Within London we have experience working on many basement development schemes in LB Southwark and Westminster. A similar set of circumstances is encountered in Lift Pits in deeply stratified parts of London.

 

Dyers Hall, Dowgate Hill, City of London

Our client The Worshipful Company of Dyers, needed to construct a lift shaft at the Dyers Hall. The excavations for this would reach 5m below the adjacent pavement level. From the street level we are now met with Cannon Street Station on Dowgate Hill but hand excavations to a depth of 5m takes us down to the floor level of a building which faced the Roman Governors Palace by the great river Thames. Such excavations involve close working with lead contractors in order to ensure safe working. Such depths require shoring and competent staff to install and check this. The archaeological despots over 5m are complex and a huge quantity of artefacts (over 60 crates) were removed along with many tons of deposits. Joe worked closely with the archaeological contractor PCA and their highly experienced team. We mirrored this close working with the construction team and with the monitors from Historic England and the City of London.

 

The site was a Scheduled Monument and we are well used to helping our clients in arranging Scheduled Monument Consent in such circumstances.

 

University of Bedfordshire, Luton

While at Headland and at Albion, Joe managed archaeological evaluation works at two Castles in Luton. The town has seen huge change in recent years and these sites were developed for residential and commercial property use. One was for development of the University of Bedfordshire, an institution which has gone through huge growth. Castle sites evoke public interest, and Luton is a busy town. Managing what are deep, urban demolition, then construction sites and ensuring the public feel informed – while being kept at a safe distance is a balance. We are well used to the situation. We used a mixture of online methods and areas of open fence and signs to ensure visibility at key times. There are several publications relating to these important sites now and the developments were able to progress on agreed deadlines while archaeology fitted into very finely balanced construction programs. Essentially between the demolition/enabling stage and the construction stage/s. More details can be found here:

https://digventures.com/2014/02/a-knights-tale/