Appler, Douglas R._ Baugher, Sherene_ Moss, William - Urban archaeology, municipal government and local planning _ preserving heritage within the Commonwealth of Nations and the United States-Springer

Sherene Baugher
Douglas R. Appler
William Moss Editors
Urban Archaeology,
Municipal Government
and Local Planning
Preserving Heritage Within the
Commonwealth of Nations and the
United States
Urban Archaeology, Municipal Government
and Local Planning
Sherene Baugher Douglas R. Appler
•
William Moss
Editors
Urban Archaeology,
Municipal Government
and Local Planning
Preserving Heritage
Within the Commonwealth of Nations
and the United States
123
Editors
Sherene Baugher William Moss
Department of Landscape Architecture City of Québec
Cornell University Québec, QC
Ithaca, NY Canada
USA
Douglas R. Appler
University of Kentucky
Lexington, KY
USA
ISBN 978-3-319-55488-4 ISBN 978-3-319-55490-7 (eBook)

DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-55490-7
Library of Congress Control Number: 2017937514
© Springer International Publishing AG 2017

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Contents
1 Introduction: Thinking Globally and Acting Locally—

Exploring the Relationships Between Community,
Archaeological Heritage, and Local Government . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Sherene Baugher, Douglas R. Appler and William Moss
Part I The Challenges and Accomplishments of Local Government

Archaeology Programs in the Commonwealth of Nations
2 Planning Archaeology in World Cities: Looking at London . . . . . . 17
Hana Morel, Joseph Flatman and Kim Stabler
3 Preservation, Participation and the Pursuit of Knowledge:
Strategic Policy and Archaeological Practice Within
the City of York 1989–2015 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
John Oxley
4 Crowdsourcing the Story of Bristol . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Peter Insole
5 Archaeological Resource Management in Toronto:
Planning, Preservation, and Interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
Ronald F. Williamson, David A. Robertson and Susan Hughes
6 Under the Old Stones of Kingston, Ontario: The City
of Kingston Archaeological Master Planning Process
(1987–2011) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Marcus R. Létourneau
7 Quebec City’s Archaeological Programme
and Provincial Cultural Heritage Legislation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115
William Moss
v
vi Contents
8 Archaeology Down Under: Management and Outcomes

in the First State in Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
Siobhán Lavelle
9 From Alliance to Dissonance: Two Centuries
of Local Archaeology and Conservation in Indian Cities.
The Case of Lucknow, India . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161
Ashima Krishna
Part II The Challenges and Accomplishments of Local

Government Archaeology Programs in the United States
10 Toward a Theory of Municipal Archaeology: Why Local
Government Should Become Public Archaeology’s New Best
Friend . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
Douglas R. Appler
11 We Dig Alexandria: A Reflection on More Than Fifty Years
of Community Archaeology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203
Francine Bromberg, Pamela Cressey, Garrett Fesler, Paul Nasca
and Ruth Reeder
12 Reflections on the New York City Archaeology Program
(1980–2016) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227
Sherene Baugher
13 Digging the Hub: The Evolution of the Boston City
Archaeology Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257
Joe Bagley
14 Phoenix Rising: The Development of a Municipal
Archaeology Program in Arizona, USA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277
Todd W. Bostwick
15 Municipal Archaeology Policies as a Vector in Public
Outreach Programs: Digging Up Dirt for the Masses
in St. Augustine, Florida . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 299
Carl D. Halbirt and Sarah E. Miller
16 Like No Other Place: Albuquerque’s Archaeological
Odyssey . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321
Matthew Schmader
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343
Editors and Contributors
About the Editors

Sherene Baugher, Ph.D., was the first City Archaeologist for New York City (1980–1990). Since
1991, she has been a professor at Cornell University affiliated with Cornell’s Departments of
Landscape Architecture, City and Regional Planning, and the Cornell Institute of Archaeology and
Material Studies. Her research on class, ethnicity, gender, and inequality focuses on eighteenth and
nineteenth century sites with a special focus on New York sites. She has coedited two other books
for Springer, Archaeology and Preservation of Gendered Landscapes (2010) and Past Meets
Present: Archaeologists Partnering with Museum Curators, Teachers, and Community Groups
(2007).
Douglas R. Appler, Ph.D., AICP is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Historic

Preservation at the University of Kentucky. He is a former practicing city planner whose research
emphasizes innovation in the relationship between local government and historic resources. He
received his Ph.D. in City and Regional Planning from Cornell University and is a member of the
American Institute of Certified Planners.
William Moss coordinates municipal archaeological heritage management for the City of Québec,
a UNESCO World Heritage site. He was appointed Chief Archaeologist, the first position of its
kind in Canada, in 1985. More than two hundred projects carried out under his supervision have
generated an important body of knowledge that has been widely communicated to the city’s
inhabitants, as well as contributing to the conservation and development of numerous sites. Laval
University, where Mr. Moss is a sessional lecturer, awarded him an honorary Ph.D. for his
contribution to the knowledge of the protection and the development of Québec City’s rich
archæological heritage.
Contributors
Douglas R. Appler Department of Historic Preservation, University of Kentucky,
Lexington, KY, USA
Joe Bagley City Archaeologist, Boston, MA, USA
Sherene Baugher Department of Landscape Architecture, and the Cornell
Institute of Archaeology and Material Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA
vii
viii Editors and Contributors
Todd W. Bostwick Verde Valley Archaeology Center, Camp Verde, AZ, USA
Francine Bromberg Alexandria Archaeology, Alexandria, VA, USA
Pamela Cressey Alexandria Archaeology, Alexandria, VA, USA
Garrett Fesler Alexandria Archaeology, Alexandria, VA, USA
Joseph Flatman Historic England, London, UK
Carl D. Halbirt Planning and Building Department, City Archaeologist, St.
Augustine, FL, USA
Susan Hughes City Planning Division, Urban Design, City of Toronto, Toronto,
ON, Canada
Peter Insole Planning Division, Place Directorate, City Design Group (Urban
Design), Bristol City Council, Bristol, UK
Ashima Krishna Department of Urban and Regional Planning, University at
Buffalo, The State University of New York, Buffalo, NY, USA
Siobhán Lavelle Parramatta, NSW, Australia
Marcus R. Létourneau Department of Planning and Geography, Queen’s
University at Kingston, Kingston, Canada; Letourneau Heritage Consulting, Inc.,
Kingston, ON, Canada
Sarah E. Miller Florida Public Archaeology Network, Flagler College, St.
Augustine, FL, USA
Hana Morel Institute of Archaeology, University College London, London, UK
William Moss City of Quebec, Québec, QC, Canada
Paul Nasca Alexandria Archaeology, Alexandria, VA, USA
John Oxley City of York Council, York, UK
Ruth Reeder Alexandria Archaeology, Alexandria, VA, USA
David A. Robertson Archaeological Services Inc., Toronto, ON, Canada
Matthew Schmader Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico,
Albuquerque, NM, USA
Kim Stabler Stabler Heritage, London, UK
Ronald F. Williamson Archaeological Services Inc., Toronto, ON, Canada
Chapter 1
Introduction: Thinking Globally
and Acting Locally—Exploring
the Relationships Between Community,
Archaeological Heritage, and Local
Government
Sherene Baugher, Douglas R. Appler and William Moss
Introduction
From ancient times to the present, cities have been dynamic places that bring
together people of diverse occupations and classes, and they are constantly trans-
forming as economic, political, and social conditions change. Cities have fasci-
nating and diverse histories, and archaeologists, historians, and preservationists
have worked with local communities to protect and preserve that heritage. As a city
evolves, the new and the old can exist in harmony. Sections of some, such as the
historic district of Old Town Quebec City, have been declared World Heritage Sites
by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO). Others, such as Boston, New York, and Sydney, Australia, have
landmark commissions that have designated sections of their cities as historic
districts to preserve their diverse architectural heritage. Preserving this heritage can
bring a unique sense of place and pride to a community, and many cities capitalize
on that heritage and use it as a marketing tool. For example, Santa Fe, New Mexico,
calls itself “The City Different” in order to market its Native American, Spanish,
S. Baugher (&)
Department of Landscape Architecture, and the Cornell Institute of Archaeology
and Material Studies, Cornell University, 440 Kennedy Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA
e-mail: [email protected]
D.R. Appler
Department of Historic Preservation, University of Kentucky, 117 Pence Hall,
Lexington, KY 40506, USA
W. Moss
City of Quebec, Ville de Québec, 295 Boulevard Charest Est, Québec,
QC G1K 3G8, Canada
© Springer International Publishing AG 2017 1

