LUC is working with a design team led by Collective Architecture on two affordable housing projects for Moray Council. In early March, LUC Planners helped organise a public consultation event for each of the two proposed development sites.

The proposals for the former Spynie Hospital site seeks to create a residential scheme of up to 65 affordable housing units. This is a brownfield site surrounded by a mix of built development, with mature woodland that will be retained and enhanced where appropriate.

The second site, Bilbohall, forms part of an approved masterplan area which consists of six parcels of land under a variety of ownerships. The proposals for this site aims to create a residential scheme of up to 190 affordable housing units. The project will also deliver new enhanced landscaping and woodland features and associated infrastructure.

For each of the public consultation events the design team prepared presentation boards to inform the public and seek their views on the emerging development proposals. In addition, Collective Architecture prepared wooden models of the proposed development sites to help members of the public visualise the initial layouts.

These projects allow LUC to deploy our full range of environmental services in a collaborative approach. In addition to providing planning consultancy, our Ecology team have undertaken a Phase 1 Habitat Survey and are proactively informing the design of the emerging layouts to minimise impact on sensitive species and habitats. Our landscape architects and urban designers continue to work collaboratively with Collective Architecture to ensure landscape and environmental issues are positively integrated as the design develops for each site.

Both events were well attended and our planning team are now collating the feedback to further inform the design proposals. We are progressing towards the submission of both applications to Moray Council by mid-May 2020.

Read more about our Development Planning service.