St George's Quay, Lancaster- Watching Brief

As part of a feasibility study for the construction of a flood defence system for the city of Lancaster, the Environment Agency proposed to conduct a programme of geotechnical site investigation on St George’s Quay, Lancaster (centred on SD 476 620) to provide further information for the development. Following submission of a project design, which was approved by Lancaster County Archaeology Service (LCAS), Oxford Archaeology North (OA North) were commissioned by the Environment Agency (EA) to undertake a watching brief during all groundworks on the historic quay.
The groundworks, designed to locate the position of nineteenth and twentieth century services, were carried out in two phases: Phase 1 between 30th June and 11th July 2005 and Phase 2 between 5th December 2005 and 3rd March 2006. Phase 1 involved the excavation of six exploratory Service Inspection Pits (SIPs) set out at intervals along St George’s Quay and dug to a maximum safe depth of 1.2m. Phase 2 comprised the re-excavation and then expansion of these SIPs using an excavating machine. A programme of monitored boreholing was also undertaken during Phase 2 of the groundworks, which was followed by a visit to the Norwest Holst laboratory in Leeds to examine any closed cores when they were opened for analysis.