S. Baugher et al. (eds.), Urban Archaeology, Municipal Government
and Local Planning, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-55490-7_1
2 S. Baugher et al.
and Anglo-American heritage. Across the globe, planners and economic develop-
ment officials are realizing the value of heritage tourism. Yet despite the many
contributions of urban archaeology to those working in the heritage sphere at the
local level, very little has been written that explores the relationship between city
government and archaeology. We hope to address this gap in the archaeological
literature.
Archaeology can play an important role in revealing a city’s heritage. Globally,
many urban archaeological projects have garnered tremendous publicity for the
cities in which they are found. Excavating Viking remains in York, England, and
unearthing an eighteenth-century merchant ship in New York City are just two
relevant examples of major finds over the last thirty years that have captured media
attention. But the unexpected discoveries that capture the minds and attention of the
public are just part of what makes these examples so important. Many projects,
including the two mentioned above, were either first identified or are now protected
as a result of a strong relationship between archaeology and local government. The
discoveries themselves, of course, deserve the attention they have received. But the
process that created a regulatory framework and local political environment con-
ducive to community archaeology is the larger, “behind the scenes” story.
Improving and expanding the relationship between archaeology and local gov-
ernment represents one of the next great challenges facing archaeology. Not only
does local government have access to powerful legal tools and policy mechanisms
that can offer protection for archaeological sites, but because local government
exists at the grassroots level, it is also often closer to people who have deep
knowledge about the community itself, about its values, and about the local
meaning of the sites most in need of protection.
In a diverse range of cities across the globe, the tools of local government and
taxpayer funds, have been used to support archaeology either to pay directly for
urban archaeology projects led by archaeologists on city staff, or to support
archaeological staff to review the work conducted by cultural resource management
firms (contract archaeologists) who are hired by developers. Developers in this
context undertake the archaeological work because of local laws and policies
regulating the conditions associated with obtaining building permits.
But what is the public benefit of these projects? Some cities, such as London,
have permanent archaeological exhibits in their museums. Cities such as Phoenix,
Arizona, and Albuquerque, New Mexico, have stabilized and partially restored the
archaeological remains of ancient Native American buildings. Other cities have
archaeological walking trails, such as the Alexandria Heritage Trail in Alexandria,
Virginia. An increasing number of cities have erected monuments and signage
commemorating heritage sites and places of archaeological discoveries. Perhaps
more significant than the physical amenities, however, are the opportunities many
of these cities create for local residents to develop a personal stake in the past. By
participating in the process of protecting archaeological sites or recovering
archaeological information, they become stewards of, and advocates for, the use of
that information. Volunteers invest their time and energy into making sure that
information about their city’s past reaches the present. It is worth mentioning that
1 Introduction: Thinking Globally and Acting Locally … 3
developers themselves are not necessarily excluded from this group of advocates. In
some of the cities discussed in this book, such as Boston, developers and
landowners permitted archaeological work to be conducted when none was strictly
required, and in others, such as New York, they funded archaeological research or
interpretation beyond their legal obligation. For a handful of developers, the
opportunity to recover archaeological information or to interpret the history of their
site represented a chance to distinguish their project from competitors.
The tools of local government can be very effective in creating these opportu-
nities where archaeology is a “value added” instead of an obstacle, and where local
residents can exert ownership over their own history. By providing the structure, the
informational resources, the archaeological expertise, and the relationships with
community members, municipal archaeology programs can create a thoughtful,
informed, and less destructive process for developing land that has in many cases
been occupied for millennia. Instead of treating all land within a community as a
blank slate devoid of archaeological or social value, cities with municipal archae-
ology programs balance the need of the community to build and grow with its
perhaps less widely appreciated need to protect, recover, and use information about
its past. Creating this balance benefits not only archaeologists and their supporters,
but residents of the community at large.
Urban Archaeology Versus Municipal Archaeology
Urban archaeology is both an archaeology of a city and in a city. Many North

American urban archaeologists are interested in the archaeology of a city as an
urban place, and they analyze the city’s urban development. With the advent of the
environmental and preservation legislation of the 1960s and 1970s, historical
archaeologists from Canada and the USA have focused on the study of the cities
during the post-medieval period. Archaeologists Nan Rothschild and Diana Wall
(2014, p. 20) write that an urban archaeology of the city
examines the city as an artifact and looks at how it developed and the functions of its
various parts, and it explores how these relate to each other, to the city’s history, and to the
events that took place within it and how it has changed with the development of modern
global processes.
Urban archaeologists study the material culture—the artifacts, the building

foundations, food remains, gardens, pathways, and bridges—to understand the lives
of the diverse people in the city and how they transformed their landscape.
Archaeologists have uncovered the remains of now-abandoned seventeenth- and
eighteenth-century fortified North American towns, such as Jamestown in Virginia
(Kelso 2006) and the Fortress of Louisbourg in Nova Scotia (Fry 2004) that are
now tourist destinations, but remnants of many other fortified colonial owns are still
buried in our modern cities. Quebec City in Canada was founded in 1608, and
urban archaeologists continue to unearth evidence of the transformation of the
4 S. Baugher et al.
fortified city of New France into a major nineteenth-century urban port (Moss 2005,
2009). In New York City, archaeologists analyzed how the colonial city’s neigh-
borhoods changed as commerce expanded, as new immigrant groups moved in, and
as class differences became more apparent (Rothschild 1990). The impact of the
global economy and capitalism altered the shape of our nineteenth-century cities
and has been seen in archaeological research in numerous cities including New
York (Louis Berger 1990; Yamin 2001).
But urban archaeology is also about archaeology in the physical place of the city
and not just about the development of post-medieval cities. Archaeological work
undertaken within our cities not only uncovers material from the recent past but also
uncovers material from the ancient past. Our global cities all have long histories of
indigenous people finding those locations desirable for habitation. Archaeologists
have excavated numerous artifacts that attest to people living for thousands of years
in the places we call modern cities. For example, Native Americans were living in
New York City as early as eleven thousand years ago (Cantwell and Wall 2001, 3,
39–45). The site of the city of Phoenix, Arizona, has been transforming over the last
six thousand years from the home of small bands of hunters and gatherers to the
elaborate large farming settlements of the Hohokam people down to a small western
town in the nineteenth century to a large metropolitan area in the twenty-first
century (Bartlett et al. 1986). The remains of a Wendat Indian village and ossuary
were unearthed in Toronto (Williamson and Pfeiffer 2003). The archaeological
history of a location that we call a city is filled with stories of different people,
times, and events. In the 1970s, archaeologists unearthed the remains of a Viking
settlement in York, England (Jorvik 2016). In 1999, in the Spitalfields section of
London, archaeologists excavated a Roman cemetery that was beyond the boundary
of the Roman city of Londinium (Thomas 2004). In the heart of London, prior to
the start of many construction projects, archaeologists uncover the remnants of
buildings, roads, wells, and even drains and water pipes from Roman Londinium
(Rowsome 2000). Our cities are treasure troves of thousands of years of human
history.
Municipal archaeology is different from urban archaeology in that it is the
municipal laws, bylaws, and regulations that require certain types of archaeological
investigations to take place prior to permits being issued for development projects.
The municipal archaeology laws prevent the archaeological record of a city from
being destroyed by modern construction projects. City archaeologists work for a
city agency and enforce these municipal archaeology laws. They ensure that
archaeological sites of all time periods and cultures are protected. They may
oversee archaeological work undertaken by private archaeology firms as part of the
permitting process, and they may also undertake work on city sites sometimes with
their team of community volunteers. The city archaeologists may also be involved
in public outreach in the form of tours, lectures, museum exhibits, archaeology
signage for public plazas, city archaeology Web sites, and community engagement
in excavations and archaeology laboratory work. Because of the diverse scope of
activities that might be conducted by municipal archaeology programs, the chapters
of this book may contribute to a number of discussions currently underway within

