A82 “High Road” Petition to be considered again at Holyrood

The Friends of Loch Lomond and The Trossachs’ and Helensburgh and District Access Trust’s joint petition arguing for a “High Road” solution to the upgrade of the A82 between Tarbet and Inverarnan is to be considered once again by The Scottish Parliament’s Citizen Participation & Public Petitions Committee petitions.committee@Parliament.Scot on Wednesday 2 April 2025, when the Committee will hear evidence from the Cabinet Secretary for Transport.

Check the petitions webpage at PE1967 High Road petition’s webpage for the full history of the petition which was first lodged in September 2022.

John Urquhart, Chair of the conservation charity, Friends of Loch Lomond and The Trossachs, said:

“It has taken over 2 years for us to bring the Transport Secretary before the Petitions Committee. In that time we have lost track of the number of individuals who have occupied this post, something which speaks volumes to how the government has allowed this key infrastructure project at the heart of the National Park to drift.

All along, Transport Scotland has been allowed to treat the project as a series of road straightening and widening engineering tasks, when the reality is that it as a major infrastructure project which will define the future of north Loch Lomond and its fragile human and natural communities for generations to come. We continue to demand that, in line with the government’s own legal requirements, the many undoubted benefits of the High Road option are measured properly against the disastrous Low Road idea, including now taking account of the National Park’s newly announced “Future Nature Landscape Connections Initiative” which further enhances our arguments around the need to preserve the beautiful loch shore as an essential landscape connection in terms of its cultural, recreational and economic significance as well as its ecological role as an Atlantic Oakwood wildlife corridor and freshwater littoral ecotone, vital for the preservation and promotion of biodiversity.”

The petition now has over 900 signatures