National parks of the United Kingdom (
Welsh: parciau cenedlaethol;
Scottish Gaelic: pàircean nàiseanta) are areas of relatively undeveloped and scenic landscape across the country. Despite their name, they are quite different from
national parks in many other countries, which are usually owned and managed by governments as protected community resources, and which do not usually include permanent human communities. In the United Kingdom, an area designated as a national park may include substantial settlements and human land uses that are often integral parts of the landscape. Land within national parks remains largely in private ownership. These parks are therefore not "national parks" according to the internationally accepted standard of the
IUCN[1] but they are areas of outstanding
landscape where planning controls are a little more restrictive than elsewhere.
Within the United Kingdom there are fourteen
national parks of which nine are in England,
three in Wales,
two in Scotland, and none in Northern Ireland. There is one further area in England with "equivalent status".
An estimated 110 million people visit the national parks of England and Wales each year. Recreation and tourism bring visitors and funds into the parks, to sustain their
conservation efforts, and support the local population through jobs and businesses. However, these visitors also bring problems, such as
erosion and
traffic congestion, and conflicts over the use of the parks' resources. Access to cultivated land in England and Wales is restricted to
public rights of way and
permissive paths. (Under the
Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 there is a right of access for walkers to most but not all uncultivated areas in England and Wales.)
Following the
Environment Act 1995, each English and Welsh national park has been managed by its own national park authority, a special-purpose
local authority, since April 1997.[2] Previously, all but the
Peak District and the
Lake District were governed by
county councils. The
Peak District and the
Lake District, the first two national parks to be designated, were under the control of planning boards that were independent of county councils. Similar national park authorities have also been established for the Scottish parks under separate legislation.
Slightly over half the members of each national park authority are appointees from the principal local authorities covered by the park; the remainder are appointed by the
Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (in England) or the
Welsh Ministers (in Wales), some to represent local
parish or
community councils, others to represent the national interest.[3]The Broads Authority also has members appointed by
Natural England,
Great Yarmouth Port Authority and the
Environment Agency. The national park authorities and the Broads Authority are covered by regulations similar to those that apply to local councils.
The national park authority for each park addresses the stated aim in partnership with other organisations, such as the
National Trust. In cases where there may be conflict between the two purposes of designation, the first (to conserve and enhance the natural beauty, wildlife and cultural heritage of the National Park) must take precedence under the
Sandford Principle. This principle was given
statutory force by section 62 of the
Environment Act 1995, although there are no explicit provisions as to how wildlife is to be preserved. The national park authorities also have a duty to foster the economic and social wellbeing of communities in pursuit of these purposes.[4]
Funding for national parks is complex, but the full cost of each park authority is funded from central government funds. In the past this was partly paid for by local authorities and refunded to them from the government to varying degrees. In 2003/2004 the park authorities received around £35.5 million of central government funding.
Other organisations
The UK's national parks are members of National Parks UK, which works to promote them, and to facilitate training and development for staff of all the parks.[5]
Natural England is the statutory body responsible for designating new national parks in England, subject to approval by the Secretary of State;
Natural Resources Wales designates new national parks in Wales, subject to approval by the Welsh Ministers. All fifteen United Kingdom national parks are represented by the
Association of National Park Authorities, which exists to provide the park authorities with a single voice when dealing with government and its agencies. The
Campaign for National Parks (formerly Council for National Parks) is a charity that works to protect and enhance the national parks of England and Wales.
Legal designation
National parks were first designated under the
National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949, and in England and Wales any new national park is designated under this Act, and must be confirmed by the
Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. The 1949 Act came about after a prolonged campaign for public access to the countryside in the United Kingdom with its roots in the Industrial Revolution. The first 'freedom to roam' bill was introduced to Parliament in 1884 by
James Bryce but it was not until 1931 that a government inquiry recommended the creation of a 'National Park Authority' to select areas for designation as national parks. Despite the recommendation and continued lobbying and demonstrations of public discontent, such as the 1932
Kinder Scout mass trespass in the Peak District, nothing further was done until a 1945
white paper on national parks was produced as part of the Labour Party's planned post-war reconstruction, leading in 1949 to the passing of the
National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act.[6]
In England and Wales, as in Scotland, designation as a national park means that the area has been identified as being of importance to the national heritage and as such is worthy of special protection and attention. Unlike the model adopted in many other countries, such as the US and Germany, this does not mean the area is owned by the state. National parks in the United Kingdom may include substantial settlements and human land uses which are often integral parts of the landscape, and within a national park there are many landowners including public bodies and private individuals.[7]
Origins and growth
Archaeological evidence from
prehistoric Britain shows that the areas now designated as national parks have been occupied by humans since the
Stone Age, at least 5,000 years ago and in some cases much earlier.
