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The SDW traces the length of the Downs from Eastbourne to Winchester

But walkers were unimpressed by official rejection. Voting with their feet they were drawn in greater numbers to explore the region when, in 1972, its ‘recreational value’ was enhanced by the establishment of the South Downs Way between Eastbourne and Buriton on the Sussex–Hampshire border. Designated an official long distance route by the Countryside Commission, the SDW was the first in Britain to be both a footpath and bridleway. Today this increasingly popular National Trail stretches as far as Winchester.

In 1990, the South Downs Campaign was launched by a coalition of pressure groups representing local, regional and national organisations to fight for National Park recognition. Several million visitors to the Downs each year could not be wrong. Could they?

Twenty years later, after lengthy Inquiries and Appeals, and more than 60 years after the Hobhouse Report to the post-war government of Clement Attlee included the Downs in a list of 12 proposed National Parks for England and Wales, Environment Secretary Hilary Benn finally gave the go-ahead. The South Downs would become the 10th National Park south of the border, in 2011.