Gartnafuaran Woods

Gartnafuaran Woods: Exploring our Options.

Background

The BLS Community Trust were approached in 2020 by a small group of Balquhidder residents who are keen to purchase and develop a small area of woodland near Gartnafuaran Forest, Balquhidder, for the benefit of the community, namely for recreation and environmental education.

BLS Community Trust has agreed to work with this group of residents to take the project forward to the next steps. This comprises supporting and facilitating a community consultation, which will gauge and obtain support for a Feasibility Study. This Feasibility Study will investigate how suitable the purchase and development of the site would be for community benefit.

The results of the community consultation and Feasibility Study will determine whether the project will go forward. For more detailed information please click here for the Outline Project Proposal.

What site?

The proposed site runs to c0.65ha and is located c850m to the south-east of Balquhidder Village Hall, immediately to the east of the Calair Burn, and is accessed by the Gartnafuaran Forest track from the Stronslaney back road between Strathyre and Balquhidder.

It comprises mixed woodland, including sliver birch, willow, sitka spruce, and a few Scots Pine. There are significant boggy areas, with sphagnum moss, heathers and some rhododendron, as well as some drier areas covered in heathers and tussocky grass.

What next?

Our main aim is to explore the possibility of purchasing and developing the site through a Community Consultation and Feasibility Study. This will be delivered via the following:

The BLS Community Trust will undertake a thorough Community Consultation to gage support to secure funds and commission a Feasibility Study - this will be done in the main through a Google Form, see below for details.
If the results of the Community Consultation are positive, we can work towards securing funding for a Feasibility Study.
And finally, we will commission a suitable consultant to undertake a Feasibility Study into the purchase and development of the site.

If you have any questions about the project please contact Kelly Clapperton at blsctmail@gmail.com

Update: Community Consultation Results

Thank you to everyone who took part in the survey. We had 87 responses across the three communities, with 79.3% voting 'yes' to the Feasibility Study Proposal. A full summary of the results can be found here.

Our next steps are to develop a tender brief which will outline the areas that need investigation. Your suggestions and concerns will be included in this. We will then secure funding and put the brief out to tender to suitable consultants. We would like to have the Feasibility Study completed by the end of 2021, however these things always take longer than we would like.

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