But this is not a new road or lowland building; this devastation is taking place high on Cairn Gorm, Scotland's sixth highest mountain. Just a few hundred feet below the summit the mountainside has been destroyed, stripped away to build a new visitor centre and a funicular railway.

A whole vast corrie has gone, ripped apart by bureaucratic vandals in the hope of a quick profit from tourists who will be told they are seeing a wonderful mountain landscape when what they'll actually see will be the hastily repaired degraded slopes of a rundown ski resort. The funicular mountain railway is due to open this December, in time for the skiing season, with the Ptarmigan Centre and Mountain Exhibition following in May next year.

Yet the devastated heart of the mountain in Coire Cas is strangely quiet at present, construction work having slowed to a crawl. On one weekday afternoon in early July the place was deserted apart from a couple of walkers sheltering from a heavy shower in the shell of the visitor centre. Perhaps the workers knock off early. Or maybe there is no work being done. Rumours abound. Work is delayed because payments aren't forthcoming, it is said.

Of course the bodies involved - HIE, CairnGorm Mountain (formerly the Chairlift Company) and Morrisons Construction - deny that anything is amiss. But Morrisons have laid workers off and transferred others to different projects. That's fact.

If progress were visibly being made the rumours wouldn't mean much. But nothing seems to be happening. And I am informed, by a very reliable source, that the project is well behind schedule and unlikely to be ready for the December opening. For those who would like to see this abomination removed as soon as possible and the mountain healed this is good news.

Whilst actual building work has slowed down the essential work of softening people up to accept that what is happening on the mountain is beneficial to the environment continues.

Knowing that the extreme damage the funicular is doing could put visitors off the new CairnGorm Mountain company is busy pushing out propaganda of breathtaking hypocrisy, claiming that the funicular is actually environmentally friendly.

Their latest leaflet, titled CairnGorm Mountain 2001 - Work In Progress, is quite astounding.

Reading it you would think that building the funicular was a positive development that will protect the mountain. The language is truly Orwellian as the people responsible for one of the worst acts of destruction ever seen on a Scottish mountain portray it as a wonderful environmental success. 1984 is alive and well and living on Cairn Gorm! George Orwell would be proud of the doublespeak spouted by the brazen writers of this leaflet.

They even have the cheek to promote the funicular by pointing out that the Cairngorms will become a national park (omitting that the development was rushed through in case the national park stopped it), that it has been proposed as a World Heritage Site (a designation that is less likely due to the funicular) and that it is home to Europe's largest bird reserve (whose owners, the RSPB, are so opposed to the funicular that they went to court to try and stop it).

The mountain destroyers have appropriated the language of conservation. Pictures of what is happening on Cairn Gorm give the lie to their apparently reasonable and reassuring words however.

The captions to the accompanying images are all taken from CairnGorm 2001 - Work in Progress as is the title to this piece - "A Special Place". These photographs, all taken in late July, show what really is happening to this "special place" and why the despoilers must be thrown off the mountain.

Chris Townsend
20/9/2001