The people’ s park
Roly Smith the people’ s park
There were a few scuffles and a gamekeeper who had fallen down injuring his ankle was ministered to by caring ramblers. The group went on to reach Ashop Head, where they were joined in a victory meeting by other groups from Sheffield, who had trespassed over from Edale.
Six ramblers were arrested when they returned singing and arm-in-arm into Hayfield, and five were later charged with riotous assembly and tried at Derby Assizes. Ironically it was severity of the sentences – which ranged between two and six months – which united the ramblers’ cause, and a record 10,000 people attended an access rally held a few weeks later in The Winnats Pass, near Castleton.
The people’ s park
Of all Britain’ s 15 national parks, the Peak can most truly be described as“ the People’ s Park.” Not only do the sprawling populations of Manchester, Sheffield, Nottingham and the West Midlands regard it with unalloyed affection and because of its unrivalled accessibility as their own personal backyard, the landscape which we see today, like everywhere else in Britain, has largely been shaped by the local farmers, miners and quarrymen over the millennia.
The men who made the National Park what it became, the pioneer in so many conservation-led policies and projects( see box), were equally men shaped by their backgrounds. It was people like Ald. Norman Gratton, Tideswell bornand-bred former quarryman who was chairman for 22 years; Ivor Morten, urbane vice-chairman and Buxton-based farmer and conservationist, and Lt. Col. Gerald Haythornthwaite and Prof John Tarn, hardline chairmen of the Planning Control Committee, who took the ground-breaking decisions which marked the early years of the park.
But it was the officers who came up with the ideas, led by inspirational bosses like John Foster, Theo Burrell, Harry Brunt and later, Michael Dower, son of John Dower, the man who had originally come up with the blueprint for British National Parks in 1945.
Good conservation such as that practiced by the Peak District National Park Authority is often invisible. So we don’ t see a 200 mph Grand Prix racing circuit near Hartington and Arbor Low; a steel works in Edale; a motorway cutting through Longdendale, nor more vast limestone quarries, which were threatening to eat away the protected landscape itself. All these were schemes which have been successfully fought off by the Park
authority in its three- quarters of a century.
The authority was, in the words of Environment Minister Denis Howell in 1978 when Parliament debated the Park’ s Structure Plan, both“ a splendid achievement” and“ a great national asset.” This has surely been proved by the huge numbers which have descended on the Peak for its life-affirming fresh air and freedom during the recent Covid pandemic.
But faced now with ever-decreasing funding from successive Governments and the resultant huge cuts in staff, we must hope that the National Park authority can survive to continue in its unique role as“ the People’ s Park.”
LEFT TOP Winnats Pass, Castleton, Hope Valley LEFT BELOW Curbar Edge, Hope Valley ABOVE Parkhouse Hill from Chrome Hill, Hollinsclough All with thanks to Rob Bates on Unsplash www. robbatesphotography. co. uk
Spring 2026 OUTDOOR FOCUS 11