4.6 The archaeological work of the regional teams
Channel Tunnel Rail Link (3 of 4)
This major project requires a significant involvement of English Heritage archaeological staff covering London, Essex, and Kent. The builders of the railway continued to refine their proposals for mitigating the impact of construction through a very major programme of field evaluations. Based on these findings Written Schemes of Investigation were discussed for the recording of archaeological remains affected by the new railway. The discussions took place against the background of an archaeological strategy for the entire route of the railway. This was commissioned by Rail Link Engineering and is designed to maximise the gain in archaeological knowledge as a result of the project, by defining archaeological priorities for each landscape zone through which the line passes. Enabling works for the rail link revealed a major new Roman cemetery in the vicinity of the Roman town at Springhead, in Kent. At the time of writing major excavations are set to commence at archaeologically important sites identified by a most thorough evaluation process. Further evaluations are planned to try to limit the incidence of unexpected discoveries during the construction process.
The Channel Tunnel Rail Link is almost certainly the largest archaeological project ever attempted in this country and the ground work has been laid to ensure that archaeological considerations are an integral part of the project, and will result in a significant increase to our archaeological knowledge of this part of the country.
