EIR/202600516057 · FOI/EIR · partially withheld
Communications regarding Non Motorised Route between Aviemore and Carrbridge: EIR release
Information requested
“With reference to The Freedom of Information (FOI) Act, I am requesting all information and communication from 2023 and up to the present date between Transport Scotland and CNPA, The Highland Council, The Highlands and Islands Transport Partnership and Sustrans in relation to the planned Non Motorised Route between Aviemore and Carrbridge (the ACNMU route).
The basis for this request is that Transport Scotland, in a response to feedback received at the 2024 public consultation for the ACNMU route stated that: “After concluding this current round of virtual and public exhibitions, we will begin finalising the planning application while working closely with CNPA, The Highland Council, The Highlands and Islands Transport Partnership and Sustrans and will be seeking to submit the planning application.””
Response
As the information you have requested is 'environmental information' for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA.
This exemption is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.
Response:
Please see Annex A which contains communication between Transport Scotland and The Highland Council, Sustrans (now renamed as Walk Wheel Cycle Trust) and the Highlands and Islands Transport Partnership (HITRANS).
Please see Annex B which contains communications between Transport Scotland and the Cairngorms National Park Authority.
An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to some of the information requested because it is personal data of a third party and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018. This exception is not subject to the 'public interest test', so we are not required to consider if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. This exception has been applied to Annex A and B
Under regulation 6(1)(b) of the EIRs, we do not have to give you information which is already publicly available and easily accessible to you in another form or format. We have applied this regulation to Annex A and Annex B. This information can be accessed using the below links:
Public Engagement Events Summary Report - June/July 2024 - Aviemore to Carrbridge Non-Motorised User (NMU) Route - A9 Dualling | Transport Scotland
2025/0109/DET | Formation of 3m wide 9km long segregated NMU route/path | Land Between Aviemore And Carrbridge PH22 And PH23
About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.
Detected exemption language
We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 (FOISA), so that we do not also have to deal with your request under FOISA. This exemption is subject to the 'public interest test'. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. An exception under regulation 11(2) of the EIRs (personal information) applies to some of the information requested because it is personal data of a third party and disclosing it would contravene the data protection principles in Article 5(1) of the General Data Protection Regulation and in section 34(1) of the Data Protection Act 2018.