Plans to turn a Lake District quarry into a zipline theme park have been met with fury by locals and campaigners.
The owner of Elterwater Quarry in Langdale, Burlington Stone, has teamed up with Zip World. Burlington Stone said: “Zip World has an admirable track record of delivering fun, activity-based attractions safely and responsibly in the heart of national parks and Unesco world heritage sites.”
Zip World has a theme park at Penrhyn Quarry, Snowdonia, which is home to Velocity 2, the fastest zipline in the world.
The Lake District proposals comprise a “Quarry Explorer” high ropes course and a “cavern toboggan”. A planning application has not yet been submitted.
Burlington Stone, part of the Holker Group, said it had permission to operate the site until at least 2042 but had taken a decision to reduce the number of quarries it extracted from.
Campaigners are already mobilising to block the scheme. One group, called Zip Off Langdale, said: “We strongly believe that the national park is being developed as a theme park.”
