Community / Plenty of discussion on whether Lerwick should have local place plan
COULD Lerwick benefit from having a ‘local place plan’?
That was a topic of discussion at a meeting of the town’s community council on Tuesday night.
Local place plans are described as a way of offering communities the opportunity to develop proposals for their local area by expressing aspirations and ambitions for future change.
They were introduced by Scottish legislation in 2019, offering communities a new right to produce their own plans.
Living Lerwick project manager Emma Miller backed the idea of the town having a plan – while Shetland Islands Council’s depute leader Gary Robinson also it could present a “real opportunity”.
But Lerwick Community Council chairman Jim Anderson had a word of caution over the workload compiling a place plan could potentially create.
Local place plans contain the community’s proposals for the development and use of communities to feed into the planning system with ideas and proposals.
They can be prepared by a community council or a community controlled body.
Scalloway already has a local place plan following the Re-Create Scalloway project, which had secured funding.
Robinson described them as “another layer” on top of Shetland Islands Council’s existing local development plan.
He suggested it could be useful to think about a plan for Lerwick as the harbour continues to evolve.
Referring in part to how the oil depot near the Malakoff may not be needed in future, Robinson added: “You could end up with some fairly big windfall sites in the middle of the town, and it would be good to start thinking about how that would impact on the town.”
Miller said town centre organisation Living Lerwick would be interested in being involved in the creation of a local place plan.
“I would like to maybe try and get something in a diary to move forward and see how we can actually work together on it,” she said.
Miller added that she was initially sceptical of local place plans but had changed her mind after attending training on the matter.
She also questioned whether more than one place plan is needed for Lerwick given the varying uses of the town – such as the commercial centre and the industrial outskirts.
But community council chairman Anderson said he felt one plan would be better, to “look at the big picture”.
He also questioned the workload involved in a plan if Lerwick Community Council was leading on it.
“There’s a part of me that thinks historically the planning department created these documents,” Anderson added.
“You wonder how much of it is pushed onto public bodies, or volunteers essentially.”
Meanwhile community councillor Stewart Hay said he was “astounded” by the number of plans in the island of Harris off the West Coast of Scotland that have enabled local activities.
“Clearly it’s working there without too much bureaucracy,” he added. “I presume it could be a driver for initiatives here.”
Lerwick North and Bressay councillor Stephen Leask also praised the “fantastic” engagement the Scalloway plan had, from children to the elderly.
He said there may be naysayers who say there is not much point, or that would question the financial spend on one.
“It all comes down to communication with the public to get these things done,” Leask added.
Anderson said public meetings on these topics can often be poorly attended, making projects difficult without community buy-in.
Lerwick South councillor Dennis Leask, who chairs the SIC’s development committee, said also said it seems difficult in the town to get a lot of people engaged in these topics.
He also suggested it would be good to engage school pupils in the process if a plan was to be created.
It comes after four events were held in Shetland last month on the topic of local place plans.
There is help and support available for any community bodies interested in developing local place plans, including from Planning Aid Scotland.
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