Before the 19th century relatively wild, remote areas were often seen simply as uncivilised and dangerous. In 1725
Daniel Defoe described the
High Peak as "the most desolate, wild and abandoned country in all England".[8] However, by the early 19th century,
romantic poets such as
Byron,
Coleridge and
Wordsworth wrote about the inspirational beauty of the "untamed" countryside.[3] Wordsworth described the
English Lake District as a "sort of national property in which every man has a right and interest who has an eye to perceive and a heart to enjoy" in 1810. This early vision, based in the
Picturesque movement, took over a century, and much controversy, to take legal form in the UK with the
National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949.
The idea for a form of national parks was first proposed in the
United States in the 1860s, where
national parks were established to protect
wilderness areas such as
Yosemite. This model has been used in many other countries since, but not in the United Kingdom.
After thousands of years of human integration into the landscape, Britain lacks any substantial areas of wilderness. Furthermore, those areas of natural beauty so cherished by the romantic poets were often only maintained and managed in their existing state by human activity, usually agriculture.[9]
Government support is established
By the early 1930s increasing public interest in the countryside, coupled with the growing and newly mobile urban population, was generating increasing friction between those seeking access to the countryside and landowners. Alongside of direct action trespasses, such as the
mass trespass of Kinder Scout, several voluntary bodies took up the cause of public access in the political arena.
In 1931
Christopher Addison (later Lord Addison) chaired a government committee that proposed a 'National Park Authority' to choose areas for designation as national parks.[2] A system of national reserves and nature sanctuaries was proposed:
(i) to safeguard areas of exceptional natural interest against (a) disorderly development and (b) spoliation; (ii) to improve the means of access for pedestrians to areas of natural beauty; and (iii) to promote measures for the protection of
flora and
fauna.
However, no further action was taken after the intervention of the
1931 General Election.
The voluntary Standing Committee on National Parks first met on 26 May 1936 to put the case to the government for national parks in the UK. After World War II, the
Labour Party proposed the establishment of national parks as part of the post-war reconstruction of the UK. A report by
John Dower, secretary of the Standing Committee on National Parks,[10] to the Minister of Town and Country Planning in 1945 was followed in 1947 by a Government committee, this time chaired by Sir
Arthur Hobhouse, which prepared legislation for national parks, and proposed twelve national parks. Sir Arthur had this to say on the criteria for designating suitable areas:
The essential requirements of a National Park are that it should have great natural beauty, a high value for open-air recreation and substantial continuous extent. Further, the distribution of selected areas should as far as practicable be such that at least one of them is quickly accessible from each of the main centres of population in
England and Wales. Lastly there is merit in variety and with the wide diversity of landscape which is available in England and Wales, it would be wrong to confine the selection of National Parks to the more rugged areas of mountain and moorland, and to exclude other districts which, though of less outstanding grandeur and wildness, have their own distinctive beauty and a high recreational value.
National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949
The
National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949 was passed with all party support. The first ten national parks were designated as such in the 1950s under the Act in mostly poor-quality agricultural
upland. Much of the land was still owned by individual landowners, often private estates, but there was also property owned by public bodies such as
the Crown, or charities which allow and encourage access such as the
National Trust. Accessibility from the
cities was also considered important.
The
Peak District, site of the Kinder Scout trespass, was designated the first national park in April 1951 under the
Clement Attlee led
Labour administration. This was followed in the same year by the designations of three more national parks; the Lake District, Snowdonia and Dartmoor. By the end of the decade the national park family had increased to ten with the Pembrokeshire Coast, North York Moors, Yorkshire Dales, Exmoor, Northumberland and Brecon Beacons national parks all being designated.[6]
Other areas were also considered: for example, parts of the coast of
Cornwall were considered as a possible national park in the 1950s but were thought to be too disparate to form a single coherent national park and were eventually designated as an
Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) instead. The north
Pennines were also considered for designation as a national park in the 1970s but the proposal was thought to be administratively too difficult because the area was administered by five different
county councils.
Later additions
The Norfolk and Suffolk Broads was designated through its own
Act of Parliament in 1988, gaining status equivalent to that of a national park.
