CONCERNS have surfaced over the potential deaths of red squirrels and otters if the renamed £30m Flamingo Land holiday resort which spawned a Save Loch Lomond campaign, gets the green light.
Campaigners have pledged to deliver a a record number of objections for any planning application in Scottish history over the plans for the project, renamed Lomond Banks.
A fresh masterplan has been formerly submitted to Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park and features a water park, 60-bedroom apart-hotel, a craft brewery, boat house, leisure centre and restaurants.
An environmental impact assessment reveals that approval of the plans would result in damage to ancient woodland, pollution of standing and running water, red squirrel and otter fatalities and other environmental concerns.
The document produced by consultants Peter Brett Associates for the developers refers to "negative impacts of injury and fatality, disturbance and displacement to otter and red squirrel, resulting in significant effects at a local level".
There would also a loss of habitat and damage to ancient woodland and pollution of standing water and running water resulting in "significant effects at local level".
Residents have also expressed concerns about the volume of traffic expected on local roads, access issues and the principle of publicly owned land in a world-famous national park being sold to a private developer.
They are also concerned that a large chunk of Loch Lomond is to be handed over for the project fronted by Iconic Leisure Developments "for the sake of a high-end tourist resort".
Over 40,000 have backed a petition objecting to the project by Iconic Leisure, the firm behind the Flamingo Land theme park of rollercoasters, water rides and flumes in North Yorkshire.
The petition portal was set up by Scottish Green MSP Ross Greer who pledged to deliver at least 50,000 objects "a record for any planning application in Scottish history".
READ MORE: More than 20000 back 'Save Loch Lomond' campaign over Flamingo Land project
Mr Greer said: “The success of tourism at Loch Lomond comes from the world-famous natural beauty of our national park. For the sake of a private developer’s profit margins, that world-famous natural beauty and many jobs & businesses currently dependent on it are now at risk.
“Flamingo Land’s own impact assessment was clear about water pollution, destruction of ancient woodland, harm to protected species and much more.
"Between that environmental damage and huge local concerns about the impact on roads and access to what is now, but would no longer be, public land, it’s no wonder that 40,000 people have already objected.
"I hope people will speak up louder than ever in saying no to Flamingoland and support the calls for the land to be taken into local community hands instead. We’ll be presenting at least 50,000 objections next month as just one part of our campaign to save Loch Lomond.”
The development features outside activity areas including a tree top walk, events and performance areas, children’s play areas a monorail, forest adventure rides and picnic and play areas.
It also features 32-bedroom budget accommodation, 131 self-catering units, six private houses and 15 apartments.
The developers, Iconic Leisure Developments hope to complete the project in 2024 and say they expect as many as 80 full time jobs, 50 part-time jobs and to 70 seasonal posts to the area.
Iconic was selected as the "preferred developer" after a national marketing campaign for a 44-acre site by Scottish Enterprise. That gave the company exclusivity over the area to undertake site investigations such as geotechnical, ecology, flood risk, utilities and access studies.
The Scottish-owned company has said it hopes to build on the existing success of Loch Lomond Shores which has seen visitor levels steadily increase to 1.25 million visitors annually.
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 here