The fragile pavements are already protected by law, but now a university team will be set up to classify and provide 'care instructions' for protected sites..
One of their tasks will be to categorise the natural pavements, which are gradually being eroded, mostly by illegal quarrying for garden rockeries.
Leading the project is Professor Cynthia Burek, of the University's biological sciences department. Prof Burek is the UK's only specialist in geo-conservation.
She said: "I'm very excited about the new opportunities we have at the centre and the PhD post will be looking at the subject from all angles.
"I was concerned that if we continue to lose these sites, then we will not be able to educate new students coming through and now we have the funding to conduct this work for the first time.
"Limestone pavements are very special habitats and we hope to devise some sort of management plan that will allow us to classify the pavements.
"At the moment there is no such classification, and there is no other research being carried out in this way anywhere in the UK at the moment, which I find incredible."
News RSS Feed