UKC

In case people missed this on UK Hillwalking, Scottish Environment LINK has produced a major report calling for better control of hill tracks in Scotland's finest landscapes:

https://www.ukhillwalking.com/news/2018/09/legal_curb_to_hill_tracks_is_req...

LINK is asking people who are concerned about unsightly tracks blighting the Scottish Hills to write to their MSP's as soon as possible as Andy Wightman’s amendment to the Planning Bill, currently before the Scottish Parliament, is likely to be considered next week. Andy Wightman is a Green MSP. The embedded links in the above web address take you to how to contact your MSP and what to say- it is easy to do.

If you are a regular visitor to Scotland from elsewhere, you can write directly to the Scottish Government Minister concerned. He is Kevin Stewart (member of the Scottish Parliament) and his email is scottish.ministers@gov.scot and the email should be entitled ‘For the attention of Kevin Stewart MSP'. If you live outside Scotland, please state that but stress that you regularly visit the Scottish hills.

The standard letter to MSPs or the Minister, which you can of course customise, is as follows:

“I’m writing to you to ask for your help to protect Scotland’s most iconic landscapes from ugly, damaging vehicle tracks.

Controversial hilltracks have concerned environmentalists and outdoors enthusiasts for decades, but currently full planning permission isn’t required if they are claimed to be for agricultural purposes.

Please support the campaign to get the forthcoming Planning Bill to require all new ‘agricultural’ tracks to require full planning permission.

Scottish Environment LINK Hilltracks Group’s new Changing Tracks report has found many ‘agricultural’ tracks are almost certainly built mainly to support field sports, such as deer stalking and grouse shooting – which aren’t classed as agriculture.

Changing Tracks also shows the current Prior Notification process for such tracks is confusing, undemocratic and failing to prevent ongoing environmental damage – including within National Parks, Wild Land Areas and Sites of Special Scientific Interest.

You can read the full Changing Tracks report here: www.ramblers.org.uk/get-involved/campaign-with-us/hilltracks-campaign

Green MSP Andy Wightman’s amendment on the issue here: www.parliament.scot/Planning%20(Scotland)%20Bill/SPBill23MLS052018.pdf

The new Planning Bill offers a unique opportunity to protect our special landscapes from further damage. Please support the growing calls to withdraw Permitted Development Rights for new agricultural tracks.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Yours Sincerely”

Thanks for this - as a Sassenach I will be writing direct to the minister.

I wonder if there is a similar campaign for Wales.

Thanks for acting.

I am not aware of anything similar for Wales but that's not to say that there isn't. The context and legal situation will, of course, be different.

George (North East Mountain Trust)

Brilliant, thanks for sharing George. It's crazy that shooting firms get away with battering in more and more of these tracks without planning permission, even in national parks, SSSIs etc. 

The ongoing Planning Bill debate offers a great opportunity for change. For anyone living in Scotland, it takes less than a minute to contact your MSPs via this page: ramblers.org.uk/get-involved/campaign-with-us/hilltracks-campaign.aspx

Cheers, 
Danny. 

Thanks George,  not only are estates are getting away with sporting tracks as 'permitted developments', as you know they are also paying scant regard to remedial mitigation of track impact, to projects which have been through the planning system.  Commonly not even undertaking the restoration they agreed to in their own planning application documents.

e.g. this hydro-scheme on the very edge of Torridon:

http://parkswatchscotland.co.uk/2018/09/20/the-coulin-run-of-river-hydro-sc...

Not only do we need all hill-tracks brought into the planning system, we need the planning applications to be better scrutinized, and where approved, effective restoration enforced. 

Estates; 'Custodians of the countryside'.........don't see much in the way of good stewardship, all I see is ecologically illiterate 'subsidy and money junkies'.

Done.

Yes. You (rightly) need planning permission if you want to make relatively minor alterations to a house, yet for some reason it’s fine to bulldoze what are effectively roads into protected landscapes. Barmy!

Thanks.

George

The LINK Hilltracks Group shares your concern about hydro tracks but, as you note, this is a separate issue as hydro schemes already need full consent whereas 'agricultural' tracks, a number of which are clearly for sporting use or primarily for sporting use, are permitted development. The Hilltracks Campaign is aiming to persuade politicians to remove Permitted Devlopment Rights from agricultural tracks so that they require full planning consent.

