Landscape Partnership Scheme - East Ayrshire, Scotland
Over the centuries, life in the landscape ebbs and flows following patterns of social, economic and cultural change. Not only the physical landscape changes but so do communities. The long history of industrial use of the landscape in the Coalfields Communities Landscape Partnership area (via farming, coal and iron extraction and associated iron works to opencast mineral mining , forestry and now wind farms) has shaped communities heritage and their interaction with the landscape.
The collapse of the open cast coaling industry in East Ayrshire in 2013 left an ugly, unsafe and inaccessible landscape in the heart of the area containing those communities upon whose livelihood depending upon it. To address these issues, East Ayrshire Council produced a Minerals Local Development Plan, with a focus on regeneration and restoration, rather than extraction. The CCLP is a key component of the Minerals Local Development Plan.
The CCLP, funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund over 5 years completing in September 2025, is a partnership led by East Ayrshire Council. It delivers 22 community-led natural heritage, built heritage and cultural heritage projects to breathe life back into the landscape.
The CCLP provides an opportunity to re invigorate life in the landscape based on the lessons of the past, life in the present and a vision of life in the future.