Moray Council is to launch a consultation on five potential residential development sites in the county.

Draft development briefs have been drawn up for the sites, which will set out the design standards for future development. The sites are located at Clarkly Hill, on the outskirts of Burghead; Manse Road in Hopeman, Braes of Allachie at Aberlour, West Pilmuir Road in Forres and Hamilton Drive in Elgin.

The Hamilton Drive site is owned by the council, while the others are in private ownership.

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In addition, a draft masterplan has been drawn up for land owned by Altyre Estate at Dallas Dhu, near Forres. The 22-hectare site could potentially comprise of 150 new homes.

The draft masterplan on the sites will go out to public consultation for eight weeks.

A report to the planning and regulatory services committee said: "The masterplan adopts a landscape-led approach and aims to achieve a successful transition from urban to rural character, creating a high quality new edge to the settlement.

"The site has unique characteristics since much of the site cannot be built on as it operates as flood storage for the Chapelton dam as part of the Forres (Burn of Mosset) flood alleviation scheme.

"Almost half of the site will remain undeveloped with many of the open spaces remaining in a natural state."

(LM)