Heritage and Archaeology – Page 8
Heritage significance, harm tests, listed building consent and archaeological evidence.
Heritage and Archaeology articles – page 8
210 articlesReporting archaeological discoveries during works
England has no general duty to stop work for archaeology. The obligations come from your planning condition, the Treasure Act and burial law, and each has a different trigger and a different timescale.
Shopfronts in conservation areas: what officers assess
Shopfront applications turn on whether the historic frame survives, where the fascia sits, how the sign is lit and what happens at night. Advertisement consent runs separately.
Heritage at risk and optimum viable use
For a building at risk, the optimum viable use is the one causing least harm to significance. Here is how to rank uses, evidence marketing and calculate a conservation deficit.
Choosing a historic building recording level
Recording levels run from a basic photographic record to a full analytical account. Here is how to match the level to what is being lost and agree it before work starts.
Written schemes of investigation: what gets approved
A written scheme of investigation is approved by the council's archaeological advisor, not the case officer. What the document needs to contain, from sampling strategy to archive deposition, and the mistakes that cost weeks.
Designing an archaeological field evaluation
An evaluation before determination turns an open-ended archaeological liability into a measured one. Choosing techniques, setting sampling levels, and what positive and negative results mean for the layout.
What an archaeological desk-based assessment must cover
A desk-based assessment establishes what is known, what is likely and what survives. Here is the content a county archaeologist expects, and why truncation analysis often decides the outcome.
Registered parks and gardens in the planning process
There is no such thing as registered park consent. Protection comes through planning policy and a distinct set of consultees, and the assessment turns on designed views rather than on individual buildings.
Listed building consent: what needs it and what does not
Consent is needed for works affecting the character of a listed building as one of special interest. Size and visibility are irrelevant, and there is no internal exemption.
Applying the setting assessment steps in practice
Most setting assessments skip the step that matters: saying what the surroundings contribute to significance before the proposal is introduced. Here is how to work through all five.
The ecclesiastical exemption and church building works
Listed places of worship in five English denominations are exempt from listed building consent and use their own internal systems instead. Planning permission, scheduled monument consent and churchyard archaeology are untouched by that exemption.
Heritage partnership agreements and consent orders
Agreements and consent orders can remove repeat listed building consent applications. The statutory basis, the schedule that carries them, and when the effort pays.
Demolishing a boundary wall at a listed building
A garden wall at a listed house is usually protected by the curtilage rule. What needs listed building consent, what counts as repair, and how to win a vehicle opening.
Geophysical survey in archaeology: what it can find
Geophysical survey detects contrast, not archaeology. Which technique suits which ground, what stays invisible, and where the survey sits before trial trenching.
Assessing a historic farmstead before a barn conversion
Conservation officers read a farmstead as a working whole. Plan form, the hierarchy of buildings, the fabric inside the threshing barn and the yard surfaces all shape what a conversion can do.
Treasure finds on a development site: what happens next
Treasure reporting is a statutory duty with a criminal offence attached, and it falls on the finder. What the definition covers, who to ring, and how to settle reward shares before work starts.
Human remains on a development site: the licence
Removing buried human remains needs a separate licence from the Ministry of Justice, or a faculty on consecrated ground. Former burial grounds carry a further statutory notice period before building.
Scheduled monument consent: applying under the 1979 Act
A scheduled monument on your land brings a consent regime that runs entirely outside the planning system, with strict liability offences and no application fee.
Non-designated heritage assets and the balanced judgement
A locally listed building carries no statutory protection, and that surprises people on both sides of the counter. What it does carry is a balanced judgement, which is a different argument entirely.
Strip, map and sample: when councils ask for it
Trial trenching rarely ends the archaeological story. Where features are dispersed or their character is unclear, county archaeologists ask for strip, map and sample, and the groundworks programme has to absorb it.
Ecclesiastical exemption and listed building consent
Ecclesiastical exemption removes listed building consent for works to churches of five denominations in England. It does not remove the need for planning permission.
World Heritage Site buffer zones and visual impact
A World Heritage Site is not a statutory designation in England and a buffer zone is not a control boundary. The assessment turns on attributes of Outstanding Universal Value and agreed views.
Archaeology and biodiversity net gain on the same site
Trial trenching strips the habitat that the biodiversity metric is about to measure. Survey order, habitat placement over deposits and parallel pre-start conditions decide whether both regimes can be satisfied.
Like-for-like repairs to a listed building: consent or not
Repairs to a listed building need consent if they would affect its character as a building of special interest. Mortar, roof coverings, joinery and render are where like-for-like usually fails.
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