Cairngorm Funicular Legal Cases Settled Out Of Court
Cairngorm Funicular Legal Cases Settled Out Of Court
Published : 17-Aug-2023 06:18
Three complex legal cases that related to the original design and construction of the Cairngorm funicular railway in the 1990s and early 2000s have reached an out-of-court settlement.
The legal cases began when government development agency Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE), which owns Cairngorm Estate and commissioned the funicular, was forced to shut it down in 2018, 17 years after it opened after a construction cost of £19.5 million, after safety inspections found issues with concrete track supports.
The closure eventually lasted more than four years with the funicular finally returning to service in January this year, following a four-year programme of inspection, design and engineering works at a cost of around £25m bringing the total spend on capital works connected to the funicular to around £45m over the past 25 years.
Under the terms of the out-of-court settlement, HIE is receiving a total sum of £11m.
HIE had been pursuing legal action in the Court of Session against construction company Galliford Try Infrastructure Limited and designer A.F. Cruden Associates Limited. But the settlement means the cases will not proceed to a court proof hearing, which had been scheduled to begin this month.
HIE was also seeking payment relating to guarantees issued by Natural Assets Investments Ltd (NAIL), which was the parent company of previous operator CairnGorm Mountain Ltd (CML), and from NAIL's main shareholder.
Stuart Black, chief executive of HIE, said: "We are pleased to have reached this settlement, which enables us to recover a significant amount of public funding and brings closure to these long-standing matters."
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