public archaeology and the broader heritage management sphere.
There are, for example, many recent works drawing much needed attention to
the gaps and weaknesses of conventional approaches to the protection of heritage
resources worldwide (King 2009; Kaufman 2009; Smith 2004; Waterton and Smith
2010). Many of these critiques underscore how the lack of access to political power
by marginalized groups shapes the character of the resources that are protected.
Municipal archaeology programs address some of the issues raised in this discourse,
though certainly not all, by creating an environment supportive of a
heritage-centered conversation at the relatively approachable level of local gov-
ernment. Municipal archaeology programs allow local residents‚ archaeologists‚
developers‚ and members of descendant communities, of preservation and planning
commissions, and of city councils, to collaboratively define the parameters under
which archaeological work will be conducted. Many of these programs take the
devolution of heritage authority even further by providing avenues for local resi-
dents to use the information recovered through archaeology, even though that use
may complicate existing historical narratives (Appler 2013).
This volume also contributes to the discourse exploring public outreach within
archaeology, as seen in Past Meets Present (Jameson and Baugher 2007) or
Unlocking the Past: Celebrating Historical Archaeology in North America
(DeCunzo and Jameson 2005). While these works emphasized public outreach and
partnerships with community groups, the chapters in this volume build on those
ideas by focusing on the political reality of sustained, long-term, community
archaeology carried out through local government. Many of the chapters in this
book reflect the compromises necessary for building enduring relationships with
politicians, developers, and property owners, but they also highlight what happens
when a community conceptualizes archaeology as a long-term commitment, rather
than as short-term project. That means that the tools and processes used in
municipal archaeology are different than their traditional CRM or academic
counterparts. For example, the sequence in which sites within a city are excavated
will likely be dictated by developers seeking building permits, by modern ideas
about what neighborhoods are desirable, and by land availability, rather than on a
purely rational, scientific sampling process. The community members who become
involved are different, in the sense that volunteers are rarely limited to those in the
demographic found in university field schools or to others who might be making a
professional career out of fieldwork. The vehicles for communicating archaeolog-
ical information to and with the public are also different, in the sense that most
programs with significant levels of public engagement will almost as a matter of
course create opportunities for social activities and events featuring archaeology
that are encountered only in the most exceptional CRM projects. In short, municipal
archaeology enables and enhances urban archaeology and, in some cases, is the
only rampart permitting it to exist. Municipal archaeology is more often than not
instrumental in allowing field research to present otherwise invisible results to the
public, often with the agency of the public.
6 S. Baugher et al.
The Focus of This Book
This book explores the experiences, both positive and negative, of small and large
cities globally where local government has played a role in the protection of
archaeological resources. The case studies in this volume examine programs in the
Commonwealth of Nations (formerly known as the British Commonwealth) and in
the USA. These countries share similar perspectives on preservation and heritage,
although the approaches these cities have taken to address municipal archaeology
reveal considerable diversity.
Most of the case studies highlight how these innovative partnerships have
developed and explain how they function within local government. A handful
examine cities where there are no formal local archaeology regulations or policies,
but where local actors have achieved varying levels of success in merging local
government and archaeology. Engaging with the political sphere to advocate for
and conduct archaeology requires creativity, flexibility, and the ability to develop
collaborative partnerships. One of the principal themes to emerge from the chapters
in this book is that there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to developing municipal
archaeology programs. The needs of each community vary from place to place, the
objectives of stakeholder groups vary wildly, even within the same country, and the
level of financial support that these programs receive runs the gamut from being
relatively well supported to having virtually no budget at all. One of the major goals
driving the creation of this volume is simply the need to increase awareness among
archaeologists and their allies that municipal archaeology programs can be made to
function under a diverse range of circumstances if residents feel compelled to
protect the archaeological resources of their community.
Many chapters in this volume draw attention to the significant challenges that
municipal archaeology programs have faced during economic downturns. In the
past fifty years, cities have experienced both periods of economic expansion and
contraction, such as the Great Recession following the stock market crash of 2008.
Spending cuts imposed by mayors and municipalities, often weakening the impacts
of local laws, have damaged some of these innovative municipal archaeology
programs. In addition to threatening the realization of urban archaeology’s vast
potential, this all-too-frequent sputtering of financial support impacts what the
public and the press perceive. With limited funding, municipal archaeology can
change from being a constant source of new and meaningful information about each
city’s past to being a source of sound bites, in best cases stimulated by excitement
generated by occasional finds that lend themselves well to media spectacle, the
equivalent of a museum’s most recent but momentary blockbuster exhibits instead
of the continuity of an accumulated appreciation of heritage. In other situations,
such as those found in Albuquerque, the financial downturn prevented the hiring of
an archaeologist to enforce the regulations that the city had just passed. While that
city was fortunate in having a qualified archaeologist in another department on city
staff, this situation is indicative of the “do more with less” attitude that has become
firmly entrenched in many local governments since the Great Recession.
Another, possibly more uplifting, theme to emerge from these case studies is that
so many cities are changing the public perception of archaeology as something that
only happens in far off locations—someplace other than “home.” In the minds of
local politicians, public administrators, developers, and residents, these cities are
now archaeological sites. While that may sound like a small victory, it is an
important one. These programs feed the public’s interest in the past, and they do
this with real, place-based information and processes. Each chapter will highlight
the excavations, discoveries, interpretive efforts, and public outreach programs
developed by these cities as they encourage this more sophisticated understanding
of the local past. Several chapters will also explore the accomplishments and
challenges facing cities whose relationship with archaeology has taken a less formal
shape or that may still be in the process of being defined.
The Case Studies in the Book
The volume is divided into two sections. The first section of the book looks at eight
cities in the Commonwealth of Nations: London, York, and Bristol in the UK;
Toronto, Kingston, and Quebec City in Canada; Sidney/New South Wales,
Australia; and Lucknow, India. The second section presents six examples from
small and large cities in the USA: Alexandria, Virginia; New York City, New York;
Boston, Massachusetts; Phoenix, Arizona; St. Augustine, Florida; and
Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Section I
Over the years, London has had over 8500 urban archaeology excavations espe-
cially projects unearthing London’s Roman heritage (Chap. 2). Objects from some
of these excavations are now on display in the Museum of London. An outsider
might assume that this city has a strong city archaeology program but that unfor-
tunately is not the case. However, a unique and complex mixture of local and
central government controls has been used to protect London’s archaeology.
Greater London has overlapping borough, district, and city laws and regulations
governing archaeology. Community activists, local institutions, archaeologists, and
preservationists have all played significant roles in trying to protect London’s
heritage. This chapter describes the complex legal protections, some of the key
political battles, and some of the key archaeological discoveries. The authors
(Morel, Flatman, and Stabler) discuss the challenges that have and continue to face
the protection of London’s archaeological resources since 2010 with the neoliberal
government’s austerity budget, cuts in government spending, and its agenda for
deregulations to promote economic development. In facing these challenges, the
important role of community activists is highlighted.
8 S. Baugher et al.
Despite common origins of legal codes within the former British Empire,
countries of the Commonwealth of Nations have surprisingly varied approaches to
archaeological heritage. As explained by Morel, Flatman, and Stabler (Chap. 2), the
English system largely relies on planning consent given within the urban devel-
opment process in conformity with guidelines prescribed by the central government
through the National Planning Policy Framework. Bristol and York work within
this same context, but each has “bet on” separate strengths. In the case of Bristol,
crowdsourcing information through the Getting to Know Your Place program has
helped foster public awareness and involvement (Chap. 4). York has capitalized on
its Viking past to develop an innovative interpretation center, Jorvik, that has in turn
rallied public support for archaeological heritage protection (Chap. 3).
The Canadian example is perhaps more surprising. Canada has no nationally
binding heritage legislation as heritage comes under provincial jurisdiction. Each
province thus has its own legislation and its own approach. Ontario, with examples
from Toronto (Chap. 5) and Kingston (Chap. 6), has a very structured context with
both heritage legislation and archaeology fully integrated into the planning per-
mission process with very interesting results. Letourneau none the less clearly
illustrates the importance individual staff play in the process, and losing key players
can inhibit the application of municipal bylaws and programs (Chap. 6). The
Province of Quebec, whose legal system blends both British and French traditions,
has developed a unique approach that harks back to legislation first enacted by
France’s Vichy government in 1941. The case of Quebec City, a UNESCO World
Heritage city (Moss, Chap.7), shows to what extent the provincial government’s
reliance on municipal actors permitted the city to protect and develop its rich
archaeological heritage though there is now uncertainty as to how the application of
newly adopted heritage legislation will affect this.
The New South Wales (NSW) Heritage Act of 1977 provides some protection
for archaeological sites in Sydney, Australia. Chapter 8 on Sydney highlights some
of the serious problems that arise when there is no city archaeology program and no
protective city laws. The state archaeologist at the NSW Heritage Council works
with local government agencies, and some archaeological zoning or management
plans have been developed for parts of Sydney. However, it is non-archaeologists
with local government who evaluate development proposals that may impact
archaeological sites in Sydney, and local approvals for development may be given
in spite of the site’s archaeological potential. In spite of these limitations, there have
been some successful projects in an historic area of Sydney known as Parramatta.
Public outreach involving tours of sites, signage, and exhibits has occurred. The
author (S. Lavelle) notes that there are still numerous challenges to properly
undertaking archaeology in Sydney. There are also no formal storage facilities for
the archaeological collections, and there is a limited ability for the state archaeol-
ogist to require any written reports from these CRM excavations.
Lucknow, India, is a city without a formal city program (Chap. 9). India has the
Archaeological Survey of India, a federal agency, and various state agencies that
deal with archaeology associated with national and state monuments but not with
non-designated sites. Unlike Sydney, there is no state agency trying to protect
potential archaeological sites within cities. The city of Lucknow is an example of

