The bitter-sweet green, green grass of home for the Wee County - Nairn 1 Buckie 1

One of the Buckie players slightly perplexed by a refereeing decision

Somewhere in this pile of football players was something worth two red cards

Uneaten hospitality munchies about to be distributed to supporters. Pictures will enlarge.

The man in black gave two penalties and two red cards as County took a point from the title contenders in the first home game on a Saturday for some time. The grass was green, the sun was shining but controversy left a bad taste to what should have been a showcase for Highland league football. More news on the game later.

UPDATE: Kenny MacLeod's match report now available here. Pictures to follow later this weekend.

Fergus in County colours - Fearghas ann an dathan NCFC

Picture will enlarge

LibDem litterbug stung for £50

Charles Kennedy gets fined for dropping his fag ends in Glasgow City Centre.

"He said: “He'd been puffing at the entrance for about half-an-hour while chatting away on his mobile phone.

“He stood in the one spot and must have smoked four fags – each time letting the dog-end fall on to the pavement beside him." More on the P&J And a picture of "A right Charlie" in the Sun.

Worried LibDems must be smoking a lot more fags than usual these days but there is no excuse, it is irritating to see fag-ends left lying in the street, well done the wardens that hit the MP for £50!

A quick google finds the LibDem policy on litter:

"4.3.1 We know that people hate it when their local area is blighted by litter. Despite councils collectively spending more than £600 million a year cleaning it up, litter is five times worse now than in the 1960s and is particularly acute in rural areas where litter is often left to lie for much longer. Liberal Democrats believe in tough action on litter, not just cleaning up the mess but preventing it in the first place. We would encourage local councils to fine offenders by releasing the money raised to be spent on measures to improve the local environment." More here.

Lodgehill Clinic sites flats proposal in the P&J

"Officials urge Nairn flats approval despite opposition from residents"

Planning Committee councillors will make a site visit on Tuesday 12th next week at 09.30 a.m. If you have a spare moment why not pop along and respectfully demonstrate your concern over this project (or maybe even your support for it). They refused to hold the meeting in Nairn to decide the application but the site visit gives Nairnites a chance to show they care about what gets built in our community.

Meanwhile out there in the big digital conversation another mention for Nairn

Nairn's traffic Jam infamy gets another mention, this time on twitter.

An SNP landslide in the Highlands next month?

The details above are from the Highland Council website and show the votes cast in yesterday's Wick by-election for a Highland Council seat. More details from the Highland Council site here.

STV reports: "Wick is in the Scottish Parliament constituency of Caithness, Sutherland and Ross, which has been held by the Liberal Democrats since devolution in 1999.
However, the SNP would need only a 4.3% swing in May’s polls to land the seat." More on the STV site.

The SNP got more than twice the Labour vote, a result that would be in line with the Gurn's fun poll. The LibDems came nowhere again and our fun poll suggests a similar result. Obviously there will be local factors and issues that will have an impact in Wick but could it be that the LibDems are heading for a beating in the Highlands - a beating they may never recover from? The LibDems tipping/farewell point date with Highland destiny draws closer?

Firhall Bridge pushchair turning point

Murd reports that recent repairs to vandalism on the Firhall Bridge have created a turning point enabling anyone taking a pushchair across the bridge to turn the buggy and make a safer descent of the steps.

Thanks to anon for pointing out the appalling mistake now corrected.

Objections to South Nairn stacking up

The South Nairn planning application has received almost 50 public comments now and this observer can report that after browsing through a lot of them there seems to be fierce opposition to the plan for 319 units (232 houses and 87 flats). Leading the fight against the proposals are many of the residents of Firhall Village. Objectors complain that the B9091 Balblair Road and the B9090 Cawdor Road are not suitable for more traffic and elaborate about the deficiencies of the Railway bridge area for pedestrians, cyclists and motorists on the Cawdor Road. The loss of agricultural land and the danger to wildlife are other factors. Others ask where the jobs would come from to provide employment to the proposed residents of Nairn South. The proximity to Gordons sawmill is also mentioned.

There is one objector calling for the development to be sited in another part of town where access is not a problem. (given Nairn’s traffic problems this observer wonders just where that could be?). Mention is made of a ‘plethora of houses for sale’ in the area – there certainly seems to be quite a few and the prices of rentals seem to be falling too (in this untrained observer’s opinion).

The density of the proposed development is compared with that of Firhall, which some no doubt feel should be a bench mark for all new development on this side of town. And then there is the potential disturbance to residents of Firhall which one objector describes:

“We moved to Firhall Village for peace and quiet, which we have at the moment, but if this development goes ahead it will ruin our life completely.’ This is expanded upon further into the objection:

“At present our little community is well kept, no noise, litter of dog feces (sic) to be seen anywhere. If this project is built we will suffer the consequences of lots of families walking through our area to get to the river, leaving the litter, creating noise, and in general ruining the reason we live in Firhall Village.”

Some, perhaps, might feel annoyed by such a sense of desired isolation but that’s what they paid for and that’s what they want to keep at Firhall. It is understandable that they want to fight their corner to preserve that.

One wonders, however, in the long-term, if Firhall is just simply too close to the town. One day Nairn will grow and that field opposite Firhall may well be built on but in the meantime the reasons cited in these objections will give our councillors much food for thought and more objections may be received yet as the application has been readvertised in this week’s Nairnshire.

This observer has looked through most of the comments received and hasn’t found one submission in favour of the scheme yet. There is a comprehensive call for rejection from River Community Council, West is waiting for a copy of River’s submission before drawing up their own and this observer imagines they will side with River. Odd man out may well be Suburban this time round who will not be submitting an objection but just ‘observations’. From their meeting last week it seems that they are not opposed to the scheme.

Any Gurnites wishing to read the comments received for the application can do so here. Click on the documents tab and scroll down to see the objections. If anyone feels that they too would like to object or even support this plan then they can do so on that same page by clicking on the ‘make a comment’ tab. Anyone who lives in Nairnshire can make a comment - do you agree with the protestors or not? Why not have your say too?

Fergus in town / Fearghas sa bhaile

Pictures will enlarge.

Meanwhile on the Nairn needs a by-pass site things are rather quiet

Remember February 2009?

"The Highland Liberal Democrats will tomorrow (Saturday) launch a campaign to secure a date for the Nairn by-pass to go ahead. Local MP Danny Alexander, Nairn Lib Dem councillor Graham Marsden and a team of volunteers will distribute campaign stickers to every home in Nairn, and launch a new interactive website – www.nairnbypass.co.uk – to develop the case."

You still see the odd fading bypass sticker but there hasn't been any interaction on this site since last December. Not even a mention of all the traffic lights. Haven't the LibDems noticed them yet? Well as they say themselves: "Fingers crossed that progress is being made."

JAMS UPDATE: a regular Gurnite reports:
"Lunchtime traffic news on Radio Scotland advising non HGV drivers to take alternative routes through Nairn due to delays of up to one hour! This will surely upset the WestEnders if they become a prescribed alternative route on national radio (will gps maps add them as well?)

Maybe soon we'll see youths washing the windscreens soon of the crawling traffic. or newspaper vendors wandering through the mayhem offering copies of the Nairnshire of a Tuesday"