LONGER READ: Claims Inverness road can’t cope with increase in traffic
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A CROWD of angry residents turned up at a meeting with council planners and accused them of “mollycoddling” a housing developer.
Parents lashed out at officials, saying their children were risking their lives crossing the road to get to school because the council gave Robertson Homes the green light to build houses without redesigning local roads to cope with the extra traffic the new homes generated.
They said a danger crossing spot at Leachkin Road, Kinmylies, where new houses are being built, was an “accident waiting to happen” for one of their children.
And words were also exchanged over the developer’s “failure to install play parks” and its attitude towards the local environment, with claims it was “chopping down trees willy nilly”.
A council engineer suggested ways of making the road safer but meeting chairman Councillor Graham Ross pointed out it was too late to ask for road improvements because planners who assessed the scheme more than a decade ago decided the roads were capable, which means Robertson Homes is working within its remit.
The meeting at Charleston Community Complex was organised by councillors to allow planning managers the chance to hear residents’ road safety concerns first-hand.
Robertson Homes, which has permission to build 550 homes in phases – with the potential for more – at Westercraigs, the former Craig Dunain site, was not invited to the forum.
A resident said a decent road should have been built from General Booth Road to Kinmylies to alleviate the growing traffic problem, “but there wasn’t and that’s bad planning”.
Residents’ fears centre on a “danger spot” at Leaching Road where school pupils cross to get to Muirtown Primary, Kinmylies Primary and Charleston Academy.
An irate father said: “If you stand there at 8.45 in the morning you can see for yourselves it’s getting to be an accident waiting to happen... somebody is going to get hurt or killed and it’s going to be a child, and then where do we go from there?”
Community beat officer Stevie Maclean said visibility “could be better, no doubt about it”.
Senior council engineer Ali Nairne agreed a rise in traffic was the issue and smiley face speed signs could be put up, but Councillor Bill Boyd insisted this could only be a stop gap.
Mr Nairne said: “One of the things that crossed our minds is we could consider looking at putting in additional build-outs along the road which would help to bring speeds down and disrupt traffic. We do not have big budgets, but would we be able to do that?”
Cllr Graham said the key thing was to listen to what the residents had to say and “go away and look at how we can make the road safer”.
“Could I suggest that you get on with it quickly before a child is hurt or killed?” a parent urged.
Residents were also provided with a detailed update on how the housing scheme was progressing.
David Mudie, the council’s planning manager for the south area, said the scheme had stalled for several years due to a downturn in the housing market and was “nowhere near the 550 homes yet, as envisaged”.
He said Robertson Homes was still pressing on and was “now probably ahead of schedule”.
The company has not, however, been able to deliver the estate road in the time it said it would as there is still drainage to be put in.
There was an angry reaction when he reiterated that the original planning permission contained “very little detail on how the scheme was to be delivered” and admitted planning enforcement powers were “very limited”.
“They’ve left us no green, no open space for our children to play on,” said one mum.
“We moved to the scheme when my son was two. He’s 12 now and we still haven’t got a play park,” said a dad.
Mr Mudie said Robertson Homes, like other developers, was choosing to build a large open plan play space in a natural setting, instead of putting in small parcels of play areas.
He said: “The problem is the site wasn’t doing anything for five or six years but now there are new permissions in place which gives the opportunity to develop an open plan play area.”
Residents also claimed Robertson Homes was flouting the rules in terms of tree felling and had scant regard for regulations in place to protect wildlife habitat during nesting season.
Concerns were raised in the Courier last month after reports that were not uploaded to Highland Council’s online public planning portal, until the Courier asked for a copy, revealed more than 100 healthy, mostly mature trees between 25m-35m tall were being felled to give the estate road its required width.
“They’re removing trees willy nilly, they’re destroying the wildlife and the wood and you’re leaving them to get on with it,” said one resident. “We need to lobby government to stop councils like yours mollycoddling developers.”
They added: “Who’s going to stop them?” to which Mr Mudie replied: “Stop them doing what?”
He said: “We are not aware that they are doing anything wrong.”
Insisting Robertson Homes had permission to remove the trees, he tried to assure residents that any flouting of the rules would be spotted by the council’s tree preservation officer but urged residents to report any activity they felt was suspicious.
After the meeting, a spokeswoman from the OpenNess campaign group said she would “like to see a stronger will from our planning folk” to protect the environment.