the major problems that Indian cities face as rapid development moves forward
without local laws and any mechanism for heritage management to protect
archaeological sites. The author (A. Krishna) discusses a development project that
accidentally uncovered colonial-era building features and artifacts. The project
received lots of media attention and community interest in spite of a lack of pro-
tection on the federal, state, and local levels.
Section II
The case studies chosen for Section II, which represent small and large cities within
the USA, demonstrate the overriding importance of local context in the develop-
ment of municipal archaeology programs. As is discussed in Chap. 10 by Appler,
the Federal government in the USA does have in place laws requiring the review of
potential effects of federal projects on recognized archaeological and historic sites.
Private projects, however, are much less likely to be subject to any kind of
archaeological review than are federal projects. Municipal archaeology programs,
then, step in to fill this gap in the manner most appropriate for the people, resources,
and political climate of the city in which the program exists. No two programs are
exactly alike, nor should it be expected that they would be, even when operating
within a common legal system. Far from being problematic, this variety of
approaches to municipal archaeology should be seen as encouraging. It suggests
that this is a lively subfield of archaeological and preservation practice—one in
which the avocational public and the professional work collaboratively to protect,
recover, and make use of archaeological information for the benefit of local
residents.
The chapters included in this section reflect this diversity of approaches to
municipal archaeology. Some cities’ archaeology programs, such as those in
Alexandria, St. Augustine, and Albuquerque, (Chaps. 11, 15, and 16), were created
essentially through popular demand. Local residents saw archaeological resources
as being threatened and were eventually successful in lobbying city officials to
develop policies and procedures to prevent the loss of those resources. It is perhaps
not a surprise that this type of “direct” relationship between public sentiment and
city action is visible in the smaller cities of this group. In the larger cities, including
New York, Boston, and Phoenix (Chaps. 12, 13, and 14), where the regulatory
framework is generally a bit more robust, the cities’ archaeology regulations and
programs seem to have developed first out of administrative necessity, or as a result
of someone inside the bureaucracy advocating for the inclusion of archaeological
resources in other existing review procedures. In Phoenix (Chap. 14), for example,
it was the increasing need for federal compliance archaeology on city projects that
led to the decision to split the duties of the Pueblo Grande Museum Director from
the position of City Archaeologist, which led to new development review proce-
dures for the city.
10 S. Baugher et al.
Collaboration with the many different stakeholder groups present within a

