Banchory North Homepage

Bancon's primary development site over the last decade has been Hill of Banchory, where the companies headquarters are located. At present, Hill of Banchory contains around 600 dwellinghouses, and a primary school, business centre, dance school, and numerous other projects at the planning stage, including a leisure centre, further business developments, a care home and more community facilities.

We are nearing the end of the development that is identified in the current Local Plan, and have therefore made a Local Plan bid for further land to be allocated for development over then next two decades. We believe that the work that has already been done in terms of servicing of land, and establishment of the Hill of Banchory makes northward expansion the logical way forward.

The Hill of Banchory development has been carried out in commercial woodland, which has been felled phase by phase to allow development to take place, with belts and areas of more attractive woodland retained and bolstered with new planting to create a setting for houses. The majority of this woodland is taken up by existing allocations in the Aberdeenshire Local Plan, and therefore further expansion will extend into a different type of landscape, and one that has to be handled very carefully.

To the North of Banchory is the now drained Loch of Leys, a wetland area with considerable habitat and biodiversity interest. Both Leys Estate and Bancon are acutely aware of the importance of this area, and consider that development must not interfere with it. Whilst this is a constraint to continued northwards development, it does create a natural northern boundary for the town, and our assessments therefore extend to this area.

Please look through these pages to see what work we have carried out to date. Our initial Local Development Plan bid is fairly simplistic, but considerable work has taken place since then to add detail to proposals, and determine exactly what is possible to the North of the town. We are excited by the potential for a different pattern of development to Hill of Banchory, with more of an emphasis on environment and open space, creating a picturesque setting for housing and employment land.