Highland Council. Again.
Nov. 29th, 2011 09:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
daibhidcIt's been a while since I had a good rant about the local area, and what the Council are doing to it.
So the Council have come up with the actually quite sensible idea of a A9 bypass that lets you get from one side of the river to the other without going through the city centre. Actually, they came up with this idea 15 years ago, but were stymmied by local opposition to their insistance that it had to go through at least one of the playpark, the greenfield area, the swimming pool, the athletics fields, the rugby club, or the golf course. So now they're doing a consultation, with eight different possible routes currently on display for the people of Inverness to choose one. Including one that avoids all these much-loved city amenities, but is much more expensive than the others.
Interestingly, when you look at the display showing the pros and cons of the different routes, this option is the one with most crosses against environment and amenities. How can that be, when it avoids the greensites and so on? Well, part of it goes through a Site of Special Scientific Interest, the Torvean Landforms. Admittedly, it's a very big SSSI, which is already the site of a hotel, a disused quarry, two farms, a cemetary, and a number of houses, but it is one nonetheless. And so Highland Council believe that Scottish National Heritage would disapprove of this plan ... although they haven't actually gotten word from them about it yet.
Even more interestingly, Scottish National Heritage's website says they received an "Application for consent from a public body" with regard to Torvean in February, and "consented or recommended consent is given". Now it could have been about something else, of course, but it makes you wonder...
(ETA: Ah, it turns out the Council got a letter from SNH advising against this proposal. So the consultation was just incompetent in failing to explain that, not fixed. Apologies.)
(Further ETA: Aaand a letter in today's Courier says that SNH now say they have no objections. So now I don't know what's going on.)
Another "fun" thing they've done is start the consultation process now. So the guaranteed six-week consultation will include Christmas fortnight, when the Council is on holiday. And of course, no-one in the wider area cares about travelling on the A9 or going to the Aquadome, so the consultation meetings will all be taking place in the city centre.
So the Council have come up with the actually quite sensible idea of a A9 bypass that lets you get from one side of the river to the other without going through the city centre. Actually, they came up with this idea 15 years ago, but were stymmied by local opposition to their insistance that it had to go through at least one of the playpark, the greenfield area, the swimming pool, the athletics fields, the rugby club, or the golf course. So now they're doing a consultation, with eight different possible routes currently on display for the people of Inverness to choose one. Including one that avoids all these much-loved city amenities, but is much more expensive than the others.
Interestingly, when you look at the display showing the pros and cons of the different routes, this option is the one with most crosses against environment and amenities. How can that be, when it avoids the greensites and so on? Well, part of it goes through a Site of Special Scientific Interest, the Torvean Landforms. Admittedly, it's a very big SSSI, which is already the site of a hotel, a disused quarry, two farms, a cemetary, and a number of houses, but it is one nonetheless. And so Highland Council believe that Scottish National Heritage would disapprove of this plan ... although they haven't actually gotten word from them about it yet.
Even more interestingly, Scottish National Heritage's website says they received an "Application for consent from a public body" with regard to Torvean in February, and "consented or recommended consent is given". Now it could have been about something else, of course, but it makes you wonder...
(ETA: Ah, it turns out the Council got a letter from SNH advising against this proposal. So the consultation was just incompetent in failing to explain that, not fixed. Apologies.)
(Further ETA: Aaand a letter in today's Courier says that SNH now say they have no objections. So now I don't know what's going on.)
Another "fun" thing they've done is start the consultation process now. So the guaranteed six-week consultation will include Christmas fortnight, when the Council is on holiday. And of course, no-one in the wider area cares about travelling on the A9 or going to the Aquadome, so the consultation meetings will all be taking place in the city centre.
