Almost every Yorkshire Dales footpath will be open by the weekend.

The good news for walkers comes a day after the Government announced that Britain was officially free of foot and mouth disease.

Rangers from the Yorkshire Dales National Park are taking down "footpath closed" signs this week.

The move will open up hundreds of miles of paths and bridleways in the south of the park, near Skipton. Footpaths in and around Malham, Settle, Grassington and Burnsall will re-open, along with the Pennine Way and Dales Way.

It ends ten months of restrictions imposed last March when foot and mouth hit the district.

Jon Avison, YDNP head of park management, said there would be only a small number of footpaths still closed. These crossed farms that had not completed secondary cleansing.

He said he was confident these would be open in the next few weeks when the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs had completed the clean up.

"By the weekend 98 percent of footpaths will be open to the public, with the outlook for opening the last two percent looking good," he said.

For details of the remaining restrictions, people can contact one of the national park centres at Grassington, Malham, Asgarth Falls, Clapham, Hawes, Reeth or Sedbergh.