North York Moors

The North York Moors National Park was created in 1952 in north-eastern England, in Yorkshire, and protects some 1,434 km². It was one of the first British national parks, created under the 1949 act.

Its characteristic feature is the heather moor: the largest continuous expanse of heather moorland in England, which in August and September flowers and turns kilometres of plateau purple. It is a semi-natural landscape, not a wild one: it arose after prehistoric deforestation and is maintained by sheep grazing and controlled rotational burning, a practice tied to red grouse shooting that is at once the habitat's management tool and the object of controversy for its impact on the peat and on carbon emissions.

The park also includes wooded valleys, a stretch of coast with cliffs and fishing villages such as Robin Hood's Bay and Whitby, and a notable historic heritage, with the abbeys of Rievaulx and Whitby and traces of the alum and iron ore industries. The conservation of the upland peat, badly degraded by centuries of drainage and burning, is today one of its management priorities, with restoration programmes because of its role in carbon storage.