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What about the loss of knowledge of our natural environment and deep past?

In these days of habitat destruction and the wholesale extenction of species the environmental surveys are an integral part of any decision to build, To protect rare species of plants, that may at some point be key to some progress in biological or medical cience and to protect the habitat of rare animal and insect species. These surveys are not just add ons.

The same applies to archeological surveys. To take a year you need to be talking of a project as large as HS2. Evaluation surveys ahead of most housing projects take a couple of weeks, and if significant archaeological remains are found, unless they are exceptional, work will be held up for a month, construction and archaeological excavavtion take place at the same time. Isn't it important that these remains that tell us about our past, especially the past of ordinary people, who did not leave documents behind them are throughly investigated and fully planned before they are destroyed?

Developmeny archaeology has added more to our know ledge of the past of this country and all the research excavations undertaken. It ha, for example, completely revised our knowledge of the civilian settlement of the north of England in the Roman period. In London it has revealed the remains of theatres where Shakespeare, bith performed in and wrote for.

As for listed builings - if you buy a house that has been listed, then it is up to you to understand in advance what you are taking on and what limits here will be on development.

We live in listed building - 550 years old -and almost everything we have wanted to do to the house has been agreed without problem because it involved protecting the house from security and fire hazards or installations of bathrooms etc within the structure. We recently had an extension built. We wrote a long and detailed Historic Environment Report, and commissioned a digital survey of the house that showed just how unrectangular it was and has been of immense interest to us and neighbours investigating the history of the village. This took weeks. No natural environment report was necessary.

Our arguments with the council over the design were because the Conservation Officer changed, and here I am critical. Far too many of the decisions on how extensions to listed buildings should look are at the whim of the Conservation Officers personal prejudices. One Conservation officer approved our plans in principle. When we formally submitted them, the Conservation officer had changed and the new one took exception to the plans and we had to start all over again.

That so many projects go ahead even when archaological remains or rare species are found, shows that they do not limit development, but on those rare occasions when significant habitats are found, where relocation is not possible, or where significant archaeological remains are found, then they should be protected.

Callistemon
Forgot to say, when you sign up cancel straight away. It won’t affect your free trail but it will stop your account reverting to long term membership.

Katie59

M0nica

Katie59 Why?

It you’re refering to surveys etc they add a great deal to the cost of any project and don’t even think about the delays, even a straightforward project can take a year, if anything is listed add more.

I'd think any digging in the fens, (Roald Dahl’s "The Mildenhall Treasure"), is a good example of delays to building.

The findng of the Mildenhall Treasure, during wartime has nothing to do with archaeological work prior to building development. Roald Dahl's book was essentially a work of fiction based on an event and like all such books fact and fiction are difficult to disentangle, although Richard Hobbs has addressed the issues surrounding the actual finding in Dahl's version of events, www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquaries-journal/article/abs/secret-history-of-the-mildenhall-treasure/69EB38595F67EF3BA67289EF2E2E8D4E

M0nica

The findng of the Mildenhall Treasure, during wartime has nothing to do with archaeological work prior to building development. Roald Dahl's book was essentially a work of fiction based on an event and like all such books fact and fiction are difficult to disentangle, although Richard Hobbs has addressed the issues surrounding the actual finding in Dahl's version of events, www.cambridge.org/core/journals/antiquaries-journal/article/abs/secret-history-of-the-mildenhall-treasure/69EB38595F67EF3BA67289EF2E2E8D4E

Do you live in the fens?

All work is slowed by the Mildenhall treasure, there is always long involved archaeological work for any building development in the fens. My local opinion.

We all know the Roland Dahl book as historical fiction, the location rinding the Mildenhall Treasure in the fens is not fiction.

Norah, it is the same everywhere in the country. many other area have produced ricj treasur. the Staffordshire Hoard, a large one, whose name I have forgot up in Cheshire

There is more to archaeology than finding nice shiny thing. In fact the best thing that could happen in archaeology would be if all the gold and silver stuff in the ground could magically disappear. What tells us most about those who lived in the past, especially the ordinary people who cultivated the soil, is their rubbush pits and the sites of the huts and houses they inhabited. We have learnt so much about life in the past by the way certain artifacts - pottery dishes, for example are distributed round a site.

