Flamingo Land ‘ruled out’ by new policies, says MSP

New planning policies ‘should rule out’ Flamingo Land’s bid for £40m tourist resort on Loch Lomond, an MSP has said.

The developers say that ‘Lomond Banks’ will create 200 full-time and part-time jobs, as well as 360 temporary jobs during the construction phase alone.

But 70,000 people have now signed a petition organised by MSP Ross Greer objecting to the plan for 100 self-catering lodges, two hotels, waterpark and a monorail.

Now the regional Green MSP says the National Planning Framework 4, now approved by the Scottish Government, must be used to guide planning decisions by councils and national parks.

He said this makes it much harder for environmentally damaging projects to be granted planning permission, citing plans for parking which he says are contrary to a requirement to provide sustainable transport.

“Flamingo Land’s plans to impose a huge tourist development on Balloch have always been a terrible idea, and thanks to Green action in Government we now have national planning policy which gives the national park the power to confidently reject the application,” he said.

“A holiday park with hotels, woodland lodges and 372 more parking spaces is obviously not what we need when we’re facing a climate emergency and when local roads are already struggling.”

The developers dropped previous plans in 2019 after a record 60,000 objections, lodging revised plans for Lomond Banks in 2022.

In February the plan was revised, with proposals to build in ancient woodland dropped.

Details of the plans are on the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Authority website – the reference number is 2022/0157/PPP .