Toll Road For Peak District

Work is about to start on a project to charge motorists for access to the Upper Derwent Valley in the Peak District - an area which is popular with walkers and cyclists as well as day trippers and extreme picnic enthusiasts.

The scheme, which will become operational by the spring of 2003, will mean motorists passing through car park-style pay barriers to access the Fairholmes car park and visitor centre on Sundays and Bank Holidays.

The move is a response to statistics showing that there can be up to 3,000 car journeys a day to the reservoirs at August Bank Holiday peak periods and is part of an overall scheme which will also see 'pavement and drainage improvements' in Derwent Lane, an new off road cycle route at Bamford and traffic management at the major road junctions in the area.

For those who object to paying for access, there will be a shuttle bus from nearby Bamford for those arriving in the area by public transport and a new bus service link to local car parks. All revenue from the scheme will be ploughed back into the area 'to pay for ongoing improvements'.

It's an interesting development - the last time we spoke to the Peak Park Authority about this, they were taking the attitude that it was a nice idea, but unlikely to happen in reality. Now it seems that it's going to. Is it the shape of things to come? Hard to say. You have to remember that the Peak Park is massively popular - the second most visited national park in the world apparently - and within two hours drive of an estimated 60 per-cent of the population of England and Wales.

In the past efforts to shift visitors onto public transport - the Stanage shuttle bus from Sheffield for example - have failed, will this be any different?