The Broads in
East Anglia are not in the strictest sense a national park, being run by a separately constituted Broads Authority set up by a special
Act of Parliament in 1988[2] and with a structure in which conservation is subordinate to navigational concerns (see
Sandford Principle below), but it is generally regarded as being "equivalent to" a national park.[11]
The
New Forest, which includes the largest remaining tracts of unenclosed pasture land,
heathland and old-growth
forest in the heavily populated
south east of England, was designated as a national park on 1 March 2005.[12] On 31 March 2009 it was announced that the
South Downs would be designated a national park; the
South Downs National Park came into effect on 31 March 2010.[13] Of the English and Welsh national parks that were originally proposed, two remain undesignated: the Cambrian Mountains and Cornish Coast.
National parks
Overview
Of the twelve national parks in England and Wales, four are in the North of England, two in the Southwest, one in the North Midlands, two (the most recently designated) in the South and three in Wales. They cover 10.7 per cent of England and 19.9 per cent of Wales.[14] They touch only sixteen
English counties and there is no national park in the southern
Midlands.
The
Cairngorms National Park, at 4,528 km2 (1,748 sq mi), is the largest of the national parks. Outside the Scottish Highlands the largest is the
Lake District National Park, which, at 2,292 square kilometres (885 sq mi), is the largest National Park in England and the second largest in the United Kingdom.
Snowdonia National Park, at 2,142 square kilometres (827 sq mi), is the largest national park in Wales and the fourth largest in the United Kingdom.
The smallest national park in England and Wales, and in the United Kingdom, is
The Broads, at 303 square kilometres (117 sq mi).
The total area of the national parks in England and Wales is about 16,267 square kilometres (6,281 sq mi), for an average of 1,251 square kilometres but a median of 1,344 square kilometres.[14] In the United Kingdom the total increases to 22,660 square kilometres (average 1511 km2).[14] The most-visited national park is the Lake District, with 15.8 million visitors in 2009, although by visitor days the South Downs at 39 million compares to 23.1 million for the Lake District.[14]
Peak District: The central location of this park provides for the coincidence of the northern limit of many lowland species, such as the
stemless thistle and the southern extent of many northern upland species, such as the
mountain hare and
globe flower. It is located at the southern end of the
Pennines, known as the backbone of England. The
Carboniferous Limestone of the White Peak in its southern and central areas, gives rise to peaks formed by harder reef limestone and dales rich in wildlife (typically over fifty species of wildflower and herb per square metre) gouged out by meltwater from the
Ice Age. In the north, east and west is the Dark Peak where the rocks are
shale,
sandstone and
gritstone and where layers of
peat have given rise to stark moorland landscapes.[17]
Lake District: England's largest national park has geology providing a dramatic record of nearly 500 million years, with evidence of colliding continents, deep oceans, tropical seas, and kilometre-thick ice sheets. The area has the largest and deepest lakes and highest peaks in England. This landscape is overlaid by thousands of years of human activity and the habitats for wildlife to be found in the park include mires, limestone pavement, upland heath, screes and arctic-alpine communities, lakeshore wetlands, estuary, coastal heath and dunes.[18]
Dartmoor: Dartmoor is the largest and wildest area of open country in the south of England.
