Surprisingly only a small amount of the ‘National Park’ is actually owned by the National Park. Originally the National Trust who raised some money to stop building work on Derwent Water in 1895 started the idea of National Parks. They now own 25% of the land in the National Park.
The main activities that people undertake whilst in the Lake District include sailing and canoeing on the lakes, as well as normal pleasure boating, although water skiing is forbidden. (In summer there can be as many as 2000 boats on Windermere alone!). People also go for day trips to see sights such as the house that Wordsworth wrote in, hill walking and climbing and also mountain biking. Activities such as taking picnics are also possible in the parks that have been created by the National Park. It is also possible to visit the sites maintained by the forestry commission.
Although the National Parks Authority has overall jurisdiction on the area because they do not own very much of the area they have to try and make people do things by persuasion, normally in the form of funding or other monetary persuasion.
The main problems associated with the tourism are those of erosion and car parking. With the vast number of people that visit the Lake District every year there is a very high rate of erosion. Measures to try and prevent this include laying stones so that they slope slightly downhill so that the water runs off them. This is however not very easy to walk on, so people walk to the side of the path which further increases the erosion at the edge of the paths. The mountain bikes also dig up the paths and are not allowed on certain paths. On some ‘roads’ any type of vehicle is allowed to roam so that 4x4 vehicles can go up these and drive around. This is just a loophole in the law dating from before motorised transport and some of the roads are little more than narrow boggy paths.
Another major problem in the Lake District is car parking. Most of the visitors to the Lake District come by car. This presents two problems, firstly the roads become heavily congested and secondly there is nowhere to park when the cars finally reach their destination. Even off-season in late March in order to ensure a car parking space it is important to reach your destination before 10am.
One solution to this is to instigate a scheme of park and ride from the major centres such as Windermere and Grasmere. These would run from these centres to areas that would allow people to leave their cars behind at heir hotels.
The Lake District is a highly valuable resource in terms of both tourism and natural beauty. The problems that are currently associated with the Lakes such as erosion and traffic problems cannot ever be totally eradicated. Plus as long as the work that is done on the paths is totally voluntary then the problems of erosion will persist. However with more collaboration between different governmental departments and the continued support of the local population then the Lake District National Park is a viable opportunity.
