The Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 will give people greater freedom to explore open countryside. There will be a new right of access on foot to many areas of open country, defined as mountain, moor, heath and downland. It is expected that open access to certain areas of downland, heath and common in the Kent Downs will be granted late in 2004.

This open access land will be clearly identified before the new rights are made available. As the first step, the government asked the Countryside Agency (link) to produce official maps showing all the open country and registered common land in England.

The South East, including the Kent Downs, is one of the first two areas to have been mapped. The Draft maps have been produced and the public consultation phase ended on 11 February 2002. The ‘provisional’ maps have been produced and all appeals, against land that was thought to have been wrongly included as open country or registered common land, have been heard. It is anticipated that the conclusive map (the map defining where open access will be allowed) for the South East will be produced late 2004. The new rights of access to open land are expected to commence at the time of publication of the conclusive map.