I have an example from my pwn garden where the pottery finds in one area of my garden are completely different to the collection elsewhere in the garden only 100 feet away.

When I have finished the analysis I will let you see the paper I write.

Indeed.

Many areas undergo rigorous intensive archaeological and ecological surveys before a project may even begin.

Time added and delays to every new purchase and project.

No, NOT time added and delays. It is an integral part of the construction process. Building projects almost inevitably, lead to the destruction of any remains of the past that are on the site and the destruction of plant, insect and animal habitat. Some can be rare and what is there needs to be known and conservation measures taken.

You may not be interested in the past of the area you live in or its place in a wider context but you, are in a minority. The excitement that excavations that can be open to the public cause and they draw large numbers of people and there is many a public objection, when development on a site might damage an archaeological important asset.

Do you not remember the hoo haa when a dvelopment in London found the site of the Rose (I think) Theatre in Southward, people rallied in their thousands and higly acclaimed actors rallies to its proection.

The National History Museum has re[ported that the UK's flying insect population has decreased b60% in the last 20 years www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2022/may/uks-flying-insects-have-declined-60-in-20-years.html

This includes bees and others essential for crop pollination and the control of damaging species. Since the 1970s, it has been shown that 41% of all UK species studied have declined.

Some groups are faring worse than others. For example, 26% of the UK's mammals are at a very real risk of becoming extinct, while 22% of seabird species studied have declined in the last five decades.

On a species level, the figures are even more shocking. Since the 1950s the number of hedgehogs have declined by 95%, while turtle doves have crashed by 98% and even numbers of the common toad have fallen by 68%. Again this information from the Natural History Museum www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2019/october/the-state-of-nature-41-percent-of-the-uks-species-have-declined.html

You may not care about the future your children and grandchildren may face as a result of world denuded of its natural life, but I and millions, if not billiom
ns do.

I think you might mean The Globe in Southwark?
As a private citizen I am fully in favour of archaeological investigations being carried out before development commences. We have much to lose by preventing that. We wouldn’t for instance have not only The Globe but the wonderful Jorvik centre in York. I am absolutely in favour of archaeological investigations being required before development. In my professional life I acted for properly developers who had other priorities, but much can be achieved by wording purchase contracts carefully!

Germanshepherdsmum

I think you might mean The Globe in Southwark?
As a private citizen I am fully in favour of archaeological investigations being carried out before development commences. We have much to lose by preventing that. We wouldn’t for instance have not only The Globe but the wonderful Jorvik centre in York. I am absolutely in favour of archaeological investigations being required before development. In my professional life I acted for properly developers who had other priorities, but much can be achieved by wording purchase contracts carefully!

I'm also in favor of archaeological excavations being carried out before development commences - apart from excessive delays because a priority is misguided. Yes, proper contracts!

No, I meant the Rose. www.mola.org.uk/blog/excavating-shakespeare%E2%80%99s-playhouses-rose-curtain. The Globe is the reconstruction and something entirely diffeent.

The link makes the argument far better than I can for the importance of archaeology in this crowded island

Norah Archaeological excavations do start before the building work starts, except on some very big developments where the archaeologists work ahead of the developer phase by phase.

Construction destroys archaeological remains. You can only do it ahead of development. Developers have to include archaeological assessments in their planning applications and these will usually be based on trial trenching on the site

M0nica

No, I meant the Rose. www.mola.org.uk/blog/excavating-shakespeare%E2%80%99s-playhouses-rose-curtain. The Globe is the reconstruction and something entirely diffeent.

The link makes the argument far better than I can for the importance of archaeology in this crowded island

Norah Archaeological excavations do start before the building work starts, except on some very big developments where the archaeologists work ahead of the developer phase by phase.

Construction destroys archaeological remains. You can only do it ahead of development. Developers have to include archaeological assessments in their planning applications and these will usually be based on trial trenching on the site

M0nica Thank you,

I know when excavations start. I know big developments are different because of size and phasing. I also know the information applications for development must include. I live on one side of the process.

Thank you so much for re-informing me.