National Parks

National parks are now extremely popular places to visit. National Parks are areas of outstanding natural beauty which have been preserved for the people of the future.

National Park has two aims;

• To preserve and enhance an area’s natural beauty
• To promote people’s enjoyment of the countryside

It is not easy to achieve these aims and rules and regulations are often set out to avoid any problems. However, with all types of tourism there are problems. The parks main problems are pressure from visitors.

National Parks are close to densely populated areas. This leads to large percentages of visitor numbers during peak times, which in turn increase litter, footpath erosion, congestion and pollution. There is also often conflict between tourists and local people living in the national park.

Case Study: The Lake District, UK

Reasons For Growth

• Offers magnificent and unique landscapes- Rivers and Mountains.
• Vast Range of things to do- From Climbing to Sailing.
• Becoming more accessible.
• Wide Range of ecosystems and Nature Reserves.
• Releases the pressures from Urban Living.

How do people solve and reduce impacts of Tourism in the Lake District?

• Traffic: Traffic is a big problem in the Lake District and is reduced by setting speed limits to 40 mph as well as restricting on-street parking and introduces new trunk roads to space the traffic out.
• Landscape: People maintain the natural beauty of the Lake District by Planting trees and Repairing Eroded Footpaths.
• Noise Pollution: In order to maintain a sense of peace and tranquillity for both residents and tourists, there has been a water skiing ban on Lake Windermere and a permanent speed limit of 10 mph was set in 2005.
• Shortage of Housing: allot of tourists buy second homes and this leads to increase in price for the locals. This has been solved by affordable houses being built just available to local people, allowing both local people and tourists to enjoy the National Park.