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Award for groups vowing to revitalise Garnock Valley
Community organisations across the Garnock Valley have created a plan for their area – which has seen them pick up a special national award.
The Garnock Valley Local Place Plan – called Our Garnock Valley - is believed to be the first where towns – Beith, Dalry and Kilbirnie - have worked together to create a place plan for a cluster of communities, rather than each working in isolation. It was prepared through extensive consultation with the local community and stakeholders.
‘Local Place Plans’ provide communities with an opportunity to feed into the planning system with their own ideas and proposals for the development and use of land.
West Kilbride, Largs, Cumbrae, Fairlie and Stevenston have already had their Place Plans approved by North Ayrshire Council’s Planning Committee – and the Garnock Valley plan was the latest to be approved at a meeting at the end of October.
Work has been led by a working group made up of Beith and District, Dalry and Kilbirnie and Glengarnock community councils, along with Beith Community Development Trust, Dalry Community Development Hub, Dalry Community Sports Club and Garnock Valley Youth Forum. It has been supported by North Ayrshire Council and funded by the Scottish Government’s Place Based Investment Programme.
The collaboration has been recognised with a Judges’ Special Award as part of the 2025 Scotland Loves Local Awards. The special prize was presented after award judges heard how the Garnock Valley communities recognised the power of collaboration - working together to tackle common problems while also addressing individual issues in each town and surrounding villages.
These community-led plans will set out the aspirations of people for the place they live in and suggest solutions, including the big challenges like the global climate emergency and tackling inequalities.
By setting out priorities for future development in an area, Local Place Plans can also help communities to develop and deliver their own projects and bring about community-based change.
Quote: A huge congratulations to all those involved in creating the Place Plan – to win the Judges’ Special Award is fantastic recognition for them. We are currently working on our third Local Development Plan and it’s important that we get as much support and input from our communities as possible. The Local Place Plans are a new concept but will be invaluable and feed into our Local Development Plans. It is great that we now have our Garnock Valley Place Plan and it will be highly invaluable when we produce our Local Development Plan.”
Quote from: Councillor Alan Hill, Cabinet Member for Communities, Islands and Housing
The Local Place Plan has been registered and will now be considered in the preparation of the Local Development Plan - the strategy that defines and shapes where future development of land and property will take place.
Speaking on the group’s behalf, Helen McNaughton, chair of Beith and District Community Council, said: “Our Garnock Valley is an inspirational document with identified common themes and priorities for each of our areas.
“The vision is to make things better - to improve our areas for our children to grow, our communities to grow and for people to live, be employed and have happy lives in the Garnock Valley. We just want to make things better.
“We’re really proud to have taken this work to the place it is now. We look forward to working together to implement the proposals and deliver positive change.”
Check out Our Garnock Valley
Published: 01 December 2025