ONE of Scotland's best known dairies has submitted fresh plans for a controversial new "town" on green belt land.
The backers of the Airthrey Green development in Bridge of Allan, Stirlingshire, said the multi-million project will bring 600 needed homes and hundreds of new jobs to the area.
Graham's The Family Dairy and housing developer Mactaggart & Mickel Homes said the move would also mean school and infrastructure provision as well as shops and community facilities.
The plan has been criticised by some nearby residents and Green councillor Mark Ruskell claimed the project has not been modified enough to satisfy the critics.
Robert Graham, managing director of Graham's The Family Dairy, said the plan would mean a new £20m dairy that would secure 400 jobs and create 450.
He said: "Airthrey Green is a deliverable project which not only meets a shortfall in housing land requirements in the Stirling area, but enables the delivery of a new purpose built dairy and new product development facility in Stirling.
"Our proposals offer wonderful social and economic opportunities for Bridge of Allan and Causewayhead, while protecting the unique character and identity of these communities, in a planned and considered manner."
A public park with footpaths and cycle ways will remain designated green belt and features a flood alleviation scheme to address localised flooding in the area while protecting existing properties under flood risk in Bridge of Allan and Causewayhead.
As well as the new dairy it is hoped the plan will help finance a food and research facility on a purpose built location in Stirling.
Mr Ruskell, the Green councillor for Bridge of Allan, said: "Stirling's Local Development Plan has comprehensively rejected arguments for major housing development on the iconic green belt of Airthrey Kerse after a democratic process that has lasted years."
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