community also shapes the activities of city archaeology programs, tailoring them
to fit the needs of the local population. In both Phoenix and Albuquerque
(Chaps. 14 and 16), consultation with local Native American tribes has shaped the
activities of the city archaeology programs, often leading to more respectful
treatment of sensitive sites. In Alexandria (Chap. 11), collaboration with the city’s
African American community has long guided the research questions that shape the
city’s archaeology program and that influence is on full display at several sites
across the city, including the African American Heritage Park and the Contrabands
and Freedmen’s Cemetery Memorial site.
One of the most important aspects of municipal archaeology programs is the
variety of ways in which the public can access archaeological information. Some of
these approaches are the result of careful planning on the part of archaeologists,
designers, and developers, such as interpretive exhibits built into the plaza of an
office tower in New York City (Chap. 12). Sometimes, these approaches are more
serendipitous—budget limitations leading to the creation of a strong corps of
volunteer laborers, researchers, or artifact washers, such as those found in Boston,
Alexandria, or St. Augustine for example. Many of these programs regularly
question the nature of the relationship between the heritage professional and the
avocational archaeological enthusiast. They reflect the willingness to meet members
of the public where they are, rather than trying to lead the public into a tightly
proscribed environment where learning “should” take place.
Of course, another reason for the diversity of activities that might be seen in
municipal archaeology programs has to do with the archaeological resources pre-
sent within the community. Some cities simply bear more evidence of human
activity than others. In many parts of the country, new cities and suburbs have been
built in areas that the public does not perceive as having a great deal of evidence of
previous human occupation, and it would be difficult to imagine a strong municipal
archaeology program flourishing under those conditions. In other cities, such as
Albuquerque and New York, that evidence of human occupation may date back
12,000 years. The examples in this section as well as the Canadian cities in
Section I all have extensive Native American material buried under contemporary
city pavements. Beyond the question of the specific archaeological resources, there
is the question of whether or not these resonate with the city’s current residents. In
Phoenix, Arizona, the public interest was triggered by the excavation and preser-
vation of Native American sites. In some cities, the recent past is not seen as worthy
of significant attention, while in others having a personal or familial connection to a
site may be what triggers public involvement. Alexandria’s Fort Ward Park pro-
vides an example of an archaeological site that gained significant attention and
public interpretation even though its period of significance lasted until the early
1960s.
Conclusion
In the end, this book is an effort to encourage the use of an underappreciated tool for
building a relationship between the public and its past. Though municipal
archaeology programs have been in operation for decades, they have not received
the attention that is perhaps their due. The chapters included here suggest both why
these programs should be seen as having so much potential and why they have not
become more common. They are difficult to establish, they require compromise,
patience, professional expertise, and a willingness to engage with the unpredictable
and seemingly irrational political sphere, and in many cases, they require the
organization of an enthusiastic, but likely untrained, public. They require politicians
to allocate scarce public funds for the protection of a resource that they may not
even be able to see. And there is also the larger picture issue of whether voters in a
community care enough about their history to make a point of protecting it. To
many, it is difficult to justify the salary of an archaeologist, or the cost of artifact
storage and laboratory space, when faced with the ever-present boogeymen of
crumbling public infrastructure and unsatisfactory city services.
And yet as many of the chapters included in this volume make clear, municipal
archaeology programs represent an investment in place and people. They are not
simply recurring expenses. This is an important distinction to make. Framing
archaeology as an investment in the community may help archaeologists and their
supporters to be more strategic in their use of resources, in partnerships and col-
laborations, and in how they present their activities and goals to the city. Many of
the greatest community returns, for example, stem from programs prioritizing the
use of archaeological information, not simply its recovery. This slight change of
emphasis can encourage archaeologists and members of the public to ask what steps
during the process of information recovery and dissemination can be used as
opportunities for volunteerism, for creative place-making projects, and for recre-
ation of different forms when combined with the work of other departments,
organizations, or developers. Each of these provide opportunities for “value” to be
created for the city, usually in the form of human or social capital, but not nec-
essarily excluding the monetary form. The following chapters include many
examples of the public reaping its reward for having made relatively modest
investments in local archaeological capacity.
The contents of this book could serve many purposes. In one respect, the book
could be a primer for small and large communities across the globe trying to
establish municipal archaeology programs. Many of the chapters highlight how
successful programs began, faced various challenges, and have taken root and
grown over time. The variety of experiences help to demonstrate that there is more
than one way to approach combining archaeology and local government. The book
could also be used by existing programs to identify new approaches or forms of
practice that could address the seemingly intractable problems that resurface with
each new election or budget cycle. Simply put, it is almost never a bad thing to
understand how different people in similar situations have dealt with similar issues.
12 S. Baugher et al.
While it may be the most optimistic take on the contents presented here, the editors
sincerely hope that this volume will raise the profile of municipal archaeology
programs worldwide and that it will draw attention to their potential for putting
archaeological information in service to the diverse stakeholders who call the
modern city home.
References
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of the changing significance of Fort Ward park. In C. Niedt (Ed.), Social justice in diverse
suburbs: History, politics, and prospects (pp. 172–184). Philadelphia, PA: Temple University
Press.
Bartlett, M., Kolaz, T., & Gregory, D. (1986). Archaeology in the city: A Hohokam village in
Phoenix, Arizona. Tucson, AZ: University of Arizona Press.
Cantwell, A.-M., & Wall, D. (2001). Unearthing Gotham: The archaeology of New York city. New
Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
DeCunzo, L. A., & Jameson, J. H. (Eds.). (2005). Unlocking the past: Celebrating historical
archaeology in North America. Gainesville, FL: The Society for Historical Archaeology and
the University Press of Florida.
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reconstructed past: Reconstructions in the public interpretations of archaeology and history
(pp. 199–214). Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.
Jameson, J. H., & Baugher, S. (Eds.). (2007). Past meets present: Archaeologists partnering with
museum curators, teachers, and community groups. New York, NY: Springer.
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Historical Archaeology, 35(3).
Part I
The Challenges and Accomplishments of
Local Government Archaeology Programs
in the Commonwealth of Nations
Chapter 2
Planning Archaeology in World Cities:
Looking at London
Hana Morel, Joseph Flatman and Kim Stabler
Introduction
Cities are dynamic organisms, and London is not alone in experiencing changes—
brought on by today’s rapid urbanisation and global economy—to both the urban
fabric and the society that inhabits it. The vast majority of archaeological work
undertaken in England sits within a national planning framework, which itself is
also under constant flux in response to the political setting of the nation at any given
time (London Consensus 2014). The devolved governance structures of the UK
particularly impact upon this planning framework: England, Wales, Scotland and
Northern Ireland all have different planning regimes and in many cases also dif-
ferent Acts of Parliament underlying these regimes. London’s particular systems
thus sit as part of the English planning system that is similar to but legislatively
distinct from that of the other ‘home nations’, as the four constituent parts of the
UK are referred to. As such, any appreciation of the current set-up of London’s
archaeology necessitates an equal understanding of the political and economic
circumstances that unfold alongside it.
This chapter considers how London manages the protection of its archaeology
through various institutional relationships, and addresses relatively recent changes
to legislation that impact the practice of archaeology; reference is made to the wider
H. Morel (&)
Institute of Archaeology, University College London, 31-34 Gordon Square, London WC1H
0PY, UK
J. Flatman
Historic England, 1 Waterhouse Square, 138-42 Holborn, London EC1N 2ST, UK
K. Stabler
Stabler Heritage, 61 Broadway West, Newcastle Upon Tyne, London NE3 2NE, UK

18 H. Morel et al.
historic environment including buildings, parks, gardens and monuments, but the
focus is on the archaeological resource. Key to this discussion is the fact that
London—unlike many of its European neighbours—does not have a municipal
archaeology programme or central, state-funded national archaeological service,
and thus has and continues to develop through an evolving community of practi-
tioners and interested parties. Below we explore the highlights and drawbacks of
how London has developed its approaches to archaeology and archaeological
resource management, and thus contribute, we hope, to a discussion of how to
improve the management of city archaeology in general.
A Brief Introduction to Greater London
London is a varied and multicultural environment and one of the world’s leading
global cities. Greater London is 1569 km2 and, according to the London Census
2011, its population is just over 8 million with a foreign-born immigrant population
of 36.7%, similar to the population size and ethnic and cultural diversity of New
York City (NYC Department of Planning 2000).
Politically and geographically Greater London consists of 33 inner and outer
boroughs (Fig. 2.1): one of which is the City Corporation of London—the original
City at the physical, geopolitical and economic ‘heart’ of the larger city. The boroughs
were amalgamated into Greater London following the 1963 London Government Act.
This Act created a new local two-tier government structure for London, the basic
structure of which is still in place today, albeit with modifications. The 1963 Act
created the present boroughs by absorbing land from a number of counties—Kent,
Essex, Surrey and Middlesex—as well as the historic core of London. Greater London
remains bordered by these counties today.
In 2000, the Greater London Authority (GLA) was established as the ‘strategic’
level of local government, which is headed by an elected mayor. The borough councils
provide the majority of local government services, such as housing, planning, social
services, environmental health and waste services, libraries and leisure and recreational
facilities. With few exceptions, archaeological planning advice throughout England is
provided at the county level by in-house archaeological advisors situated within the
county councils. Several major cities—Birmingham and York, for example, and
Edinburgh in Scotland—have independent City Archaeologist roles that sit separate
from the County Archaeologist positions. In London, however, the absence of a county
structure has led to the evolution of the Greater London Archaeology Advisory Service
(GLAAS), which is run and funded by the London division of Historic England—
England’s national heritage advisory service (as of 31 March 2015 English Heritage
split into two organisations: a charitable trust that kept the name English Heritage
responsible for managing historic sites owned by the State, and Historic England,
England’s national heritage advisory service) (Historic England 2016). In this unique
arrangement, GLAAS provides archaeological advice in a strategic and cost-effective
manner to 31 of the London boroughs, some of which are too small to support a
2 Planning Archaeology in World Cities: Looking at London 19
Fig. 2.1 Map of Greater London with different boroughs highlighted. Attributed to Wikimedia
commons
dedicated officer. The City of London and the south-central borough of Southwark (an
historic Roman settlement with significant prehistoric and also post-Roman archaeol-
ogy) both maintain and fund their own archaeological advisory services alongside that
provided by GLAAS. Scheduled Monuments, those remains officially designated by
Historic England as being of national or international significance (under the 1979
Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act), are managed through separate
legislation and officers. Meanwhile, London is home to Europe’s largest archaeological
archive, the London Archaeological Archive and Research Centre (LAARC). It holds
thousands of records and deposits from over 8500 excavations. The LAARC plays a
huge role in the consistency and standardisation of deposits and in doing so has helped
improve consistencies during excavations and reporting.
Archaeology and Planning
The vast majority of archaeological work in London and throughout the UK is

