The French Pyrenean National Park and the Ordesa and Mont Perdido National Park are much smaller than our two National Parks in Scotland but surrounded by large buffer zones where the National Park influences what activities take place and how land is managed. In the National Parks themselves there is no permanent human habitation and…
Tag: Scottish Government
Between 18th and 21st September the Cairngorms National Park Authority are hosting the Europarc conference (see here) for “protected area professionals” . The theme of this year’s conference is “reconnecting young people with nature”. All attendees are being encouraged to bring a young person as part of the International Year of Young People and my…
The Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority local member elections, which takes place by postal vote, were counted on Thursday. While the LLTNPA has only published the names of the successful candidates (see here) the full results can be found on the Stirling Council website Election results-2018. This post takes a look at the results…
Restoration on North Drumochter Estate section of the Beauly Denny Anyone who has driven along the A9 recently and taken a passing look out the window will be aware of the extensive scars across the hillside north of Drumochter summit, scars created by the Beauly Denny construction tracks which SSE were supposed to have fully…
The gulf between the rhetoric of the Scottish Establishment on the need for community involvement in planning and reality has created a massive crisis for the Flamingo Land Planning Application at Balloch. This post takes a look at people’s response to the Flamingo Land application, considers the key issues and the implications of what…
The Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority elections In a positive step for democracy, the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority has announced the candidates (see here) who have been nominated to stand in the elections to the National Park Board which will be determined by postal vote on Thursday 5th July. I…
Yesterday nominations opened for elections to the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority Board, the only scheduled local elections for Scotland this year. (The next Cairngorms National Park Authority direct elections will be in 2019). One third of the board of each of our National Park Authorities is made up of members directly elected…
James Stuart, Convener of the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority, has publicly stated that he is committed to ensuring the National Park operates with greater transparency. One of the things I have been lobbying him on in the last year was for the LLTNPA to start publishing ALL responses to information requests…
Anyone passing through the Drumochter, even in snow, should be able to see the scars on the hillside between the summit of the pass and north Drumochter lodge but far fewer people are aware of the scars and failed restoration hidden behind the shelter belts on either side of this. Its taken me six months…
The response of many outdoor recreationists to the Drumlean decision (see here) was to highlight the hyprocrisy of the LLTNPA who while defending access rights with the one hand were undermining them with the other. These contradictions in the LLTNPA’s position were nicely exposed in an article in TGO magazine (see here). I believe people…
Yesterday, on way up to the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority meeting on the Cononish goldmine, I stopped off to take another look at the Derrydarroch hydro scheme in Glen Falloch – I had not been to the powerhouse area for over a year. I don’t recall seeing the top sign on the…
On Sunday, returning early after a short ski tour over the Cairnwell in a white out, we stopped at the Devil’s elbow, where I had the pleasure of reading an estate sign which used the National Access Forum’s recommended template and form of words as set out in their Guidance on Deer Stalking and Public…
Further evidence of the political power of landowners in our National Parks was revealed yesterday when Kate Forbes, the SNH MSP for Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch, held a reception for the Gift of Grouse http://www.giftofgrouse.com/ at the Scottish Parliament. This was preceded by an excellent post from Raptor Persecution Scotland (see here) lambasting the claims…
23rd January was the fifteenth anniversary of the passing of the Land Reform Act which enshrined access rights in laws. Behind the legislation was a recognition that any problem in the countryside which was associated with people taking access to land, from burgling houses to dogs being out of control and worrying sheep, was already…
If you have not heard it, most of Saturday’s episode of BBC Radio Scotland’s Out of Doors programme (see here) was devoted to Scotland’s access legislation as it approaches its fifteenth anniversary. If you want to understand the amazing story of how our access rights were secured – and in this case “our” really does…
Over the last year Parkswatch has featured a number of posts about the destruction of the landscape at Drumochter, including: the unrestored Beauly Denny construction track between Dalnaspidal and Drumochter (see here); the failure of Scottish and Southern Electric to restore the ground at Drumochter as required by the Beauly Denny planning consent from the…
By Bruce Biddulph (This text was included in an update to a petition to the Scottish Government to stop the sale of the Riverside Site in Balloch to Flamingo Land) Drumkinnon Bay, along with its Woods and the river bank along the Leven which flows from Loch Lomond, are steeped in history. This history was…
The Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority will, at its Board Meeting on Monday, consider an “Update Report” for Scottish Ministers on the operation of the camping byelaws in their first year. There is a cover paper (see here), the Report for Ministers (see here) and appendices (see here). The basic line the Park has…
In order to ban camping and get the camping byelaws approved, the Loch Lomond and Trossachs National Park Authority misrepresented and grossly exaggerated the impacts campers were having on the loch shores. They did this by promulgating multiple images of irresponsible campers while ignoring their own data and misusing police data which put the problems…
Following my two posts last December about the destruction caused by the hydro scheme in Glen Bruar (see here) and (here), I took a jog up the glen on Saturday. I was prompted to do so after planning staff at the Cairngorms National Park Authority were kind enough to inform me – unprompted – that significant…
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…
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…
If you see a digger in the hills……………report it! On Friday, I went for a run up Geal Charn and went just beyond the summit because the views then open up down Loch Ericht. There was a digger a little way to the south on what used to be a stalkers path into the Fraoch…
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…
At the end of August, after a stravaig over the east Drumochter hills, I looped back to Dalwhinnie through the Drumochter pass, the idea being to combine enjoyment with a look at the effectiveness of the restoration of the land along the Beauly Denny. Just beyond Dalnaspidal and hidden behind the A9 shelterbelt, I came…