Granite, intruded 295 million years ago underlies 65% of the park and is surrounded by sedimentary rocks including limestones, shales and sandstones belonging to the
Carboniferous and
Devonian periods. Almost half of the park is moorland, and within it are four separate
national nature reserves, including the 366 hectare
East Dartmoor Woods & Heath. There are also over forty locations designated as Sites of Special Scientific Interest within the national park covering 26,169 hectares. Dartmoor is also home to England's second highest waterfall (
Canonteign Falls) and highest man made waterfall.[19]
North York Moors: Boasting archaeology dating from the end of the
last ice age, the park contains the largest Iron Age hill-fort in the North of England, Roman forts, castles and abbeys, moorland crosses and important early industrial sites.[20] Its ancient and varied geology includes the evidence left behind of ancient oceans, huge river deltas and great ice sheets. The evidence left behind by these events has brought geologists to the area for over a century, including figures such as
William Smith, 'the father of English geology'. The area is also famous for its fossils, from ammonites to dinosaur footprints.[21]
Yorkshire Dales: The park straddles the central Pennines. At the Millstone Grit-capped Three Peaks it rises to over 2,300 ft, contrasting with its deep cut valleys (dales) from which it derives its name. In the south the park boasts limestone (
Karst) scenery, with its crags, pavements and extensive cave systems, whilst in the north valleys with distinctive stepped profiles are separated by extensive moorland plateaux. A different geology shapes the grassy rounded hills with deep ravines in the west known as the Howgill Fells. The park is noted for its glacial and post-glacial landforms including the drumlin fields,
Norber erratics, and the moraines and post-glacial lakes of
Semerwater and
Malham Tarn. The park also boasts waterfalls including Hardraw Force and the Aysgarth Falls.[22][23]
Exmoor: The majority of Exmoor's rocks were formed during the
Devonian period of geological history between about 410 and 360 million years ago,[24] the most prominent being old and new red sandstones, Devonian slates, shales and limestone. The park rises to 519m at Dunkery Beacon and boasts 55 km of coastline towards which flow a number of rivers, most notably the River Lyn. In contrast the
Exe flows south and east. A number of settlements are found within the park including the much-visited
Lynton and Lynmouth.[25]
Northumberland: With a population of around 2,000 people this is the least populated of all the national parks in England and Wales. Rising to 815m at
The Cheviot, the park contains over 1,100 km of paths for walking, cycling and horse-riding. The park also contains a
Ramsar site (an international site for the protection of wetlands) as well as 31
Sites of Special Scientific Interest, six Special Areas of Conservation and three
national nature reserves. The park's human heritage is no less impressive than its natural diversity, with 259 listed buildings, 432
scheduled monuments and 3,883 Historic Environment Records.[26]
The Broads: Britain's largest nationally protected wetland, the Norfolk and Suffolk Broads is considered to be the eleventh member of the national park family, but in fact was designated through its own
Act of Parliament in 1988 gaining similar status to a national park.[27] The Broads was not established as a national park, but was described at the time as having a 'status equivalent to that of a national park'. It has since adopted the title 'national park' and is a member of the UK national parks family, with the same level of landscape protection and an additional statutory purpose: to protect the interests of navigation.[28] Its rivers, broads (shallow lakes), marshes and fens make this area rich in rare habitats, supporting myriad plants and animals. It is also one of Europe's most popular inland waterways. There are six rivers (Bure, Ant, Thurne, Yare, Chet and Waveney) and 63 broads within the park, comprising over 125 miles (200 km) of navigable waterways. The
How Hill National Nature Reserve is wholly contained within the boundaries of the park, as well as 28
Sites of Special Scientific Interest, most of which fall under the
Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance.[29]
New Forest: England's smallest national park[30] was designated as a hunting ground by
William the Conqueror almost 1,000 years before it became a national park and has its own section in the
Domesday Book, in 1086. Originally the term 'forest' referred to the designation as a hunting ground subject to forest law, not to a collection of trees[30] and today less than half the national park is tree-covered (22,300 hectares).[31] The rest is heather- and bracken-covered heath, open pasture, marsh, villages and coastline, and the park contains the largest remaining lowland heath in Europe as well as three quarters of Europe's 120 lowland valley mires.[32] 38,000 hectares of the park is covered by the historic '
Perambulation' in which commoners’ rights apply and their animals can roam freely.[30] Amongst the 700 species of wildflower in the forest grow the
blue marsh gentian and the
bog orchid and the park is the only place in Britain where the
wild gladiolus grows. The park is home to five types of deer, all species of British
newt, all three native species of British
snake, the UK's largest breeding population of the
Dartford warbler, the rare
southern damselfly with thirty colonies, thirteen native species of British
bat and the
New Forest cicada, rediscovered in 1962.[33] The park also contains a wealth of human history with 214
scheduled monuments.[34]
South Downs: The most recently designated national park in the United Kingdom is a line of hills that run from Winchester in the west to Eastbourne in the east. The underlying geology of the eastern half, from the
River Arun to
Eastbourne, is mainly hills made of
