Public consultation period for Blairgowrie and Rattray Local Place Plan begins

Date: Wednesday 5 March

Public consultation period for Blairgowrie and Rattray Local Place Plan begins

A public consultation period on the Blairgowrie and Rattray Local Place Plan has begun.

Residents of the east Perthshire town are invited to view the documents either online or in person and provide feedback to Blairgowrie and Rattray Development Trust (BRDT) by 5pm on Friday, 28 th March, 2025.

The Blairgowrie and Rattray Local Place Plan has been compiled by the development trust over a period of several months and provides a vision of what the future of Perthshire’s largest town could look like.

Local Place Plans are part of the Scottish Government’s wider work on planning reform and implementation of the Planning (Scotland) Act 2019, which aims to improve community engagement and build public trust in planning matters, and offer an opportunity for community-led, collaborative approaches to creating great local places.

Once a local place plan has been completed and registered with the local planning authority, it may be taken into consideration, alongside other elements, in the preparation of the relevant local development plan, the third iteration of which is set to be worked on in Perth and Kinross.

The Local Place Plan for Blairgowrie and Rattray has been created with extensive input from the local community and chair of BRDT Linda Tait encouraged residents to look over the document before it is submitted to Perth and Kinross Council.

She said: “Blairgowrie and Rattray face many challenges: we’ve seen a significant decline in our town centre, lost opportunities for our young people, and a lack of government and private sector investment that has held the town back from realising its potential. We need to make bold changes.

“Thankfully, our community is ready to face those challenges, but we need support from the public and private sectors to make change happen.

“This local place plan is the ideal opportunity to facilitate positive change and it is very much a product of our hard-working community’s vision to create a vibrant, thriving town for visitors and locals alike.”

Some 1200 comments were received during the community engagement process, which took place last year and builds on work done as part of the town’s community action plan.

Linda continued: “We are grateful for the diverse mix of experience within our community that helped create this Local Place Plan. A vast number of local people have worked tirelessly to produce this document and help ensure that the council and the Scottish Government know that we have these places in our town and that we have ideas on how best to use them.

“We’re also grateful to the hundreds of people from a range of different age groups and backgrounds who contributed their comments, thoughts, suggestions and ideas to the Local Place Plan – the response has been incredible.

“We’re now in the final stages of the process before we submit the document to Perth and Kinross Council and would love to hear from people in the town if they support the overall draft plan or if there is anything they disagree with.”

Comments can be emailed to admin@brdt.org.uk. Alternatively, call 07777 694827 or write to BRDT at 55 High Street, Blairgowrie, PH10 6DF. Any comments must be submitted by 5pm on Friday, 28 th March, 2025.

To view the document, see https://discoverblairgowrie.co.uk/lpp

For further information or media enquiries, please contact Clare McMicking on telephone 07514 343 042 or email media@brdt.org.uk