commercially led and funded through development activity. In 2006, for example,
93% of all archaeological investigations in the UK were initiated through the
20 H. Morel et al.
planning process (Aitchison 2009). Archaeology, or more accurately the impact to

significant archaeological assets, has been a ‘material consideration’ under the
planning process in the UK since 1991, which means that prior to receiving
planning permission, the developer must ensure that they have sought expert
opinion on whether there is significant archaeology present or not (Flatman and
Perring 2012; Flatman 2012).
Today, all national planning policies, including policies surrounding archaeol-
ogy and built heritage, are delivered through the National Planning Policy
Framework (NPPF), which came into effect in March 2012. The NPPF consolidated
a substantial amount of existing legislation in favour of a streamlined, single-policy
approach to planning that would be faster and fairer and would, it was argued, aid
development and thus economic growth; those against such reform highlighted in
contrast the risk of diminishing or entirely destroying the many hard-won ‘checks
and balances’ of the previous systems, including many of the advances towards the
protection of the historic environment that had been won over the preceding dec-
ades (Sheppard 1991; Marsden 1996; Flatman and Perring 2012; Aitchison 2012).
In terms of the historic environment, the NPPF sets out the government’s aspira-
tions for the protection of all heritage assets, both designated and non-designated,
which are considered of having heritage value. Policies specifically associated with
heritage and archaeology stress the need to assess the significance of any heritage
asset in order to fully understand the impact of development proposals and inform
on how to manage change, using local historic environment records and expert
advice (section 12 of the NPPF paragraphs 126–141). Most importantly, however,
the high-level positioning of the historic environment within national planning
policy is in itself a victory.
The major themes and issues presented in national planning policy are further
expanded and articulated in local development frameworks, which are better suited
to address local issues and development concerns. Within the London boroughs,
local archaeological policies require developers to consult the Greater London
Record, a GIS database of all assets and archaeological intervention within the
region, prior to the submission of a planning application. The policies generally
state that the boroughs will seek expert archaeological advice, such as that offered
by GLAAS or the City or Southwark archaeology advisors, when determining
planning applications. This advice may range from a series of pre-determination
intrusive or non-intrusive assessments, depending on the archaeological potential
and significance of a site, through to the recommendation of planning conditions
attached to any consent, preservation in situ, or the refusal of planning applications.
For example, in 2013–14, a total of 79,837 planning applications were submitted in
Greater London; GLAAS carried out detailed assessments on the archaeological
impact on 2188 of the applications. Further work—excavation or building
recording—was recommended in 790 cases. GLAAS advisors and their borough
colleagues also monitor the implementation of planning conditions, including
fieldwork, post-excavation assessment, publication and archiving. While archae-
ology advisors do have the right to seek prosecution for offences provided under the
Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act 1979, Planning Act 1990 and
the National Heritage Act 2002, they are considered to only have soft power and
work under the Local Authority Planning Officer, who makes the final decision on
whether or not ‘conditions’ (the British equivalent of the US permit system,
including specifically for archaeology) have been met, and who pursues any
enforcement action, either directly through the planning system or indirectly, and
with greater severity, through the courts in more extreme cases of developer mis-
behaviour. So regardless of the law being quite strong clarifying a series of obli-
gations and roles, England’s current sidelining of environmental and cultural
considerations during the planning process, and its cuts to resources, are increas-
ingly making it easier for developers to find loopholes in the law.
The Background of London’s Archaeology
Part I: An Issue of Access and Funding
The current high level of urbanisation and increasing agglomeration of economies

in politically and economically strategic cities such as London has, since the 1950s,
generated an extraordinarily fast pace of change on the urban environment,
demanding an exponential growth of infrastructure as the population’s needs and
requirements increase.
London’s archaeology in such a context followed from the devastation of World
War II and the consequential global economic boom that went on until the early 1970s
recession. During this time, London went through an intensive period of post-war
reconstruction and development. The bombing from the war, which destroyed more
than a third of the City, and subsequent redevelopment uncovered numerous archae-
ological sites across London, providing an opportunity for various archaeological
societies scattered around the city to do limited excavations (Sheldon and Haynes
2008). Some seminal sites were excavated in the immediate post-war period, including
the third century Roman Temple of Mithras, uncovered in 1954 by Professor William
Francis Grimes, the then director of the Museum of London, as part of an informal
programme recording Blitz sites prior to wholesale clearance and redevelopment of the
City of London. The Mithraeum remains one of the best-known archaeological remains
from Roman London (Shepherd 1998; Lyon 2007). Recent excavations from 2010 to
2013 by the Museum of London as part of the larger redevelopment of the site
undertaken through the planning system outlined above completed Grimes’ work on
the site and will enable the statuary and remains of the temple to be returned to their
original location and accessible to the public (Walbrook Discovery 2016).
It was clear that, despite interest from the major museums, learned societies and
the general public, the rate of change across London, coupled with the limited
resources (from government or negotiated with some developers) available for
archaeological investigation, meant that an increasing number of potentially sig-
nificant sites were being lost without appropriate recording. At that time, there was
no full-time professional coverage of archaeological sites in the Greater London
22 H. Morel et al.
area; the odd project was executed by museums, the occasional university, or by
local archaeological societies. These projects, despite their invaluable contribution,
were geographically patchy, and, despite keen interest and enthusiasm from those
practitioners, the hardships that they stood against included fundamental challenges
such as the lack of any legislative requirement by developers to undertake ar-
chaeology, and the difficulty of receiving funding or even access to set up city
projects. Access to sites and any funding was generally negotiated on an individual
basis without consistent application. It was gradually realised that key to providing
means to investigate and preserve archaeological deposits was creating a formal
relationship between the archaeological community, planning authorities and
commercial developers.
Part II: The Rescue Movement and the Setting

up of Archaeological Units
This political environment of the 1970s provided the right conditions for archae-
ologists to agitate for change against the increasing impacts of such intense
development in historic cities across the country, not just in London. With the push
from Philip Barker at Birmingham University, the organisation RESCUE was
founded in 1971 with the aim of excavating as many threatened sites as they could
and ensuring preservation for some (RESCUE 2016).
With the aims of the ‘rescue archaeology’ movement gaining momentum across
England, RESCUE itself was promoting archaeology and informing the public on
the devastating damage that was being done to England’s archaeological heritage,
alongside ‘sister’ organisations such as SAVE Britain’s Heritage (founded in 1975)
campaigning to protect historic buildings (SAVE Britain’s Heritage 2016). One of
the most influential publications of the time was The Future of London’s Past
(Biddle et al. 1973), which suggested that a City of London Archaeology Unit be
established for the investigation and recording of the remaining evidence of
London’s past before it was lost to development. This Unit was thought to be best
organised under the auspices of the Museum of London (MoL) which was then
being built as a city museum amalgamating both the London Museum and the
Guildhall Museum under the Museum of London Act 1965. It opened in December
1976 and was agreed that costs would be divided by the City of London, The
Exchequer and the City Corporation. The previous year, the Department of Urban
Archaeology (DUA) was set up and based in the City of London as part of the
Guildhall Museum, until the opening of the MoL. The DUA was only to cover the
City of London under the funds of the Corporation of London and was only one of
many organisations operational at the time; indeed, the 1970s saw something of a
zeitgeist in the provision of archaeological services throughout Greater London.
Units operational in the early 1970s were often based in local museums or spon-
sored by planning authorities or learned societies. This included the Southwark and
Lambeth Archaeological Excavation Committee (1973); the South West London

