An unspoiled, spirit-enhancing countryside view celebrated by the 19th-century critic and poet John Ruskin<\/a> as one of the most beautiful in the world is under threat unless \u00a31m can be raised.<\/p>\n

It was after a visit in 1875 that Ruskin described the view over the River Lune from the churchyard of St Mary\u2019s in Kirkby Lonsdale as \u201cone of the loveliest in England, therefore in the world\u201d.<\/a><\/p>\n

He wrote<\/a>: \u201cWhatever moorland hill, and sweet river, and English forest foliage can be seen at their best is gathered there. And chiefly seen from the steep bank which falls to the stream side from the upper part of the town itself \u2026 I do not know in all my own country, still less in France or Italy, a place more naturally divine, or a more priceless possession of true \u2018Holy Land\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

The view was painted by JMW Turner in 1822<\/a> but it was already famous, with the poet William Wordsworth describing it as a place not to be missed in his 1810 Guide to the Lakes.<\/p>\n

It is the reason why many tourists visit the small Cumbrian market town but if they do so today they will be met with a locked gate.<\/p>\n

The issue, said Mike Burchnall, the chair of the town council, is that the footpath is on an embankment and when the river Lune below is high it cuts into the bank. Work was done in the mid-1980s to try to reinforce the bank but a lot of that was washed away during Storm Desmond in 2015<\/a> \u201cand we\u2019ve had big storms ever since then so the whole bank is eroded\u201d.<\/p>\n

\n

<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/img><\/picture><\/div>