Excavations in North-West Kent, 2005-2007 One hundred thousand years of human activity in and around the Darent valley Evaluation M25 J 1b- 3 Rapid Widening S cheme Treatment Pond 3

Excavation
This report presents the results of three projects
undertaken by Oxford Archaeology in North-West
Kent from 2005-2007; on the A2/A282/M25
Improvement Scheme immediately south-east of
Dartford, on part of the Eynsford to Horton Kirby
Pipeline a little further south-east, and at Dartford
Football Club. While different in character and scope,
all three projects are located close together either
within Dartford or just to the south and east, with a
maximum distance of c 6 km between them. Not
only, therefore, do they share a common geography
(the area of the lower Darent valley and territory to
the east of it), but, despite their multiperiod character
– particularly in the case of work on the A2/A282/
M25 Improvement Scheme – all have a focus on the
archaeology of the later prehistoric and Roman
periods. For these reasons, and to allow presentation
of the results of these pieces of work at reasonable
length, it has seemed appropriate to publish the
reports on these projects, originally conceived as
separate pieces of work, together, offering both
economies of scale and also the benefits of a wider
view than that presented by each individually. The
individual reports were themselves based on
proposals for publication arising from separate
programmes of post-excavation assessment. Most of
the original format of each report has been retained,
but the outlines of the archaeological background to
the area formerly contained in each report have been
combined (Chapter 1), and a short general discussion
(Chapter 16) has been added to the site-specific ones.
Evaluation
Oxford Archaeology (OA) carried out a field evaluation at the proposed
site of a new treatment pond on the M25 J1b to J3 Rapid Widening
Scheme. The fieldwork was carried out from 30th April to 2nd May 2007
and was instructed by Jacobs Babtie on behalf of Costain Ltd working for
the Highways Agency. A total of 200 meters of trenching divided between
5 individual trenches was excavated on the 0.3ha site. The evaluation
demonstrated the presence of 5 features in the southwest half of the site. A
curvi-linear gully, two ditches which probably constitute field boundaries
and two pits were all dated to the late Iron Age / early Roman period by
pottery evidence and raise the possibility of a nearby settlement. Flints
possibly dating to the Neolithic or Bronze Age periods were also
recovered from the features indicating activity in the area during the
prehistoric period although no related features were recorded.