Archaeological Unit (1974); the West London Archaeological Unit; the Inner
London Archaeological Unit (1974); Passmore Edwards Museum; and the Kent
Archaeological Rescue Unit. These organisations all worked within particular
geographical areas in or close to London and provided planning advice to local
authorities, determined what work needed to be done, conducted the fieldwork, and
would also negotiate with developers requesting either time slots or financial
assistance for conducting archaeological work they would advise as necessary.
Unlike more recent work, these organisations both made the determinations for the
need for work and undertook the work themselves, rather than the split system of
government advice and contracted archaeological units that later emerged.
Depending on the unit, artefacts would be stored in various available spaces, in
some cases in local museums or archives, in other cases in long-term storage.
A more regular system of engagement fuelled the number of excavations
undertaken, and many influential sites were investigated and published during this
time that demonstrated the importance of London’s archaeology. Much work was
focused on the identification and exploration of the Roman settlement of Londinium
as a major mercantile and administrative centre for the Roman Empire (Merrifield
1965; Bird et al. 1978; Marsden 1980). Similarly, in the 1980s, extensive inves-
tigations in the Covent Garden area of London allowed for the identification of the
Saxon settlement of Lundenwic (Biddle 1984; Cowie and Whytehead 1989). Such
fieldwork included limited opportunities for public engagement, something that was
not seen as a priority, neither in terms of time nor funding, at that time.
This landscape of many small and disparate local units providing archaeological
services continued until 1983. At that time, the Greater London Council provided
central government funding to establish a full archaeological service for all of London.
While the Department of Urban Archaeology continued its jurisdiction in the City of
London, the rest of the London units were pulled together as the Department of
Greater London Archaeology (DGLA), also based at the Museum of London. This
move consolidated, for the first time, the operating excavation units, the Sites and
Monuments Record and the archaeological archive. This was the first—and arguably
the last—time that all three wings were completely integrated.
The 1980s saw a massive development boom in London, partly led by changes in
the deregulation of the City of London financial corporations. This saw a significant
uplift in the number of major City sites under excavation, when developer funding
overtook public grants as the means of resourcing archaeological works and offset a
continuous erosion of public funding. The Museum of London issued site codes—
registered codes to identify sites—for archaeological work undertaken in Greater
London from the 1960s onwards. Although a simplistic measure, the overall increase
in archaeological sites is easy to trace. In the 1970s, 538 site codes were issued, in the
1980s 871 and the 1990s 2800 (Sidell 2012). This model was, however, heavily
dependent on the voluntary cooperation of the development community. Government
guidance lagged considerably behind what was being established as standard pro-
fessional practice: a government circular (Department of the Environment Circular
1/85) allowed access to archaeologists, but the issue of obligatory funding was yet to
24 H. Morel et al.
be addressed. The length of time available for excavation was also fluid and was most
likely based upon tight development timescales rather than the completion of
archaeological works to an agreed professional standard. The DUA and DGLA were
very successful in obtaining funding on a case-by-case basis, but as they were also
providing planning advice, without the support of a clear regulatory framework, there
was an increasing tension between all parties, with the museum services open to
accusations of conflict of interest (Sheldon and Clark 2008, p. 256). When a developer
did not want to undertake archaeology, there was only limited recourse to the law in
order to enforce a bare minimum off work under the terms of the DoE Circular 1/85.
This often meant the most rudimentary of archaeological investigation, with little or no
post-excavation analysis, conservation or publication, and no public engagement in the
process at all.
At the same time, and fuelled by the success of some recent excavations, the
public awareness of the value and fragility of London’s archaeology was increasing.
Londoners have always had a complex relationship with the past—ancient cultural
traditions and customs are steeped into current social and political constructs,
historic places and buildings rest alongside steel and glass high-rise towers, the rate
of change is fast yet the desire to protect is also strong, which creates an ongoing
tension between ‘modernisation’ and retention. The concept of preservation in situ,
where significant sites are retained despite development interest, was perhaps first
implemented in London in 1848, when the remains of the Billingsgate Roman bath
house were found during the construction of the Coal Exchange in what is now
Lower Thames Street, parallel to the north bank of the Thames. The remains of the
baths, which include the frigidarium, tepidarium, caldarium, furnaces and hypo-
caust systems, were preserved by order of the then City Architect J B Brunning
(Sidell 2012). The remains are currently part of the basement of an office block. The
opportunity to view remains of Londinium in situ, particularly when during the
course of excavation, has also always been of enormous popular interest, with
numbers of over 30,000 being recorded as queuing for glimpses of Roman mosaics
or baths. The British fondness for lengthy queues is indeed a well-noted phe-
nomenon, no less for archaeological sites. An estimated 50,000 people visited the
Bucklersbury mosaic over a course of 3 days when exposed in 1869 (see Museum
of London Archaeology 2014 for an in-depth analysis). Similarly, almost 100 years
later, a recorded 30,000 queued to see the Temple of Mithras remains in 1954, an
event that has since become a crucial part of the cultural history of London’s
archaeological community (Sidell 2012: 378), and which was itself the subject of an
oral history project in 2014–15 (Museum of London Archaeology 2014).
In the late 1980s, two particular sites brought these issues to the fore: Huggin
Hill Bath in the City of London and the Rose Theatre Playhouse in Southwark.
Huggin Hill baths are part of a massive public building complex from the first AD.
The baths are terraced into the banks of the Thames to make use of the natural water
supply and drainage. Elements of the hypocaust systems, marble mosaic floors,
numerous rooms and wall survive, some to a height of c. 3 m. The Rose Playhouse
was built in 1587 and was where Shakespeare and Marlowe, amongst others, wrote
and performed.
The footprint of the Rose is intact, including the stage area. A large number of
artefacts recovered from the excavation has contributed significantly to under-
standing of the Elizabethan age and literature (Fig. 2.2). Both sites contained
important, and in the case of the Rose internationally significant, remains preserved
to a very high standard. It was estimated that revoking the consents at Huggin Hill,
for example, could have left English Heritage open to claims of between £7 and
Fig. 2.2 An overview of the Rose Theatre excavation. Courtesy of Rose Theatre Trust, 1989
26 H. Morel et al.
£70 m (in 1980s prices), which would have been equal to its annual budget (Orton
1989). Both were also subject to high-profile development schemes, and although
negotiations had taken place to allow DUA archaeologists on to the sites for limited
periods of time, the value of the remains was such that public opinion demanded
they be retained. As planning consents had been granted for both developments, the
cost of compensation was simply too high to consider revoking permissions as the
quality of the remains became revealed. The Rose Theatre foundations are currently
under water to help preserve it and continue to be monitored, while the Huggin Hill
Roman bath house is scheduled under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological
Areas Act 1979.
In the face of mounting public pressure, including dramatic protests and sit-ins,
questions were asked in Parliament about the lack of planning regulation in a
system that enabled such destruction to take place (Fig. 2.3). There needed to be a
fundamental shift in including archaeological remains as a consideration when
granting planning permission, and making the development community responsible
for the impacts that they were creating.
Fig. 2.3 Public demonstrating against the demolition of the Rose Theatre. Courtesy of Rose
Theatre Trust, 1989
Part III: A Change in the Organisational Landscape
Finally, through Planning Policy Guidance Note 16: Archaeology and Planning
(DoE 1990), archaeology was for the first time identified through policy as a
material consideration during the process of approving development projects. The
guidance note also secured preservation in situ as the first option for nationally
significant remains and emphasised the need for proper assessment and investiga-
tion prior to granting planning consent in order to avoid situations as at Huggin Hill
and the Rose. It was through PPG16 that archaeologists for the first time gained
guaranteed access and funds to carry out archaeological work. The ‘polluter pays’
concept was adopted, whereby developers, rather than government departments or
publically funded museum services, would be responsible for funding archaeo-
logical works.
This change symbolically marked an end to the struggles that had been faced by
the various archaeological groups of the 1970s and 1980s. By the early 1990s, the
introduction of archaeology underpinned by political planning requirements
directed the profession into a realm of economics, through highlighting that the
MoL excavation unit clashed with trade practices law—or competition law—that
promotes and maintains market competition by regulating or restricting monopo-
lies. A separation between those providing advice and those carrying out resultant
work was necessary, which is when GLAAS, acting within the wider umbrella of
English Heritage (since March 31 2015, Historic England), was created. The set-up
meant that the archaeological process was divided into different sections: local
authorities and GLAAS would become curators (understood in the UK as local
planning authority archaeology officers, development control archaeologists or
county/city archaeologists who oversee archaeology under the planning regulation
on both public and private land and property); private archaeology contractors (such
as the redeveloped MoL, now MoLA) would tender for the work and undertake
necessary fieldwork required by curators and developers so that the former can
‘sign off’ required considerations (known as planning conditions) for planning
permission; and a requirement of a basic technical report would need to be sub-
mitted to the Planning Authorities and agreed by the archaeology officer. MOLA is
one of the largest archaeological contractors in London, although it should be noted
that there are numerous companies of varied sizes in this highly competitive urban
environment, which (in a microcosm of the UK as a whole) is arguably the most
competitive archaeological marketplace in the country. As a consequence, staff
sizes in such organisations change regularly, with a significant use of fixed-term or
subcontracted staff to meet short-term shifts in demand.
Archaeology was now part of legislation and part of the political economy.
Following this, shift archaeology experienced a new age of a huge rise of funding,
professionals, greater job opportunities, career development and most importantly the
re-emergence of separate units—this time professionally driven contract/commercial
units. In 2010, PPG 16 was replaced by Planning Policy Statement 5: Planning for the
28 H. Morel et al.
Historic Environment (DCLG 2010), itself rapidly replaced in turn less than two years
later by the current NPPF (DCLG 2012; discussed above).
London’s Archaeology Today
The ostensibly clear and simple basis of archaeology in London—and in the UK—
being managed through the frameworks of the NPPF since 2012 belies in truth a
very much more complicated system of heritage management, especially in
London. The unique political, social and economic pressures of this city discussed
above place particular pressures on its archaeology. The fact that England does not
have a state-funded national archaeological service, the archaeological structures
that are seen in many of its European neighbouring countries, has also necessitated
London’s archaeology to progress in a unique way through the intersection of
multiple different stakeholders in different partnerships. This includes local com-
munities (and community-based archaeologists); owners and developers of historic
sites (often via their paid consultants and/or archaeological contractors); the charity
and amenity sector (including religious organisations); local and national planning
authorities; and other governmental and non-governmental organisations, (notably
in London the Port of London Authority along the river Thames). While it would be
naïve to suggest that there are no tensions between these sectors, it remains a fact
that the responsibilities and roles of each sector and the effort to make relationships
work are now most important as we see an increasing loss of services across the
country. While there is a strong focus on the regulatory functions that allow
archaeology to develop, London continues to experience a challenge during the
current economic and political climate of austerity whereby archaeological work of
all types is constantly squeezed to do the bare minimum of work within the tightest
of financial margins.
An Archaeological Archive
Having an archaeological archive is undoubtedly one of the greatest accomplish-

