BY this weekend, pedal, foot and horse power can be adopted along all but two out of every hundred footpaths and bridleways in the Yorkshire Dales National Park.

The announcement made by the national park authority will bring to an end the majority of foot and mouth restrictions.

For the first time in 10 months the Pennine Way, the Dales Way, and other footpaths and bridleways around Malham, Settle, Grassington and Burnsall, will be open to the public.

The move comes after the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) said it was now safe to open all but a handful of paths and bridleways.

Around Skipton, the majority of paths are open including the Roman road to Addingham, Skipton Woods, the canal towpath, Barden Moor and most walks around Embsay and Bolton Abbey.

Just a few closed signs will remain on rights of way which cross farms that are still to complete secondary cleansing.

Within the Settle/Clitheroe rectangle, there are still 40 farms out of the 500 culled which have to complete cleansing. Until this is done the public is asked to respect the remaining closed signs.

However, DEFRA says farms that have chosen not to be cleaned must remain dormant for 12 months. "In these cases, we work closely with the county councils to divert paths which go through these farmyards so there is less of a risk of spreading the disease," said a DEFRA spokesman.

Jon Avison, the national park's head of park management, said: "By the weekend 98 per cent of the authority's footpaths will be open to the public, with the outlook for opening the last two per cent also looking very good.

"Today we can start to rebuild and encourage the public back to this great national park safe in the knowledge that the majority of footpaths and bridleways are open."

Details of which rights of way remain closed can be obtained by contacting the national park offices at Grassington, Clapham and Malham.