Sustainable Tourism in Lake District National Park

This report discusses about sustainable tourism. Tourists play important role in economic and social development of an area but increasing number of tourists also increase several environmental issues also. Therefore, proper and strategic plans are needed that can promote sustainable tourism in the area. Here, in this report a study on Lake District National Park is conducted. It is one of the major tourist destinations in UK and is awarded as one of the most sustainable tourists destinations.

Running Head: LAKE DISTRICT NATIONAL PARK 0
Sustainable Tourism
Student Details
2/7/2019

Lake District National Park 1
Contents
Introduction................................................................................................................................2
Lake District National Park........................................................................................................2
Initiatives for Sustainable Tourism........................................................................................3
Sustainable Accommodation..................................................................................................5
Conclusion..................................................................................................................................6
References..................................................................................................................................7

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Introduction
Tourism is important for every country as it is one of the major sources of income for each
country. But due to increase in tourism, along with benefits of it, there are also some negative
impacts that affect the environment of that place. Due to this reason there is need of
developing sustainable tourism. Sustainable tourism is defined as a tourism that provides a
perfect balance between economic, environmental, and socio-cultural aspects of tourism.
Sustainable tourism has become the need of today’s world as conserving biodiversity is most
important because of adverse changes happening in environment and increase in global
warming (Buckley, 2012). Every country around the globe is promoting sustainable tourism
and UK is also one of them.
Source: (Lake District, 2019)
This report is discussing about Lake District National Park, which is largest park of England.
Key attractions of this park include Scafell Pike, Wastwater. This park offers various
activities to visitors such as climbing, walking, boat cruises, cycling, and various museums
(Lake District, 2019).

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Lake District National Park
A recent study showed that around 15.8 million visitors come to visit Lake District National
Park every year and this creates revenue of around £925 million for the park authority. It is
the peace, history, wildlife, culture and scenery of the park that attract such large number of
tourists here but there are also large numbers of tourist who come to take part and enjoy
outdoor activities or to visit specific attractions. Tourism is vital source of income for the area
and creating employment for local community (Visit Britain, 2019).
Source: (Lake District, 2019)
Authority of Lake District National Park focuses on maintaining sustainability in area as it is
its core responsibility. Vision of the park is to make it is an inspirational example of
sustainable development for all other. Lake District Park’s main motive is to create a tourism
industry which is profitable and successful as well as protects the local culture and
environment too. Increase in tourism in a specific area has both advantages as well as creates
challenges. Positive impacts of increase in tourism includes development of job, support local
products and shops, generate revenue for developing and conserving area, development of
area due to the services for tourists such as road and public transport development, and
improvement in lifestyle of local people and environment care (DCMC, 2009). But along

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with these positive impacts, tourism has several negative impacts also which includes:
tourism in area is seasonal and has low wages, rise in prices of products, catering of shops as
per the requirements of tourists and avoid needs of local people, damage to the environment,
increase accommodation needs, and more pollution and litter (Lake District, 2019).
Source: (Lake District, 2014)
Initiatives for Sustainable Tourism
In order to preserve the sustainability of Lake District along with encouraging tourism in the
area, authorities of Lake District have taken several steps in this direction. Tourism in the
area is promoted by providing better and unique facilities as well as experiences to the
visitors (Tourism Alliance, 2010). This requires development of transport, improved
accommodation, activity facilities, and proper safety arrangements for visitors. In this
direction, transport department in collaboration with Cumbria Country Council and
authorities of Lake District National Park and Cumbria tourism has initiated a programme
naming ‘Go Lake Travel’ with a fund of £6.9 million (Lake District, 2019).

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Source: (DCMC, 2009)
In years from 2011-2015, main focus was on the modes of transportation used by the visitors
to and around the Southern and Central Lake District and visitors were encouraged and
enabled to use more sustainable modes of travelling. Initiatives for sustainable transport
includes enhancing public transport services and plans for managing traffic congestion to
reduce delays, developing separate pedestrian for walking, cycling and easy use of
wheelchairs. Provide easy access to tickets and avail discounted offers to tourists who use
public transport to travel to the area, proper marketing and information strategy for
encouraging visitors to change their travel behaviour around and to/from the lakes. One more
initiative is ‘Give a Break to Driver’ lead by local authority which aims to get people out of
their cars (Lake District, 2019). In 2012, a £7 million fund was given by government for a
three-year scheme naming ‘See More, Drive Less’. Under this scheme a network of bikes,
boats, buses, and boots was created to provide connectivity throughout the park. This
included availing public transport services across popular walking routes. A bike-friendly bus
was also introduced (Lake District, 2019).

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Source: (Visit Britain, 2019)
Erosions in footpath is a serious concern for tourism industry and mountain environment in
Lake district, because walking is one of the most popular activities and this could be more
injurious on high fells mainly. To repair erosions in road, ‘fix the fells’ project is initiated in
partnership with six organizations in the supervision of national trust. It is an important
project that reduces the severe effects of fells on tourism industry. Fell paths were repaired
using the stones by digging them from the ground and creating solid footfalls (Lake District,
2014).
Source: (Tourism Alliance, 2010)

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Lake District Foundation which was known as ‘Nurture Lakeland’ initially is a charity
organization, working for 23 years that raise funds from tourism industry to maintain and
developing sustainability of lakes. Another initiative naming ‘Love your Lake’ encourages
visitors, local people, and business to avoid practices that increase phosphates amount in and
around the lake area and thus reduce toxic entities that harm water quality of lakes (Lake
District, 2019).
Source: (Lake District, 2019)
‘Low carbon cottages’ is an initiative to reduce the emissions of carbon. Authorities of Lake
are working with cottage owners to develop cottages that meet their traditional characters as
well as meet the standards of environment (Lake District, 2019).