Chalk. To the west of the Arun, the area is wider and includes not only chalk hills but also part of the Weald made of sandstones and clay.[35] Most of the rocks that make up the South Downs were formed 120 million years ago, uplifted by earth movements and pushed up into a huge dome about 125 miles long and 50 miles wide which was then worn away to form the North Downs, South Downs and the plain of the Weald.[36] Amongst the key habitats overlaying this geology are chalk grassland, lowland heath and floodplain grazing marsh. The park rises to 280 metres at Blackdown in Sussex.[37] The park has the highest population of any national park in the UK which at 107,929 is bigger than the next two largest combined (Lake District: 42,000 and Peak District: 38,000). The park has a wealth of cultural heritage from evidence in
Boxgrove of the earliest humans, through to contemporary arts, such as Edward James’ collection of surrealist art at
West Dean College.[38] The park contains 600
scheduled monuments, over 5,000 listed buildings, two registered battlefields and 165
conservation areas.[37]
Snowdonia: The largest national park in Wales, it includes the highest mountain in Ireland, England and Wales, and Wales' largest natural lake. The area is steeped in culture and local history, where more than half its population speak Welsh.[39] Fossil shell fragments on the summit of
Snowdon date from over 500 million years ago and the ancient ‘Harlech Dome’ of which Snowdon and
Cadair Idris form the northern and southern extents respectively, was created in the Cambrian Period before the volcanoes erupted. The more recent Ice Age glaciers were at their peak 18,000 years ago in Snowdonia and formed the distinctive U-shaped valleys including
Llanberis and
Nant Gwynant in the north and
Tal-y-llyn Lake in the south.[7]
Brecon Beacons: The last of the original ten national parks to have been designated in the 1950s, the park straddles the divide between rural mid Wales and industrial South Wales. It is formed from sedimentary rocks from the mid
Ordovician through to the late
Carboniferous though it is the
DevonianOld Red Sandstone which is the rock most identified with the park, since it forms the larger part of the different mountain massifs including South Wales' highest point
Pen y Fan at 886m. Like many other upland national parks in the UK, it is glacial activity during the
Quaternaryice ages which is responsible for many of the well-known landforms. The west of the park is also designated as
Fforest Fawr Geopark in recognition of its geological interest, and includes
Waterfall Country. A number of former
tramroads and the
Monmouthshire and Brecon Canal running down the
Usk valley dating from the
Industrial Revolution now serve as recreational facilities.[42]
Cairngorms: The largest national park in the United Kingdom, the heart of it is the eponymous mountain range, the
Cairngorms, but these mountains form only one part of it, alongside other hill ranges such as the
Angus Glens and the
Monadhliath, and lower areas like
Strathspey and upper
Deeside. Three major rivers rise in the park: the
Spey, the
Dee, and the
Don.[44]
Development and land use planning in national parks
National park authorities are the strategic and local planning authorities for their areas, so that the local district or unitary councils do not exercise planning control in an area covered by a national park. Consequently, they have to perform all the duties of a
local planning authority.
They are responsible for maintaining the
local development framework — the
spatial planning guide for their area. They also grant planning consent for development, within the constraints of the Framework. This gives them very strong direct control over residential and industrial development, and the design of buildings and other structures; as well as strategic matters such as mineral extraction.
The national park authorities' planning powers vary only slightly from other authorities, but the policies and their interpretation are stricter than elsewhere. This is supported and encouraged by the government who regard:
"National Park designation as conferring the highest status of protection as far as landscape and scenic beauty are concerned." The Countryside — Environmental Quality and Economic and Social Development (1997)
Contribution to the local economy
Tourism is an important part of the economy of the regions which contain national parks. Through attractions, shops and accommodation, visitors provide an income and a livelihood to local employers and farmers. This income provides jobs for the park. For example, within the Peak District National Park the estimate in 2004 for visitor spending is £185 million, which supports over 3,400 jobs, representing 27% of total employment in the national park.[46]
Conflicts in national parks
The national park authorities have two roles: to conserve and enhance the park, and to promote its use by visitors. These two objectives cause frequent conflicts between the needs of different groups of people. It is estimated that the national parks of England and Wales receive 110 million visitors each year. Most of the time it is possible to achieve both the original two purposes by good management. Occasionally a situation arises where access for the public is in direct conflict with conservation. Following the ethos of the
Sandford Principle, the
Environment Act 1995 sets down how a priority may be established between conservation and recreational use. Similar provision has been made for Scottish national parks.
Although recreation and tourism bring many benefits to an area, they can also bring a number of problems. The national funding offered to national park authorities is partly in recognition of the extra difficulties created in dealing with these conflicts.
Congestion of villages and beauty spots
Some of the most popular "
honeypot" areas attract large numbers of visitors, resulting in overcrowded
car parks, blocked roads, and overstretched local facilities, particularly on Sundays in the summer and on
bank holidays. Examples include the areas near
Keswick in the Lake District,
Castleton and
Bakewell in the Peak District, and
Betws-y-Coed in
Snowdonia.
