Access to Scotland’s first community-owned craft whisky distillery could be provided by an “electric elevator”.

The GlenWyvis Distillery Community Benefit Society has proposed building the facility at a site near Dingwall following a crowdfunding appeal.

And one of the 2,600 investor in the distillery suggested that the public could access the site by a funicular-style railway.

Scotland currently only has one funicular railway, also known as a hillside tram, which is at the CairnGorm Mountain, near Aviemore, having opened in 2001 to run up to the UK’s highest restaurant which is 1,097m (3,599ft) up Cairn Gorm mountain.

It has been proposed that the electric-powered inclined elevator at the distillery would form part of a park-and-ride scheme serving the distillery’s visitor hub.

An electric bus would take visitors from Dingwall to the elevator’s base station.

GlenWyvis Distillery Community Benefit Society said the elevator would only be built if the distillery site is also chosen for the location of its visitor centre.

If the funicular does go ahead it would be the first of its kind in the UK and, at 400m (1,312ft), the longest in Europe, the organisation said.

John Mckenzie, the founder of GlenWyvis and site landowner, said: “We are now exploring this funicular-style solution as a positive response to local concerns about access to the distillery.

“We think this has great potential to attract many more people to Dingwall and the distillery itself.

“It is all aimed at rejuvenating Dingwall as the craft distilling town for Scotland.”

The Highlands are already home to

The ride at Dingwall would take three minutes, the society said.