Key points
• The village does have basic shops and services though Cumnock is regarded as the main service centre.
• New Cumnock is considered to be well served by a range of indoor and outdoor recreational facilities many of which are run by the local community.
• Geographic access to services as measured by the SIMD is good in most parts of the community benefit area, with the exception of the rural datazone.
• The main form of transport in most of the community benefit area is road- based. The A76 main trunk road runs through the area, connecting it with the large towns of Ayr and Kilmarnock but also causing problems of traffic volume and speed.
• The rail line between Dumfries and Kilmarnock runs through the north part of the community benefit area, with a station at New Cumnock and regular train services to Kilmarnock. There are also regular bus services linking the main settlements to bigger towns.
• Car ownership is lower than for Scotland as a whole.
New Cumnock lies on the A76 trunk road which runs from Kilmarnock to Dumfries. The nearest large towns to the community benefit area are Kilmarnock and Ayr. The small town of Cumnock is much well used for services by New Cumnock residents.
A 2008 report ‘New Cumnock Community Portrait’, funded by the Coalfields Regeneration Trust, stated that, in its heyday, New Cumnock had over 50 shops and three hotels, but by 2008 had only 14 shops and two fast food outlets. Whilst the economic decline is apparent, the village still maintains a range of shops providing for the day to day needs of residents as well as a busy, well used community centre, a town hall, a purpose built Games hall, a seasonal outdoor swimming pool and a library. A local council centre provides a range of council services including a local registry office.
Outdoor sporting and leisure facilities include the much loved and well used seasonal outdoor swimming pool, the Recreation Ground and associated running track, an open area alongside Afton Water, the Greenhead Park and Playing fields
at Afton Bridgend and some recreation areas within the Coupla Housing Scheme to the south of the village. The village also hosts the Glen Afton Football Ground, a bowling green and a golf club. These and other community groups are eligible for support from the New Cumnock Community Energy Fund which distributes approximately £12,000 per annum through a sub-committee of the community council to community group through four rounds of grant making.
There are different communication channels for people to find out what is going on locally including the community council newsletter, the Cumnock Chronicle newspaper as well as information displays in the Town Hall, Library and Community Centre. A local website, S1newcumnock.com, does not appear to be greatly used. CCF was producing a quarterly newsletter ‘The Glennie’ which provides a variety of information on the range of projects and initiatives operating within the Cumnock and Doon Valley. However, the website for the CCF does not appear to have been updated since 2010.
Although the village is well connected by road, the busy A76 can also cause problems due to traffic volume and speed, and it splits the community in two. The local transport strategy identifies the need for developer contributions to be sought for a New Cumnock bypass. Community members confirmed the need to improve management of heavy transport through the village and expressed concern about children’s safety.
New Cumnock is well connected to Kilmarnock and Glasgow by rail, with nine trains a day to Kilmarnock and a journey time of approximately 25 minutes. There are also good connections to Carlisle and Dumfries. The great asset of a railway station has seen growth of commuting in recent years and could potentially encourage more incomers. This in turn could help sustain more services and local facilities but could equally run the risk of New Cumnock becoming more of a dormitory village where residents engage less and less with local services.
The cost of rail fares was suggested to be prohibitive for some community members on lower incomes and that ‘if you don’t have a car you’re really stuck here.’ There are regular (half hourly) bus services linking New Cumnock with Ayr and less frequent services to Kilmarnock and Dumfries. Bus services were described as being ‘poor’ although some residents suggested services between New Cumnock and Dalmellington had improved. Community members value the
regular and generally reliable train service but felt the bus service could be improved and was too ‘erratic’.
In June 2000 a People’s Jury was held to identify the ways in which people within the community could be encouraged to play a more active role. The report highlighted infrequent and inaccessible transport as a major barrier to social inclusion and as a barrier to participation. As a result, Coalfield Community Transport19 was formed to provide affordable and accessible transport to local
community groups. This has helped encourage higher levels of participation in the wide range of social, recreational and community activities that are on offer locally.
There are eight minibuses for hire by community groups, volunteer drivers and other services including:
• Dayhopper - Provides a shopping and excursion service to individuals in receipt of benefit, older or unemployed people, lone parents and people with a disability or are geographically disadvantaged.
