Welcome to our April Newsletter which is a bumper edition this month with an update on the Glascairn Development, lots of other information and a more in-depth article about the Active Travel Route. I trust that you will find these articles helpful and informative.

I hope that you have been able to get outside and enjoy the spring weather recently. As we look forward to the further easing of lockdown, we also look forward to developing our projects within the village and value your support.

CCT is thrilled to have received support from the North Highland Initiative for work to refresh the Feasibility Study and Business Plan for the Glascairn Community Project and to assist with fundraising. These documents were first prepared in 2014 and although the project remains very much as originally intended - to create a new heart to the village - these documents have become outdated with the passage of time. The main changes that have arisen are due to:

This work will be undertaken by consultancy firm Alan Jones Associates and will be completed by around the end of July. We would like to thank the North Highland Initiative for their help at this crucial stage.

CCT has submitted a full planning application for the development of the Community Hub and the village green. Once these are accepted and registered with Highland Council Planning Department we will alert members as to where the plans can be viewed on line for comment. There will then be the usual period of consultation prior to determination. 
 

At the weekly outdoor markets from Saturday May 1st, CCT will be setting a Treasure Hunt Challenge to guess the location of the hidden prize on a landscaping plan for the proposed Village Green at Glascairn. You will be able to check out different design features, besides being in with a chance to win a garden voucher. Join us at our stall, set up alongside the refreshments stand where you can enjoy a home-made cake, savoury, coffee, tea and juice. 

Active Travel Route Update

With the fantastic spring weather we’re enjoying at the moment, it’s been fantastic to see so many people cycling and walking through the village, and we gather there are record numbers of pupils getting to school on foot and bike. With the increased interest in active travel, we’re pleased to be able to report some more progress in developing our plans for an active travel route through the village – making it safer and more enjoyable to walk, cycle and “wheel” (covering any other non-motorised transport, i.e. scooters, mobility aids, wheelchairs, etc.).  
In the last few months the team has been looking at two main areas:

We’re almost ready to unveil these proposals, and in early May we’ll share them in a further round of on-line consultation, together with drop-in sessions at the community markets on 8th and 15th May. We’re also putting together an exercise for the primary school, to capture the ideas of the children. Watch out for leaflets with more details, coming through your letter box soon!

Placemaking
By “placemaking” we mean the street furniture and features along the route that help to make it an enjoyable experience to walk and cycle, over and above the obvious benefit of getting from A to B. We’re already engaged on a major placemaking project with the village green at Glascairn, and we’re looking at ways to integrate that with the Active Travel Route. In addition, we have also commissioned some preliminary designs for gateway features at each end of the village, and for improvements to some of the public spaces along the Active Travel Route, and we’ll be looking for feedback about these in the consultation.

Developing the route
Mostly we have been adding engineering detail to the route plans, which will have very little practical impact on residents. However, we are proposing a few more tangible changes. Firstly, the feedback from villagers has been pretty clear that the existing chicanes aren’t popular, nor were the initial proposals for alternative traffic calming measures. However, the chicanes do (mostly) slow traffic down, and we remain concerned that if we take them away without some alternative physical structures, traffic simply won’t keep to the new 20 mph speed limit. To address this we have changed the plans in those two areas, adding in a shared-use path for pedestrians and the less confident cyclists in the centre of the village, and inserting a single build-out in place of the chicane by the new Glascairn development. Secondly, we have reviewed the places we envisaged the new speed limits. At the western end of the village, the existing 30 mph sign will change to 20 mph, and we will have a 50 mph limit from there to the A9 at Duncanston. At the eastern end, we propose taking the 20 mph zone a bit further out from the existing 30 mph sign, to make sure the footpath to the football ground/ playpark entrance is safer.

Consultation
Most of the feedback we’ve had to date has been generally supportive of our plans, but there are lots of people we haven’t heard from – so do please have a look at the consultation on-line and complete the questionnaire, or if on-line stuff isn’t really your thing, come along to have a chat with us at the market on 8th and/ or 15th May.

Now the clocks have changed and the evenings are longer, the Culbokie Community Cycle Club has re-started its regular Monday evening rides, and so far turn-out has been even higher than last year. Ride lengths vary, so there’s something to suit all levels of fitness and cycling experience. We now have a couple of members with e-bikes, which is a great idea for anyone worried about keeping up – although rides always go at the pace of the slowest, and there’s absolutely no shame in getting off to push on some of the steeper hills!

In addition to the Monday evening rides, there are one or two other group rides most weeks, and the club is also planning to organise some training in bike maintenance, first aid, and possibly other topics. Membership of the club is free – fill in and return the membership form – or email cycling@culbokiect.org if you have any questions.

Open Every Day 0900-1800 (2000 on Wed) throughout the summer
Many thanks for your continued support and many donations. 
Please keep them coming.
Just a reminder that items should be in date, clean and no clothing etc please
Craft section – folk are making good use of the craft items.
Garden section - Please donate any spare flower, shrub or vegetable plants.
Everyone is welcome to make use of the shed

A new topic has been added to our History website detailing the history of the Culbokie Good Templars on the social life of the village which included the building of the original Findon Hall.

Photographs of the early days of the Senior Citizens Christmas Party have come to light and are now posted. 

It never fails to fascinate us how search engines continue to throw up new material whilst searching for something completely different. Press Cuttings that illustrate the sheer enthusiasm that the local community had for the project of setting up the Cromarty to Dingwall railway that was to pass through Culbokie have come to light. Just think we would have had a cycle/walking route to rival the sections of the Muir of Ord to Fortrose railway track had ‘our’ railway come to fruition.

If you’d like to help or have any information on these or any of our topics please contact history@culbokiect.org . 

The latest HSCN Newsletter can be found here. As usual it contains some very useful articles and information and we would commend it to you.