Glenfinnan Habitat Improvement Project

The project will help to compensate for biodiversity loss which is an unfortunate consequence of Network Rail Scotland’s ongoing tree and vegetation management programme which is undertaken to protect the operational railway line, helping to keep passengers safe, trains punctual and reduces risk for lineside neighbours.

Completion of this project provides a large biodiversity enhancement benefit across 200 hectares, a scale which would be complex and very costly to achieve on Network Rail-owned land without potentially impacting railway operations. These benefits will help us to achieve its corporate targets of no net loss in biodiversity by 2024 and Net Gain by 2035.

The project provides a route towards compliance with recommendations of the Varley review, which has been endorsed by Transport Scotland.

The project will support activity to protect, enhance and expand habitats including nationally and internationally designated sites managed by Forestry and Land Scotland (FLS). The long-term result of this activity is expected to be an uplift in biodiversity across the project area.

The work will take place over 2 years and includes the following activities:

The project will be delivered by FLS, on land they manage. FLS has the expertise, knowledge, systems and processes to support our biodiversity enhancement objectives in a robust and demonstrable way. As a government agency, FLS are (like Network Rail) publicly accountable, and partnering with FLS will allow us to deliver this project in a responsible, transparent and accountable way.

Partnering with FLS to deliver these biodiversity enhancements allows it to be completed at a much larger scale and lower cost than would be possible by delivering directly within a railway environment. Use of land owned by FLS removes any operational constraints associated with the railway environment and allows the resulting habitats to be publicly accessible to deliver maximum benefit to the local community, thus creating additional social value.

FLS will be responsible for ongoing management and maintenance of the land, so there will be no ongoing cost or maintenance burden to Scotland's railway.

The project will support activity to protect, enhance and expand habitats including nationally and internationally designated sites managed by FLS.

The first phase of works began in mid-January 2023 and consists of clearing and removing non-native species such as rhododendron regeneration across pinewood and peatland habitats by hand.

Rhododendron and self-seeded non-native conifers are threatening the rainforest and peatland habitats– seeds blow in from neighbouring gardens and plantations and can quickly take over, blocking light, upsetting delicate nutrient and water cycles and changing the ecosystem so it no longer supports the abundance, diversity and rarity of the species found in Scotland’s rainforest make this unique habitat internationally important.

The Network Rail funded activity will help to remove threats to vulnerable and internationally important woodland and peatland habitats. The long-term impacts will be to protect, enhance and expand these unique habitats for generations to come, with benefits for biodiversity, communities, visitors, climate resilience and carbon storage.

Moving forward

There is not only scope to protect and enhance these existing priority areas, but also opportunities to expand these woodland and peatland habitats further still to increase resilience and aid recovery of biodiversity.

The longer-term objective is to restore ecosystem processes over 10 years which will support full habitat recovery and ongoing resilience, thanks to these initial interventions funded by Network Rail, plus ongoing management and maintenance undertaken by FLS.