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22nd November 2007, 02:54 PM
Sorry to be pessimistic, but being of a certain age where I can remember the economic downturns of the early nineties, and its effects on the archaeology industry (eg the MoLAS diaspora). Could we be heading that way again? The world markets are extremely volatile and many economists predict further fallout from the credit crisis. The construction industry is based upon money borrowing. Banks may begin to decline lending to developers or charge so much interest that development becomes uneconomical.
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22nd November 2007, 03:47 PM
MMMMM. Depends. Markets are fairly skitish at the moment. Investers are pulling money out of the States and placing it in traditionally more stable/secure areas. Depends how *its up the American economy goes, how much the UK has generally invested in the USA and the ripple effect on the UK markets.Banks here are already paying more to borrow money from each other and that will definately be passed on to the bank customers. Though there are figures showing a fall in demand for new build property in the UK.
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22nd November 2007, 06:53 PM
In times of depression governments often spend on big national infrastructure projects. It seems pretty clear that the government is going to stick to its plans to build homes for 3 million more people by 2020 whether there's consumer demand or not.
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22nd November 2007, 09:16 PM
Its funny that we (as archaeologists) are so dependant on developers - once were excavations on sites... now there are evaluations on housing plots on the off chance.... or worse ... excavations that should take months are rushed through in weeks, understaffed and with diggers with less and less experience in 'real' archaeology...
:-0 On the other hand.... without it... we are doomed? Oh ear.. oh dear... wot ave we done?
"No job worth doing was ever done on time or under budget.."
Khufu
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25th November 2007, 02:04 PM
On that last point... I was at a lecture at a dayschool yesterday and the speaker describing a university-led dig kept saying things like "we spent 13 weeks on that area" and "that was excavated by fingertip" and so on. Having only ever worked on commercial sites where anything smaller than a mattock is positively discouraged (with swearing involved) I felt like I've been missimg out somehow.....
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26th November 2007, 10:55 AM
Don't feel you are missing out. University excavations run so slowly because nobody has any real experience at all. Often there are experienced supervisors, but they are rightly more concerned with getting the paperwork right, rather than encouraging people to go faster. it is also common to have too many students, so rather than giving everyone a feature to sort out, you can end up endlessly retrowelling an area. There are usually also a sizable amount of people who don't want to be there. Uni excavations are extremely variable, and some are very well run. mates of mine have gone on some as working holidays on uni digs: they can pay well, and the craic is good.
but this is somewhat off thread.
My impression of government policy is that it wants millions of new homes, and is prepared to relax planning regulations to get them. Developers are making lots of money at the moment, and if they can build on the green belt, archaeologists will be in work for the forseeable future.
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26th November 2007, 11:52 AM
Quote:quote:Originally posted by Oxbeast
My impression of government policy is that it wants millions of new homes, and is prepared to relax planning regulations to get them. Developers are making lots of money at the moment, and if they can build on the green belt, archaeologists will be in work for the forseeable future.
Yes, but that relaxation of planning regs could have an impact on archaeology.
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26th November 2007, 04:11 PM
Shouldn't think so. The scale of the projects (in Northamptonshire, it's 5,000 houses a year for the next 20 years) required to meet the figures in the RSSes will mean that they will require EIAs (and this is because of EU law as well as UK law) and they encompass the archaeological resource as well as the natural environment.
Conservation says no
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27th November 2007, 06:51 PM
Looks like everybody will be switching from pipelines to housing evaluations.
5000 houses do not actually occupy that large an amount of land and only 40% will be on green field land. The minimum density is 30 dwelling per Ha and with the affordable element 50 per Ha is more likely. Thus this could result in 2500 trial trenches a year.
What is being proposed overall is a percentage of the land in England will be developed.
Consultants say Yes please
Peter
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28th November 2007, 10:52 AM
Quote:quote:Originally posted by Winders
Shouldn't think so. The scale of the projects (in Northamptonshire, it's 5,000 houses a year for the next 20 years) required to meet the figures in the RSSes will mean that they will require EIAs (and this is because of EU law as well as UK law) and they encompass the archaeological resource as well as the natural environment.
Conservation says no
Maybe, maybe not. There were large price falls yesterday in the construction sector of the FTSE 100 with fears over possible recession in the housing market. :face-huh:
