Dr Alastair Noble, chairman of the Nairn Improvement Community Enterprise (NICE), renews calls for new plan for development of the town
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The Chairman of the Nairn Improvement Community Enterprise (NICE) has renewed his calls for a Local Place Plan to steer the future development of the town which he has argued for years has not been getting it's 'fair share' of Highland Council, central government, and NHS funding.
Dr Alastair Noble, who is also Chairman of Nairn West & Suburban Community Council was speaking at the annual general meeting of NICE citing the need for investment in infrastructure, a bypass and the town centre.
"We therefore are the body within Nairnshire to take forward Local Place Planning (LPP). We will deliver this by working with the Community Councils, local businesses, all the local people and facilitating the involvement of Highland Council, Highland & Islands Enterprise, Scottish Government and NHS Highland.
"A Local Place Plan is exactly that -it must be led by the local inhabitants," said.
Dr Noble said there had been considerable meetings and discussions on the future vision for Nairn.
"There are some very clear and easily understood messages that I think will resonate with all the inhabitants of Nairnshire.
"The first big message is 'Infrastructure First' -no more sprawling housing developments on our beautiful surrounding green fields until we have sorted
out our essential infrastructure.
"We need a by-pass and if the money is not there to dual the A96 then we still need a by-pass. Responsibility lies with Scottish Government and Transport Scotland."
On issues of sewage Dr Noble said: "We need to upgrade our Victorian sewage system and stop polluting the River Nairn and our beaches. Responsibility lies with Scottish Water and SEPA."
The Fishertown of Nairn he said was the 'most at risk' part of the SEPA area covering Highland and Moray Flood risk-Fishertown is the most at risk part of the SEPA area covering Highland and Moray and he stressed the new Nairn Academy was essential to replace the existing condemned building with a high quality new build
"We have too many empty or underused properties in the Town centre- responsibility lies with Highland Council and the private
sector to bring all these properties back into use."
Dr Noble said all the investment need in Nairn came with a price tag.
"A reasonable guestimate is between 5-600 million pounds. This money obviously comes from different budgets and includes private sector investment."
He added|: "We must address the idea of Fair Share weighted capitation budgets. All the data and information I have seen supports the knowledge that Nairnshire is being consistently underfunded. The biggest gap is in Integrated Health and Social Care budget, probably millions of pounds but it exists in all other budgets-education, leisure and recreation etc."
