Argyll and Bute Council has decided not to part-fund a yacht berthing facility i Continue reading
Tag Archives: marina
Big diary date for Ardrishaig: public meeting on town’s waterfront
On Wednesday 8th September 2010 at 7.30pm, Ardrishaig Public Hall sees a public meeting Continue reading
Scot sees off international rivals to buy Kerrera’s Rubh a’ Chruidh island
Everyone who’s sailed in and out of Oban Bay Continue reading
Ardyne Point development – white hope or white elephant?
Argyll & Bute Council has approved Sir Robert McAlpine’s development plans Continue reading
Design Awards: now the vote for public buildings
The award category we’re looking at today is almost always found at the one of 3 points of the spectrum Continue reading
Ardyne Point development issues
A planning application first lodged in 2007 by Sir Robert McAlpine’s Continue reading
Oban Lifeboat on two shouts today
Scotland’s busiest RNLI Lifeboat, Oban’s Mora Edith Macdonald, Continue reading
Scottish Water accepts Low Askomil residents’ concerns and opt to install a sub-sea solution to Campbeltown waste disposal
For Argyll has reported before on the outcome to Scottish Water‘s first attempt at installing a waste water treatment plant for Campbeltown. This saw Campbeltown Loch fill with raw sewage to the point where, at low tide, it cannot have been other than a public health hazard. Local businesses were angry at the impact on yachts visiting the marina, on fishing and on all business activities using the pier.
Scottish Water produced a proposed solution to lay a rising main along Low Askomil beach. Project Manager Eddie Burns says of this: ‘At a Scottish Water Open Day in Campbeltown in November, local residents continued to express their concerns about the rising main route along the beach, which was our preferred option at the time. Their concerns focused on two main areas, namely:
- the congested nature of the foreshore at present
- the potential for damage and delays to the Low Askomil Road’
At the close of this meeting Scottish Water promised to have a rapid review of options open to it in the timeframe available for the work.
The company is now proposing to use a route beneath the sea for a rising main which will form a key part of improvements to the waste water network in Campbeltown.
A new 2.6km stretch of rising main, designed to help tackle the problem of waste water discharge flooding in the town, will include a 1.6km sub-sea section beneath Campbeltown Loch.
The rising main will increase the volume of waste water received at the Slaty Farlan Waste Water Treatment Works from the Kinloch Park pumping station.
Using the sub-sea route for the rising main will benefit residents in the Low Askomil area in a number of ways:
- less disruption in terms of traffic management, access to properties and noise
- no damage to the sea wall and property walls
- significantly reduced construction time because the beach work would have been dependent on tides
- less rock excavation.
Eddie Burns says that the company is now: ‘… confident that this decision to install the rising main under the sea will be well received by Campbeltown residents and particularly those in the Low Askomil area.
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Portavadie Marina development
Energetic commercial and service developments at the 230 berth Portavadie Marina include building nineteen holiday apartments and a restaurant and bar at its Loch Fyne-side wharf with its spectacular views to Tarbert. The annual Bell Lawrie Yacht Series in Tarbert should benefit from such an appropriate a leisure facility as this, just across the loch.
Campbeltown Berthing Company may suspend marina operations
The level of sewage spilling into Campbeltown Loch from the new treatment works has dirven people from water sports, damaged the town’s reputation and lost it a significant volume of business. It has now forced the Campbeltown Berthing Company – a significant economic driver in the area, to issue an ultimatum to Scottish Water, installers of the treatment system in question.
David McAllister from the company has given Scottish Water until next Spring to sort out the problem or he will have no choice but to suspend operations at the pontoons in the harbour. Mr McAllister sees this summer’s sewage pollution as the worst in six years, a period over which he has lost 1,000 boats because of the pollution and the smell. He describes visiting yachts as ‘basically sailing on sewage’, paints the difficulty of doing any marine work without getting mired in the stuff and recalls a period in early August this year when there was little water, only sewage, in the loch.
The evidence is with him. The Lifeboat has ceased exercises within Campbeltown Loch. Dinghy sailing has come to a halt.
Councillor John Semple who chairs the Kintyre Initiative Working Group, says that the responsibility now lies with Scottish Water and the Government to get a solution to this environmentally and commercially ruinous situation.
For Argyll would be interested to hear from any community which has been satisfied and which has not experienced sewage leakages after having a water treatment plant installed by Scottish Water. All we are aware of is a series of horror stories around our shores, suggesting that a rookie sniffer dog could track the company’s contracts across Argyll’s coastline.
Argyll and Bute Council pay Scottish Water very considerably more per house for water services than any other local authority in Scotland. They are in a position to call the shots and need to be seen to do so.