Wild Land News no 56, Winter 2002/2003

Policies for Scottish Wild Land Article

Fiona Anderson examines the policy papers on wild land produced by three major organisations.

The International Year of Mountains in 2002 has encouraged several organisations in Scotland to go into print about the guidelines they use or intend to use for their own management or use of wild land areas. This is a subject central to our concerns in SWLG. Articles by two organisations, Scottish Natural Heritage and the National Trust for Scotland, together with one by a former President of the Mountaineering Council of Scotland, appear in our recently published booklet Scotland's Wild Land - What Future? They reflect a concern that has been growing in several countries with remote mountain areas. In Scotland Percy Unna of the Scottish Mountaineering Club set out principles for "maintaining land in its primitive condition" as long ago as 1937, and active voluntary organisations like ourselves in SWLG and the John Muir Trust were set up in response to perceived threats to wild land from particular development proposals, from the late 1960s onwards. These threats result from modern lifestyles, particularly increased mobility in forms of recreation and tourism, location of work and residence, or ways of managing estate land, and from forces of economic and land use change such as remote mineral development, afforestation, telecom masts or increased priority for renewable energy - wind turbines and hydro-electric schemes. But it was the last decade of the 20th century before the extent of these threats finally persuaded the public agencies that respond to development proposals or manage large areas of land in the public interest to formalise their policies. It took as long as this because the value of wildness as a national asset is not easy to define, and is contentious in many remote parts of Scotland.

Mountaineering Council of Scotland

A single interest voluntary organisation, the MCofS was actually the first to approve a suite of policies in successive AGMs from 1989 to 1995 for Access and Conservation of the hills, including policies for forestry. They realised that access and conservation are inseparable, that the quality of the mountaineering experience has become as much of a key concern as access itself. On Development in Mountain Areas their policy is to oppose generally developments which are large scale, insensitively sited, which would concentrate patterns of activity and particularly which would reduce the ever-decreasing pool of wild land in Scotland - for example proposals requiring access roads. As a rule of thumb they define land which is 5 kilometres, or one hour's walk, from a public road as remote, though they reserve the right to define other land as remote (such as some rough, uncultivated land eg Glen Torridon, Glencoe or Rannoch Moor that is effectively difficult of access but abuts a main road,) and will there consider cases on their merits.

On Footpaths and Erosion and on Hill Tracks and Vehicles they are most concerned at the reduction in the quantity of wild land remaining in Scotland resulting from the bulldozing of hill tracks, but also cases of new footpaths, chairlifts and bridges. They favour the long walk in as the best means of protecting remote and fragile land, and will resist any development of footpaths if it falls within a remote area, (as defined earlier), except where footpath repair becomes necessary to prevent further erosion. They will oppose any hill track development that erodes remoteness, as remoteness is in itself a precious resource that they have a duty to preserve, and also an effective method of conserving the mountain environment. They will seek removal of unnecessary hill- tracks and restriction of off track use of four-wheel-drive vehicles, ATVs etc as well as use of footpaths by motorcycles or mountain bikes, by means of bye-laws, user codes and other educational devices. They are also concerned about the emphasis placed in guidebooks and other publications on certain routes up hills or into remote land which tends to channel walkers and increase erosion, and will attempt to use information management techniques to redress this.

Scottish Natural Heritage

SNH as the Governmemnt's advisor on natural heritage matters has been working for some time on a policy for Wildness in Scotland's Countryside, following publication of NPPG 14 Natural Heritage by the Scottish Office in 1998. This stated that "some of Scotland's remoter mountain and coastal areas possess an elemental quality from which many people derive psychological and spiritual benefits. Such areas are very sensitive to any form of development or intrusive human activity and planning authorities should take great care to safeguard their wild land character." Wild Land is defined as "uninhabited and often relatively inaccessible countryside where the influence of human activity on the character and quality of the environment has been minimal."

SNH's policy appeared as a consultative draft in 2001, and was finalised in August 2002. Its approach is to define wildness as a quality that can be enjoyed in the countryside more widely than only in the core wild land areas of the north and west, ie the places where wildness is best expressed. Relative wildness can also be found in more managed countryside, even close to towns, because wildness is a quality experienced by people in different ways in response to places of a certain character, or according to their experience or sensitivity. The attributes of seemingly natural terrain, drama or beauty in the landscape, absence of human artefacts or structures, a sense of inspiration or awe, a degree of physical challenge, a feeling of isolation, sanctuary or solitude, and a sufficient extent of area - or combinations of these attributes can be experienced in a number of different locations in the countryside not solely dependent on remoteness.