We have considered a number of applications for hydro schemes and these tend to concentrate on the intakes, pipes (usually buried) and the turbine houses despite the fact that the tracks are the most visually intrusive aspects. Planning authorities are also at fault in not scrutinising the proposals for tracks adequately at the planning stage. My view is that some very small schemes don't need permanent tracks at all as the intakes can be serviced via foot paths and, for many others, an ATV track, not a 4x4 track, would suffice for maintenance. Of course, a lot of land owners want a 4x4 track so they can use it for other purposes.

A further problem is that contractors are often cavalier and do not carry out restoration work properly and planning authorities are under so much pressure through cut backs that they can't check the finished work.

And then there is the growing problem of the mess being created by ATVs driving over open ground---.

There is no end to this!!

However, it is important to stress that LINK's current push is focused on trying to ensure that agricultural tracks require full planning consent.

George (North East Mountain Trust)

Good effort George, but isn't the elephant in the room the industrial turbines? Benches, tracks, berms, the rape of Scotland's landscape for nothing literally.

DC

More than happy to get writing to my MSP(s) about this*, and agree that it's best to focus on the problem of inadequate planning protection.  As you say, enforcement of conditions applying to permission that has already been granted, and the inappropriateness of some of the permissions that are granted, are different arguments.  Trying to include them in the same campaign would risk diluting the message and confusing the debate (which those against would likely not be slow to take advantage of).

* Although I will certainly be amending the standard text to remove that horribly overused word "iconic".  What's wrong with "beautiful" in the given context?

Dave,

North East Mountain Trust's position on wind farms is fairly similar to that of other campaign groups- a) decarbonising energy production is a priority b) NEMT as an organisation has no opinion on the best ways of doing this (although, of course, individual members do) c) NEMT's focus is solely on the protection of Scotland's finest landscapes so we have objected to proposals but only those which would compromise this.

The good news is that decision makers do seem to be taking Scottish Natural Heritage's Wild Land Map seriously. In the four years or so since it's publication only one windfarm has been approved which strays partly over the border into a Wild Land Area and a number have been rejected in WLAs or close to them.

There will be more applications to come (the Glenshero proposal on the SW side of the Monadhliath would lead to one enormous farm as it would be adjacent to Stronelairg on the otherside of the hill) but the future of large scale onshore wind seems likely to entail applications for more (and larger) turbines on existing windfarm sites. The biggest push will probably be offshore wind. That's not to say that there won't be more proposals for onshore that North East Mountain Trust will be concerned about.

George

Installing wind turbines is not ‘nothing literally’, renewable energy is already making a big contribution to decarbonising our energy supply. Though I seem to recall that you don’t believe that burning fossil fuels is a problem (correct me if i’m Wrong).

I agree that we should not just fill up empty places with turbines, they should be evenly distributed. Have you been to Cornwall lately? Also offshore facilities.

George, appreciate your reply. However, Euan Mearns has described the Govt. decarbonisation policy as a collective delusion and the economics of the lunatic asylum (for many complex and detailed reasons).

I will not rant on about wind farms offshore and the rape onshore of Scotland's landscape, all I would say is when you take away the people, the whisky, the forests, the fishing, the agriculture, the aviation, the horticulture, the transport industries, oil and gas, quarrying, sporting interests, tourism, mountain pursuits and many other industries like defence, shipbuilding etc, you are left with Scotland, it's heritage and culture, being defined - ONLY by it's landscape (which is beautiful of course).

That landscape is being destroyed before our very eyes. In future, generations will say, "why did they do this?"

Yours passionately (as an Englishman).

DC

You  may get a shock if you study the true economics of power generation, but it would be very educational for you. Study Euan Mearns' energy externalities energy game. Euan is Scottish-based and he understands in great detail all the economic and environmental issues in the debate.

The Energy Game: Days 1 to 13

The Externalities of Energy Production Systems (Day 1 Coal)
Energy Externalities Day 2: Gas-fired-CCGT
Energy Externalities Day 3: Biomass-Fired-Electricity
Energy Externalities Day 4: Nuclear Power
Energy Externalities Day 5: Wind Power
Energy Externalities Day 6: Hydroelectric Power
Energy Externalities Day 7: Solar Photo Voltaics
Energy Externalities Day 8: Diesel
Energy Externalities Day 9: Solar Thermal or Concentrated Solar Power (CSP)
Energy Externalities Day 10: Tidal Lagoon Power
Energy Externalities Day 11: Geothermal Electricity
Energy Externalities Day 12: Wave Power
Energy Externalities Day 13: Tidal Stream Power