Erosion
Hill-walking and use of other public
rights-of-way is an extremely popular use of all the national parks. Heavy use of the most popular paths leads to considerable erosion, but strengthening of paths can be unsightly. Particularly heavy wear is caused by sponsored walks, walks promoted by national books and magazines, by
horse riding on unsurfaced
bridleways,
mountain biking and use of
off-road vehicles on
green lanes. Examples include
Dovedale in the Peak District.
Over-grazing, for example, by sheep on hill and moorland areas, can also reduce vegetation, leading to increased erosion.
Damage and disturbance to wildlife
Wildlife may be disturbed by the level of use within some of the areas of the parks that are open to the public.
Moorland and
chalk downland is easily damaged by regular use, and takes many years to recover. Moorland birds in particular nest and roost on the ground and are therefore especially sensitive.
Dog walking,
orienteering,
mountain biking and
hang gliding are typical activities which are likely to cause disturbance to nesting birds.
Litter
Litter of all kinds is both unsightly and can cause pollution and harm to livestock and wild animals. Broken glass is a danger to people and, by
focusing the rays of the sun, a possible cause of fire, particularly in areas of moorland such as
Exmoor, parts of the
Peak District and the
North York Moors.
Damage to farmland
Trampling of grass
meadows reduces the amount of winter feed for farm animals. Walkers who stray from footpaths may climb over fences or
dry stone walls rather than looking out for the
stiles that often mark the course of footpaths across farmland. Sheep can be injured or even killed by dogs not under proper control, especially at lambing time.
Local community displacement
Gift shops and
cafés which cater for the needs of tourists are often more profitable than shops selling everyday goods for local people (such as butchers or bakers). In some villages where tourist shops are in the majority and there are few shops catering for the local people, the local community may feel pushed out by the tourists. Houses are often very expensive in tourist villages as there is demand for them as
second homes or
holiday homes by
holiday cottage firms or well-off people who live elsewhere, or who move to a local home from which they commute to work, making them unaffordable for local people. This is a particular problem in areas within easy commuting distance of large cities, such as the
Peak District, the
Lake District, the
Yorkshire Dales, and the
New Forest and
South Downs.
Conflict between recreational users
Some forms of use of national parks interfere with other uses. For example, use of high-speed
boats causes
noise pollution, and conflicts with other uses such as boat trips, yachting, canoeing, and swimming. A
bylaw imposing a 10
knot speed limit came into force on
Windermere on 29 March 2005.[47][48] The new speed limit for Windermere effectively prohibited
speedboats and
water skiing in the Lake District.[49] Of the 16 larger lakes in the
Lake District, only Windermere,
Coniston Water,
Derwent Water and
Ullswater have a public right of
navigation; speed limits were imposed on the three lakes other than Windermere in the 1970s and 1980s.
^Defoe, Daniel. A Tour Thro' the Whole Island of Great Britain, Divided into Circuits or Journies. (1724–26) "There is indeed an extended angle of this county, which runs a great way north west by Chappel in the Frith, and which they call High Peak. This, perhaps, is the most desolate, wild, and abandoned country in all England; The mountains of the Peak, of which I have been speaking, seem to be but the beginning of wonders to this part of the country, and but the beginning of mountains, or, if you will, as the lower rounds of a ladder. The tops of these hills seem to be as much above the clouds, as the clouds are above the ordinary range of hills."
^McCarthy, Michael (16 March 2015). "Can the threat to the UK's only true wilderness be seen off?". No. Nature Studies. London. The Independent.
Archived from the original on 18 June 2022. Retrieved 30 December 2019. In Britain, we have paid little heed to the concept of wilderness, partly because in the southern half of the country, at any rate, we have little of it: even the natural parks we eventually established, such as the Lake District or the Peak District, cover landscapes which may be mountainous, but are essentially farmed.
^Roly Smith, Andrew Bibby (Andrew Bibby – ed) Peak District: Eastern Moors and the South – Volume 5 of Freedom to Roam Series, pp22-23 (Frances lincoln ltd), 2005,
ISBN9780711224988
^The Broads is not governed by the Sandford Principle meaning that rights of way and navigation rights are protected. Whilst not strictly a national park the Broads is considered to be 'a member of the national parks family'.[citation needed] The legislation covering the Broads is unique.
What is a National Park? at http://www.nationalparks.gov.ukArchived 8 June 2012 at the
Wayback Machine
^"Windermere Bylaws". Lake District National Park. Lake District National Park Authority.
Archived from the original on 20 September 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2023.