Extra money to roll out coastal path

Proposals for the 120km route from Filey Brigg to Newport Bridge on the River Tees, taking in Whitby, Staithes and Robin Hood’s Bay, will be submitted to the Secretary of State next year.

The England Coastal Path, a 3,000-mile route round the whole of England, connecting the fishing villages of North Yorkshire with the wide-open landscapes of Holderness and beyond, has long been an aspiration of walkers.

If agreed, the route will join onto a 55km stretch between North Gare and South Bents in Sunderland.

The 90-km stretch south from Filey Brigg to Kilnsea, along the Holderness Coast, will also make progress next year, but won’t open till 2016.

So far objections have led to two public hearings.

It comes after Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg confirmed extra funding to speed up the completion of coastal paths around England on a visit to Port Gaverne in Cornwall. The cash will go towards completing the coastal path by 2020, ten years earlier than planned.

The Deputy Prime Minister made the commitment in a speech in September, but yesterday confirmed details of funding worth more than £5m. Mr Clegg said: “Opening these coastal paths was taking far too long. Under the current timescale we would have built UK’s first space port before you could walk the length and breadth of our coast.

“This extra funding will mean these stunning paths will be open in just over five years, to be enjoyed by this generation and all those to follow.”

The plans involve creating and maintaining coastal paths will provide a walking route and a wider margin of land around the coast of England for walkers to use safely. The path will be able to move inland if the coastline erodes or suffers

from landslips.