Following coverage of Highland and Islands Enterprise and Natural Retreats failures to act on health and safety recommendations from independent consultants about the ski life infrastructure (see here), HIE refused to provide a copy of the latest report (they had provided two previous reports), citing commerical confidentiality and intellectual property rights. Malcom Garfoot appealed and…
Tag: natural retreats
Highlands and Islands Enterprise sold Cairngorm Mountain Ltd (CML) to Natural Assets Investments Ltd in 2014. The ostensible thinking behind the sale was that the Natural Retreats group of companies would bring new investment to Cairngorm and make it a profitable business. HIE probably also saw this as an opportunity to recover some of the…
Natural Retreats, the operator of the CairnGorm Mountain business, introduced compulsory parking charges at the end of June 2018. These parking charges replaced a voluntary scheme, that had been in operation since 2012, because insufficient funds were being donated, according to Natural Retreats. The amounts donated during each year since 2013 were: £10,426, £11,174, £11,427,…
After my post on the state of the Coire na Ciste (see here), I have been comparing the state of the ski infrastructure higher up the hill with what is required under the terms of the lease between Highlands and Islands Enterprise and Cairngorm Mountain Ltd dated 11th June 2014 (see here for lease). The…
We decided to walk into Coire na Ciste, Monday 2 July 2018, and then up to the top of the Daylodge Poma and down to the Coire Cas carpark. The ‘path’ that follows the line of the [now demolished] Ciste Chairlift is very eroded at a point above the Allt na Ciste about 100m from…
Skiers won’t be the only people amazed at Natural Retreats’ announcement that they were – after consultation with public agencies but NOT the public – going to introduce car parking charges at Cairngorm last week. While the basic £2 charge adds insult to the injury done to skiers at Cairngorm by Natural Retreats’ last winter…
A planning system stacked in favour of developers The Cairngorms National Park Authority called in the planning application (see here) for a large extension to the Ptarmigan Restaurant at Cairngorm financed out of public funds on the 14th May. Under their current standing orders they will only report on Objections to Planning Applications which are…
After the record temperatures in the Highlands it may seem strange to write about what’s happening to downhill skiing at Cairngorm and the impact on the local economy but its all related to the current planning applications at Cairngorm. The first, the application to install a dry ski slope above the Coire Cas carpark (see…
I am back from a couple of weeks ski touring in the Vanoise and, having taken a break from parkswatch last week, thought I would share this week a few things Scotland’s National Parks could learn from the Vanoise. The Vanoise National Park is the oldest in France, created in 1963, and consists on an…
While over the last couple of years I have frequently raised concerns about the management of the natural environment at Cairngorm, the absence of any proper plan for the area and the proposals for yet more inappropriate developments and the financial position and practices of Natural Retreats, parkswatch has so far not commented on their…
When Highlands and Islands Enterprise sold Cairngorm Mountain Ltd to Natural Assets Investment Ltd they did so on the basis that its operational arm, Natural Retreats had the knowledge, competence and financial strength to bring new ideas and new investment to Cairngorm. In the last week further evidence has emerged to show how laughable those…
Yesterday the Cairngorms National Park Authority called in a planning application (see here) for a dry ski slope by the Coire Cas Car Park at Cairngorm which had been lodged at Highland Council by Cairngorm Mountain Ltd, whose registered address is now Wilmslow in Cheshire. The idea of a dry ski slope here was originally…
Companies House, the part of Government responsible for registering and dissolving companies and filing information, including accounts, required by the Companies Act 2006 is under-resourced and ineffective. As a result often basic information which would help the public, shareholders or public agencies to understand what is really going on in a company is not available,…
I have been engaged in constructive correspondence with the HIE Chief Executive, Charlotte Wright, about what is going on at Cairngorm. While I welcome her willingness to engage, so far this has done nothing to prevent the mismanagement of Cairngorm Mountain continuing, while there is now significant circumstantial evidence suggests that “Natural Retreats” are heading…
This post explores considers very recent developments in what is going on at Cairngorm Mountain, following earlier posts (see here), how this is symptomatic of wider ills in how companies are allowed to operate and the implications for the proposed development at the Ptarmigan. Unfortunately being in a National Park offers no immunity to this…
I had not personally visited Coire na Ciste since HIE found £267k for a clear-up at Cairngorm (see here) in which they removed the ski infastructure there without any consultation. Having been sent the above photo (used with permission) I wish I had. The half removed unmarked infrastructure is an obvious hazard which could…
Last week, nine months after Highlands and Island Enterprise launched its so called masterplan for Cairngorm (see here), the Strathy announced the date of the pre-planning consultation event on the proposals to revamp the Ptarmigan near the summit of the hill. At the same time it also broke the news that the Scottish Ski Club,…
Following the split of the US and UK parts of Natural Retreats, the company that ran Cairngorm Mountain, and the transfer of the UK part of the operation to the UK Great Travel Company Ltd (see here) further re-organisation of the group of companies controlled by hedge fund manager David Michael Gorton is continuing. While…
Ref: NOV302727 Notice Type: 02 Contract Notice Title: Review of Cairngorm Ski Area Uplift Infrastructure Published: 30/11/2017 Published by: Highlands and Islands Enterprise Deadline: 10/01/2018 Full Text: http://www.publiccontractsscotland.gov.uk/search/show/Search_View.aspx?id=NOV302727 (Notice issued by Scotland Contracts Portal) On Friday 30th November, following the public row about their removal of old ski infrastructure from Coire na Ciste which forced…
On Friday staff from Cairngorm Mountain entered the Scottish Ski Club Hut on Cairngorm and removed the Winter Highland Webcam. I have checked and there is proof of this from several sources including a telephone message that Janet Janssen, Manager of Cairngorm Mountain, left on the Winter Highland answerphone. Staff from Natural Retreats had not…
A strange thing happened on the 1st November, Natural Retreats UK changed its name to the UK Great Travel Company Ltd. This took place in the middle of a massive row which has erupted over a “Natural Retreats” planning application in the Yorkshire Dales. This post looks at the potential implications of both for…
The financial position of Cairngorm Mountain Ltd Following my post on the finances at Cairngorm (see here), a Natural Retreats spokeswoman claimed to the Strathy this week that “Overall despite an operating loss the company was cash flow positive requiring no group support or bank intervention”. This is completely misleading, as the Cairngorm Mountain Ltd accounts…
The funicular railway at Cairngorm has always been a white elephant, HIE’s white elephant, but at least it brought some benefit to the local community. The latest accounts of the companies now involved in operating Cairngorm were published on the Companies House website at the beginning of October. These shows that the amount of money…
Highlands and Islands Enterprise are currently in serious trouble at Cairngorm. Their Chief Executive may have ignored my email Charlotte Wright 170825 and other such representations from the public, but their actions and failures are now being given far more extensive coverage in the traditional media. This is forcing them to respond and reveals that…
After the extensive coverage parkswatch gave to the destruction caused by engineering works in Coire Cas last year (see here for example), at the end of August a small group of us went to have a look at how the restoration work was going. In my view while there have been some improvements, there is…