Defining wild land is particularly difficult when perception of it varies between individuals, but is necessary to enable Councils to conserve and protect their valued areas and to determine where development may or should not go. A mechanistic approach, which assumes that mechanised access to remote areas is a significant threshold to people's perceptions of human intervention, identifies core areas of wild land mostly in north and west Scotland at varying distances, typically 5 kms from the public road network. If the analysis extends to areas distant from any motorable road, public or private, the core areas tend to become fragmented. But the previous definition, first used by Dr R Aitken in 1969, and by MCofS above, includes most parts of Scotland which have been judged by experts, including the National Scenic Areas, as the finest of our wild land. They are not all mountainous, and include areas such as the northern peatlands, which have strong qualities of sanctuary and are of high aesthetic quality and wildlife value.

SNH goes on to define the common physical characteristics which planning authorities might use to identify wild land areas. These include remoteness, ruggedness, and absence of recent human construction. They are also typically dominated by functioning "natural" habitats and landform processes, and they will tend to be extensive, though some smaller areas or islands may have strong wild character. Intrusive features may not disqualify an area if their impact is limited, and peripheral areas (eg closer to roads) may be important to safeguard to prevent gradual erosion of the core. SNH's recommendations for the management of these areas are set out in their article in our booklet (see above)

SNH has also produced guidelines on the siting of certain potentially intrusive developments, including windfarms and marine fish farms, which emphasise the need to steer development away from wild land. They have been looking at the wider effects of "permitted development" according to planning regulations, such as farm and forestry tracks, outwith NSAs where they are controlled. The necessary techniques for restoration of bulldozed tracks can now be recommended to Councils from various demonstration sites, including the National Trust for Scotland's work on Beinn a' Bhuird. SNH sees the most pressing need for the future as encouraging wider public recognition of Scotland's wild areas as a contribution rather than an obstacle to a sustainable rural economy.

National Trust for Scotland

In January 2002 the NTS Council approved a Wild Land Policy intended to give clear guidance for the management of all the Trust's properties containing wild land or having wild qualities. The Unna Principles are still their key reference point for mountainous properties, and played a key part in their thinking about management of properties such as West Affric and Mar Lodge in the 1990s.

NTS sees the need to define wild land quality as one attribute of a landscape for which there may be a number of objectives. In areas where wild land quality is highest these objectives should be given priority. Wild land is defined primarily from a recreational view as "relatively remote and inaccessible, not noticeably affected by contemporary human activity, and offers high quality opportunities to escape from the pressures of everyday living and to find physical and spiritual refreshment." A list of indicators that can critically affect the character and quality of wild land and the experience of those enjoying it is given in The NTS article in our booklet Scotland's Wild Land - What Future? They are divided into Enhancers, Detractors and Neutral indicators.

The list is not exhaustive and could be extended. The overall assessment for a property or part of a property with wild land qualities will be based on experience and judgment. Defining significance in terms of wild land quality will normally involve zoning of properties to identify areas to which the policy will apply. It is hoped that the indicators can be used both to confirm the relatively few, large, core areas of high wild land value that the Trust owns, and to identify smaller pockets of less remote but relatively wild land.

Management of them will avoid any reduction in wild land quality as a general principle, but thereafter the emphasis and resources will depend on the overall significance of different features at a property, such as visitor management, treatment of paths or fences that have impacts on the landscape. The work should be unobtrusive and sensitive, and where possible wild land quality will be enhanced by measures such as promotion of the long walk in and removal of intrusive high altitude tracks.

The NTS goes on to propose advocacy of wild land protection and management on areas outwith its ownership in order to help create a national constituency on behalf of the relatively few, large remote areas still remaining. People need to be engaged at all levels, as visiting remote areas will always tend to be primarily for the relatively fit and able and those prepared to develop the necessary skills. Almost everyone can however experience a flavour of the character of relatively wild areas nearer to home, if access is facilitated for the less able or experienced. Joint working with SNH and Environment Link is proposed to develop a national strategy, and a NPPG is called for to stimulate identification of smaller pockets of

Conclusion

It is hard to conceive of three approaches to wild land definition and management that are more distinct and different than these, bearing in mind that MCofS policies were drawn up in the early 1990s and the other two at least 5 years later. Yet all three give a common description of the main threats and are unanimous in stressing the importance of preserving remote or wild land. The two organisations that have to respond to development applications all over Scotland (MCofS and SNH) both see the need to adopt a simple rule of thumb definition of 5 kms from a public road, and both give indications of how they will deal with cases that fall outwith that definition. NTS does not need a definition on its properties, but like SNH it lists the attributes of wild land which will help it define the management needs of each area. Only MCofS has developed forestry policies applying to remote hill land access (not detailed here.) Both NTS and MCofS see the need for national definition of core wild land areas to ensure there is no further loss. NTS and SNH both indicate willingness to co-operate with other bodies to promote examples of best practice and both see the need for a national constituency on behalf of the few large wild land areas remaining in Scotland.