However, people did not suddenly have the right to roam wherever they liked, as is sometimes assumed.
“The 1949 act didn’t actually open up any land,” says Kate Conto, policy and public affairs manager at the Ramblers, formerly known as the Ramblers’ Association.
“It gave a mechanism for the national parks to try and get agreements with landowners to open up land.
“And the Peak District National Park tried that and they got a small amount, but the 1949 act didn’t really do what the people who introduced it had hoped.”
The 1949 act did, however, create the “definitive map” of the public rights of way network in England and Wales.
These are the footpaths, bridleways and byways that people are legally entitled to use, even if it means wandering across a farmer’s field or other private land.
The map made it clearer for people to understand where they were legally allowed to walk in the Peak District, and other national parks.