16th February 2007, 01:20 PM
Thank you to all for your input.This has certainly opened a comprehensive debate and reflections from all are most welcome.For me, it would be easy to drift into yet another rant on the subject of standards but, the bigger picture is the most disturbing by far. The systemic failures at critical milestones in the life-history of the project resulted in the complete removal of a significant prehistoric monument.In simple terms-this monument should and could have been avoided altogether.As a voting tax-payer, one would have expected the major players like Curatorial archaeologists and English Heritage to have at least questioned any justification for its removal.The manner of its removal is a separate issue here-the debate relating to archaeological issues in a competative environment has continued on other threads on this forum-the focus of attention has to be at the planning level.It was here that decisions were made resulting in the entirely avoidable destruction of said monument. Thanks are due to the contributions of consultants and curators on this forum who, for a long time now have hung the "legislative" skin upon the bones of the process we all work within, we now have a reasonable understanding of just how complex the pre-ex phase of any project can be.The management of projects from inception, through birth to completion can become exponentially more complex as the project evolves.This is a reality, we do work in an increasingly litigative industry. In my little world, I naively believe that when the word "compromise" appears in the closing moments of PPG 16, it is written once because it simply means once.I don`t believe that the spirit of the document would encourage compromise at every stage/phase of the projects lifetime.This has a nasty habit of dilluting the original intention until at the point of trowel, the original intention is no more than a distant parallel.
..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)
..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)