• Awayhopper - Provides members the opportunity to take a short break, from 1 - 3 night away, five times a year.
• Wheels2Work - A scooter loan service introduced in April 2004 to assist young people aged 16+ to gain access to work, training or education. The project has 20 scooters that can be loaned for 6-9 months. Full training is given along with protective clothing. Participants contribute £2.50 a week. • Early Years service - This new service was introduced in March 2006 with funding from East Ayrshire Community Planning Partnership to transport children on the At Risk register, or who are referred by psychological services, between home and Netherthird Nursery and Family Centre.
Car ownership at the time of the 2001 Census is shown in Table 14. New Cumnock had lower rates than both East Ayrshire and Scotland as a whole, possibly reflecting higher levels of poverty in the area.
19 http://www.yellowbuses.org.uk/
Table 14: Car ownership by CAS ward, 2001 Census Census area ward Number of households % households owning All cars or vans in the area Average cars or vans per household No car One car Two or more cars New Cumnock 1603 39.4 41.9 18.7 1350 0.84 East Ayrshire 50346 33.5 44.1 22.4 47309 0.94 Scotland 2,192,246 34.2 43.4 22.4 2,044,018 0.93
Source: Scottish Census Records Online (SCROL) analyser
In addition, distance travelled to work for those in the community benefit area was higher than for both East Ayrshire and Scotland as a whole (in the 2001 Census). Table 15 shows that a third of people in New Cumnock travelled more than 5km to work, compared to a quarter for East Ayrshire and less than a quarter for Scotland as a whole. In New Cumnock the nearest large centres of employment are Kilmarnock and Ayr with some also travelling to Irvine for walk.
Table 15: Distance travelled to work, 2001 Census Area All people Working
or studying mainly from home % travelling less than 2km 2km to less than 5km 5km to less than 10km 10km to less than 20km More than 20km New Cumnock 3781 4.0 13.4 1.9 14.3 5.5 13.6 East Ayrshire 120235 3.5 19.2 9.1 6.1 8.9 11.0 Scotland 5,062,011 3.7 21.8 11.3 9.2 7.6 6.5
Source: SCROL analyser. Percentages do not add up to 100 because they do not include those who were working offshore, outside the UK, or those not working.
Statistics on mode of travel to work (not shown) indicate that, for those that travel away from home to work, the majority travel by private car or van, bus or on foot. Very few travel by bicycle or by train which some residents consider surprising and disappointing given the good train services.
A key principle of Scottish planning policy is the need to create, support and promote sustainable communities, and one of the main dimensions of sustainability is locating housing, employment, and other services close together. This helps to sustain local services and facilities and reduces the need to travel, which in turn helps to promote social inclusion for those who do not have access a car or cannot afford to travel long distances. Alongside this, the SIMD analyses drive time and public transport time to key services as part of the Geographic Access to Services domain. This is intended to gauge levels of deprivation in rural areas. Table 16 shows that only the rural datazone in the community benefit area ranks in the top 10% in Scotland on access to services suggesting that the other five datazones have adequate access to basic services.
Table 16: Geographic access to services data from SIMD, 2009 New Cumnock Datazone 1276 (NC rural) 1279 (NC south) 1280 (NC west) 1281 (NC north east) 1282 (NC north west) Total population 2010 612 669 531 748 751 Geographic Access to Services Deprivation Decile: 2009 1 4 6 6 4
Drive time in minutes Drive time to a GP:
2009 3.6 0.9 0.5 0.4 0.9
Drive time to a Post
Office: 2009 3.5 0.4 0.3 0.6 0.6
Drive time to a
Supermarket: 2003 18.6 13.2 12.3 11.6 10.3
Public Transport time
to a GP: 2009 32.3 8.2 5.9 4.3 8.3
Public Transport time
to a Post Office: 2009 32.6 4.3 2.7 5.3 6 Public Transport time
to Shopping Facilities:
2009 45.1 23.4 21.7 21.1 19.5
The rural datazone surrounding New Cumnock was in the top decile (worst 10%) of all 6505 datazones in Scotland for geographic access to services. This area areas has higher drive times and public transport travel times to services than the other datazones which are located in or nearer the service centre of New Cumnock.