessed the…
I had never driven along the Forest Drive, a forest track open to public motor vehicles, that goes from the Dukes Pass north of Aberfoyle to Loch Achray in the Trossachs until Monday. The Drive, and the land 200m on either side of it which is owned by Forestry Commission Scotland, is included in what…
On the way to pick up Nick Kempe from Balloch Station to look at proposed Trossachs Camping Management Zones I passed Duck Bay picnic area at about 09.30 on Monday 17/05/2016, after a very pleasant and presumably busy weekend. I do not know who is responsible for maintaining the picnic area, but it does represent…
I was out looking at the proposed Trossachs Camping Management Zone with Nick Halls on Monday. Nick is a compulsive litter picker and spotted an abandoned tent on the west shore of Loch Achray so we pulled into the Ben Venue carpark, operated by Forestry Commission Scotland and picked it up. There are no litter…
In April the Standards Commission decided that Owen McKee, the former convener of Planning for the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park who had been trading in the shares of the Cononish goldmine, had breached the Code of Conduct for Standards in Public Life. They would have suspended him if he had not resigned https://parkswatchscotland.co.uk/2016/04/20/owen-mckee-hearing-standards-commission-2/ …
David Lintern, the wild land photographer who writes for Walk Highland, contacted me last week about the Ben Glas hydro scheme, above the Beinglas farm campsite at the head of Loch Lomond. He has written a heartfelt and poetic piece on his blog http://www.davidlintern.com/blog/ about this, along with photos which show the destruction that is taking…
It was good to see that the Cairngorms National Park Authority have issued a statement condemning the latest raptor killing http://cairngorms.co.uk/statement-re-goshawk-shooting/ and its well worth reading Raptor Persecution Scotland’s response https://raptorpersecutionscotland.wordpress.com/2016/05/10/statement-from-cairngorms-national-park-authority-re-shot-goshawk/ This provides all the evidence which anyone might need about why the CNPA needs to act. However, while I have a lot of sympathy for…
The failure of Aileen McLeod to be re-elected to the Scottish Parliament means there will be a new Minister for the Environment in the new Scottish Government. This post – which is responsible for our National Parks – has existed, under one title or another, since the creation of the Scottish Parliament. Dr McLeod was…