A COUNTRYSIDE champion has backed a bid to nearly double the size of one of Scotland's three regional parks.
The Association for the Protection of Rural Scotland lobby group said it supports plans to extend the Pentland Hills Regional Park into the Scottish Borders and South Lanarkshire.
It comes after the move by SNP MSP Christine Grahame to push the boundaries of the current protected area covering the Pentlands, south of Edinburgh.
The campaign group said the new lines reflected the original plan for the park.
In its response the group said: "It is clear that the compromise boundary established in 1986 lacks logic, as it resulted from administrative considerations at the time rather than defensible landscape criteria, so it is right that this anomaly should now be rectified".
The group said: "This will help the entire Pentland Hills range and its surrounding communities to achieve its full potential, and will secure the integrated management of the Pentland Hills for the benefit of future generations."
John Mayhew, APRS director, added that extending the boundary would provide greater opportunities for a wider range of people to enjoy the health benefits of outdoor recreation.
Regional parks are usually funded by neighbouring councils, but do not have the same planning restrictions as Scotland's two national parks, Cairngorm and Loch Lomond and the Trossachs.
The two other regional parks are Clyde Muirshiel, near Lochwinnoch in Renfrewshire and Lomond Hills in Fife.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article