A vision of how Scotland will work a generation from now was laid out yesterday with the government's designation of nine major projects of strategic national importance.
The draft of the country's second National Planning Framework was big on Glasgow's Commonwealth Games bid, transport and freight hubs, and the need to rebuild the national grid to support renewables.
Ministers pointed out that within the document there was the first government commitment to full electrification of the main rail network.
Transport Minister Stewart Stevenson said: "It is clear that the electrification of the entire strategic rail network based on renewable and clean power generation would significantly reduce CO2 from transport."
The nine nationally designated projects included a new Forth bridge, improvements to Glasgow and Edinburgh airports and the facilities needed for the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games.
Other projects included grid reinforcements to support renewable energy development, the Glasgow strategic drainage scheme, the Grangemouth freight hub, Rosyth international container terminal and the Scapa Flow container transhipment facility.
Launching the consultation, Mr Swinney said: "The government's economic strategy requires a planning framework that supports sustainable economic growth across Scotland while protecting the quality of the natural and built environment.
"That is why we have identified our strategic priorities for investment in transport, energy and environmental infrastructure in the draft National Planning Framework.
"Enhancing our national infrastructure with national developments will create a more successful country, increase sustainable economic growth and create opportunities for all of Scotland to flourish."
Mr Swinney said the list was not limited by finance but because the government did not want to encroach on the rights of local authorities.
He insisted the SNP's other major transport commitments, including improving rail times, dualling the A9 and completing the M74 through Glasgow, would be achieved through the transport strategy to be announced this summer and an approach to Network Rail about its improvements programme.
The document argues strongly that for a nation on the north-western fringes of Europe rail was not an option for linking directly to the continent, which was why Glasgow and Edinburgh airports had to be enhanced.
The designation of a container transhipment facility at Scapa Flow in Orkney appears to put paid to Hunterston's aspirations for becoming such a hub, while Rosyth is to become a container hub with road and rail access.
The draft document published yesterday now goes out to extensive public consultation before it goes into a two-month parliamentary process where it is dissected by MSPs. Could it emerge at the end of this year shorn of any projects or with others added? Mr Swinney said that could happen, as the consultation and political debates were genuine.
One of the most contentious issues is bound to be the need to upgrade the national power grid to bring renewable energy to users. That means more of the kind of controversy that has attended the issue on the Beauly-Denny stretch of power lines.
CBI Scotland backed the framework but claimed there was a lack of provision for replacement sources of energy generation.
CBI director Iain McMillan said: "If this is not done, Scotland's economy could suffer from a lack of competitively priced power."
However, the Green Party's Patrick Harvie was unimpressed: "The National Planning Framework clearly shows ministers' priorities - more roads, more bridges, more airport expansion, and barely a thought for the major renewables projects that should be front and centre in a document like this."
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