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Source: (GDRC, 2019)
Sustainable Accommodation
Visitors do not like old or traditional accommodations that lack of improved and latest
facilities. Therefore, there is continuous pressure on the authorities to create and develop
accommodations which can compete with new housing provision. Main problem with
tourism is that it is seasonal and therefore, there is need of developing new tourist attractions
and experiences which promote year round tourism. People from outside are buying
properties near lake to construct houses to which they can use as their second home for
holidays. It has raised the prices of houses in the Lake District (Cool Geography, 2019).
These holiday houses are vacant for most of the time in a year and thus increasing crime also
in the area. To provide better attractions and experiences, and resolve the issues of
accommodation, camping and caravan will be being promoted. Under this program
‘Showcase Areas’ will be identified where investments are made to develop and enhance
visitor infrastructure. This initiative got inspiration from Windermere Waterfront Programme
which support holiday letting only where existing buildings are reused (Harris et al., 2012).

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Source: (Cool Geography, 2019)
Under the policy of sustainable tourism and holiday accommodation, proposals that support
sustainable and high quality experiences for visitors and also ensure benefits to the local and
business communities will be promoted. In order to achieve this target, several proposals are
accepted which include enhancement in landscape, culture, environment, and adventure,
hospitality, drink, and food experiences (The Guardian, 2012).
Proposals of hotels and guest house will be accepted only if they are located within or near a
village or rural service centre, contribute in business which is land-based or diversification,
located near an already existing visitor accommodation, and which are easily accessible
through sustainable means of public transport. Holiday letting will allow for reusing existing
buildings for short term only. It will be allowed only where they are not suitable for
providing employment, local need, or agricultural process (GDRC, 2019).

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Source: (Harris et al., 2012)
Lake District national park was awarded by Global Sustainable Tourism Review as ‘one of
the most sustainable destinations on planet’. Tourism can be enhanced here further in off
seasons also by providing good visitor experiences by focusing on experiences rather than on
attraction (Harris et al., 2012). A satisfied visitor can create a huge market for the destination
like none other.
Conclusion
This report discusses about sustainable tourism. Tourists play important role in economic and
social development of an area but increasing number of tourists also increase several
environmental issues also. Therefore, proper and strategic plans are needed that can promote
sustainable tourism in the area. Here, in this report a study on Lake District National Park is
conducted. It is one of the major tourist destinations in UK and is awarded as one of the most
sustainable tourists destinations. In order to promote tourism and maintaining sustainability in

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and around the area, lake authorities have taken several steps which include sustainable
transport, sustainable infrastructure, sustainable accommodation, and several others. Each
initiative is led by Lake Development authorities in collaboration with other private and
public stakeholders. Along with all these programs, marketing and promotions are being
carried out to increase the number of tourist in off seasons also and to aware people about the
need of sustainable tourism to conserve our environment.

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References
Buckley, R., 2012. Sustainable Tourism: Research and Reality. Annals of Tourism Research,
39(2), pp.528-46.
Cool Geography, 2019. The Lake District National Park. [Online] Available at:
http://www.coolgeography.co.uk/GCSE/AQA/Tourism/UK/Lake_District_Case_Study.htm.
DCMC, 2009. Sustainable Tourism in England: A Framework for Action. [Online] Available
at: https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/http:/www.culture.gov.uk/images/
publications/sustainabletourismengland_frameworkap.pdf.
GDRC, 2019. Defining Sustainable Tourism. [Online] Available at:
http://www.gdrc.org/uem/eco-tour/sustour-define.html.
Harris, R., Williams, P. & Griffin, T., 2012. Sustainable Tourism. Routledge.
Lake District, 2014. The future's green for lake district visitors. [Online] Available at:
https://www.lakedistrict.gov.uk/aboutus/media-centre/latest-news/news-releases/the-futures-
green-for-lake-district-visitors.
Lake District, 2019. Impacts of Tourism. [Online] Available at:
https://www.lakedistrict.gov.uk/learning/factstourism/impactsoftourism.
Lake District, 2019. Sustainable tourism initatives. [Online] Available at:
https://www.lakedistrict.gov.uk/learning/factstourism/sustainable-tourism/sustainable-
tourism-initatives.
Lake District, 2019. Tourism. [Online] Available at:
https://www.lakedistrict.gov.uk/learning/factstourism.

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The Guardian, 2012. Lake District launches £7 million sustainable transport pilot. [Online]
Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/uk/the-northerner/2012/jul/11/lakedistrict-
sustainable-development.
Tourism Alliance, 2010. Tourism:Britain’s best opportunity for sustainable economic growth
and new Employement. [Online] Available at:
http://www.tourismalliance.com/downloads/TA_284_313.pdf.
Visit Britain, 2019. Sustainable Tourism Management Good Practice Guide. [Online]
Available at: https://www.visitbritain.org/sites/default/files/vb-corporate/business-hub/
resources/holiday_parks_sustainabilitybestpracticeguide.pdf.