Posts Tagged ‘harris’

Making hay while the sun shines

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With the sun shining, everyone is so much more motivated to get out around the estate doing stuff. Now we have the maintenance team in place, the list of jobs is slowly shrinking. One day there’s  bench painting going on, the next footpath maintenance, but all interspersed by a bit of Visitor Management.

The volume of cars on the road has jumped, and this puts pressure on the limited carparking at the beach hotspots in Harris. We are routinely informing and educating visitors, especially those that think it OK to restrict access on our narrow roads, by parking half on the verge. Huisinis is one busy spot on a hot summer’s day! We recently added a few more parking places at Huisinis Gateway and spent some time marking them out to get best use of the space. The hydrant has also now been concreted in and since painted for visibility.

On the other side of the estate, work has been continuing on the new path at Lacasdail Lochs. We have been working for a while now on a path down the eastern side of the loch to link via the existing bridge to the Urgha to Maraig path. This will eventually complete a circular route around the loch. Progress ramped up this week with the hire of a Polaris 6×6 ATV. With its extra capacity, 40 ton of stone was shipped 800m down the path in a few days. The bridge is almost in touching distance!

Next week will be back to doing smaller jobs round the estate, whilst shoulders and backs recover!

Funders for this path include Paths for All, Crown Estate and Western Isles Development Trust.

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Beach business

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Last week saw the S3 year group from Sir E Scott School head out for the annual Enterprise Day run by The North Harris Trust.

This year pupils headed for Huisinis Gateway, stopping off at various local businesses on the way. The aim of the day is to show the pupils the opportunities that Harris offers. They talked to a number of businesses to find out what Harris has that makes them successful. A theme of water and rain emerged during the day, despite us basking in sunshine for the event. Pupils saw how rain was used in the production of whisky, electricity and salmon. They finally saw John Muir Trust volunteers repairing footpaths that were suffering from rain damage. After lunch at the Huisinis Gateway, teams presented their findings from the morning to teachers and NHT staff.

Thanks must go to Isle of Harris Distillers, River Generation Ltd, The Scottish Salmon Co and The John Muir Trust for their participation in the event.

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Water worlds: top 10 marine adventure holidays worldwide

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Lanzarote, Belize, Mexico and Harris -all mentioned in the Guardian’s article on underwater adventures.

Following BBC’s Planet Blue series, there has been an increase in interest in what goes on under the surface of our oceans. The Guardian has picked 10 trips that explore the oceans, from reef conservation in Belize to snorkel trails in Scotland.

See the article HERE

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Lets get snorkelling

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Following the launch last month of the North Harris Snorkel Trail, a leaflet has been produced to give more information on the six specially-selected sites in North Harris.

 

Download the leaflet HERE or read up on the Scottish Wildlife Trust and their crusade to get people to experience life below the waves.

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The Urgha “thunderbox”

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This week we commissioned the first chemical disposal point for campervans in North Harris. The dump point or “elsan” point as they are also known, is installed at the North Harris Recycling site at Urgha (HS3 3BW).

The point, which is now affectionately called “the thunderbox”, is accessible during depot opening hours -currently TUES-SAT 10:00-17:30. Replacement chemicals will also be stocked.

For opening hours, click HERE

We will also be opening a further disposal point at the new Huisinis Gateway site (HS3 3AY). This will hopefully be open in the next 10 days – once Building Control has signed off the development.

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Harris’ young scientists investigate

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Earlier this month, we hosted a visit to the Bunavoneader Hydro-electric scheme. The Science Club at Sir E Scott primary school has been working on a hydro-electric project and wanted to see a full-sized scheme in operation. The pupils hiked up to the intake and then back down to look around the turbine house. The visit took place in an unusually dry spell, so the turbine was not working on the day, however everyone did go home clean and dry!

The Trust is part owner of a windfarm and a hydro-electric scheme. These are proving to be great educational resources for the local school.

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Toilets no more

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The building that provided relief to so many, is no more. Huisinis public toilets were leveled today to make way for the new Huisinis Gateway development.

Excavators will be hard at work over the next four weeks preparing the site for foundations and a new carpark. They will then move up the road to the quarry that will be turned into a licenced camping area for campervans.

The construction project will run until August, so the Trust has installed temporary toilet facilities opposite the development for the duration. The existing carpark has been taken out of use as it now forms part of the construction site. Temporary parking space is available over at the Scarp jetty.

The recent decision by Scottish Water to suspend the new water main to Huisinis will hopefully only have a minor impact upon the project. We had planned to install a water supply at the campervan site. This will no longer be possible. The existing supplies down at the Huisinis Gateway will be made available for campers, alongside the new chemical disposal point. A decision on how we will operate the showers will be made once we know the outcome of the Scottish Water review.

The funding search is still on for the finishing details. Our application to the Scottish Landfill Communities Fund was successful. £4500 has been received to provide waste recycling bins. This will cut the volume of waste heading to the landfill site from Huisinis. Bord na Gaidhlig has also awarded us £1500 towards the cost of bilingual signage.

For more details of the project, click HERE

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Huisinis Gateway gets underway

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We have finally secured all the funding required to get the construction project under way. With Highlands and Islands Enterprise confirming their award alongside CnES and LEADER, we can now start looking for someone to build the new facilities. The opportunity is now live on the Public Contracts Scotland web portal so we have a month of waiting to see who’s interested in building in one of the remotest corners of the remotest corner of the country!

We hope to be awarding a contract in January and breaking ground in the spring. See plans of the proposed development HERE.

HuisinisFundersLogo

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Another 100 homes with green energy

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Bunavoneader hydro-electric scheme is finally operational!

Back in July, Ross-shire Engineering handed the scheme over to River Generation Limited (RGL). RGL is the developer and the joint venture company formed by the Trust and Sustainable Technology Investors Limited. The main works were complete and the scheme entered a phase of close monitoring. Despite three weeks in October with no rain, we have now emerged from this phase, and all systems are go, as we enter the rainy season.

shed

Nestling amongst the houses in Bunavoneader, you’ll see a new building , the size of a double garage, with a red roof. This is the turbine house located at the bottom of 250m of 630mm pipe. The pipe brings water form a new intake up the river behind the old dam. The turbine is located inside, along with the electricity grid connection point. Water is returned to the river at the side of the building.

turbineInside the building is a 100kW Francis turbine. You’ll just see in the picture above, the intake pipe entering the buiding, under all the dials on the wall. The pipe or penstock feeds water around the outside of the turbine, through the blades and out from the middle of the casing, down into the ground. The big blue box with the black wires is the generator which is attached to the spinning blades to make electricity.

The scheme is now exporting electricity to the Harris grid. It is forecast to generate  371,000 units of electricity each year -enough to power over 100 homes. The crofter and the Bunavoneader-Meavaig North grazings committee will benefit directly from a share of the rent paid by RGL. The wider North Harris & Scalpay residents will benefit indirectly through the Trust’s share. The scheme is a good example of how the Trust aims to make best use of the 25,000ha North Harris estate for the benefit of the whole community.

 

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Science Club at Monan

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The Tarbert Primary School Science Club members visited the Monan Windfarm last week. On a still day, they took in the views and got up close to a 500kW Windflow wind turbine.

pupils

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