ments throughout the development of London’s archaeology. In the early 1990s, the
Curatorial Division of the MoL hosted the site archives (both field notes, pho-
tographs and site reports and also artefacts and ecofacts) previously housed by a
range of organisations. Space and resources were a continual concern, and so the
collection was moved during the mid-1990s and reopened in 1998 as the London
Archaeological Archive and Research Centre (LAARC)in a central London ware-
house, part of, and funded via the MoL (Museum of London Archaeology 2016a).
Having such a rich archive situated in the heart of London—one that holds infor-
mation or full archives of over 8500 sites—is a phenomenal advantage for access
purposes, whether by professionals, enthusiasts, students or other researchers. The

LAARC is the largest such archaeological archive in the world, and although its
value may at times be under-appreciated by heritage professionals, developers and
the public alike, having it has played a powerful role in setting standards for
excavation, acquisition, site reporting and also the ability to make the information
more accessible through digital means. However, like so much of London’s
archaeology, the LAARC is also an anomaly, in that no other parts of the UK have
anything close to the space and facilities that it provides for the city’s archaeo-
logical archives (although many areas of Britain aspire to this, the LAARC is in
general seen as an exemplar).
The LAARC faces a number of challenges, which include a lack of space, a
relatively small team of staff and issues with what to keep and what to throw away.
Despite this, it has created strong relationships with various archaeological societies
and has a good volunteer programme, which both encourage public involvement in
archaeology and contribute towards the analysis and understanding of artefacts.
Volunteer tasks range from as basic as re-boxing artefacts to more in-depth analysis
of sites and reports, also in some cases the conservation of materials, based on the
volunteer’s skill set. LAARC often has placements with universities, mostly—but
not exclusively—London-based higher education organisations such as University
College London and Birkbeck College. There has been a steady flow of masters and
doctoral dissertations and theses stemming from such work, which often in turn
lead to formal publications, especially short reports in the specialist journal London
Archaeologist (London Archaeologist 2016).
Roles, Partnerships and Communities
What is interesting about London is not necessarily the formal organisations dis-
cussed above, but rather the relationships that have formed over a hugely significant
period for London’s archaeological profession. The success stories of London’s
archaeology lie, as much as anything, in the ability of successive generations of
individuals and groups to invent, reinvent and persevere in their identities and
relationships through periods where their existence would seem anachronistic.
However, as time continues and established confidence fluctuates, we see that all
our established groups continue to offer key pieces to the puzzle of the archaeo-
logical process. While the many county, archaeological or historical societies seem
of little interest to younger generations, they nevertheless serve as engines for
communication and networking.
Although there are legislative frameworks that require local authorities to work
with commercial archaeologists, and although much of the archaeological sectors
are fragmented, the archaeological community in London works because these
networks exist, providing a foundation for a solid community. The city has also
successfully, and repeatedly, developed innovative archaeology programmes that
30 H. Morel et al.
have been set up to seal ‘gaps’ observed in the archaeology of the city. Many of
these programmes include individuals from different sectors, linked to organisations
and institutions that provide it with strengthened legitimacy. A recent, nationally
influential example is that of the Thames Discovery Programme (TDP). Launched
via funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund in 2008, the TDP built on initiatives
pioneered by the Museum of London’s Thames Archaeological Survey of 1993–
1999 that undertook the first systematic survey of the Thames riverfront, identifying
thousands of sites and first highlighting to the public and profession alike both the
extent, and the fragility, of this elongated archaeological ‘site’. The TDP com-
municates an understanding and informed enjoyment of the historic Thames River
—which includes significant archaeological sites of all periods (including major
prehistoric foreshore and intertidal sites)—to the widest possible audience through a
programme of education, outreach and, crucially, public involvement and training
in active research on riverside sites. A cornerstone of this work was the creation of
Foreshore Recording and Observation Groups (FROGs). This is a network of over
400 volunteers who have been fully trained by the TDP in foreshore recording
techniques and health and safety and have been certificated by the TDP to record
the archaeology of the foreshore, assist the TDP with training sessions for new
members, participate in outreach events and monitor the archaeology of the key
sites of archaeological interest, found on the Thames foreshore. The FROGs pro-
vide a self-sustaining network of volunteer groups, each with their own identity but
operating within the wider TDP network, akin to the types of self-sustaining groups
that first developed amongst the natural environment community in the 1980s and
1990s in many towns and cities and that prosper to this day. Through such a
network the TDP brings together the public with the existing archaeological
community of London to generate additional ‘value’ (be this in terms of data;
management; understanding or enjoyment) from archaeology for all partners. Such
has been the success of the TDP that major components of its structure and ethos
are now being introduced nationally via the TDP offshoot project CITiZAN
(Coastal and Intertidal Zone Archaeological Network) (Museum of London
Archaeology 2016b).
Archaeology is about recording information and about the analysis of that
information to generate new knowledge, information and even improving skills in
practice. It is fundamental—with that in mind—to both communicate that new
information and ensure that it is used to advance the practice. Because London is
fortunate through its historical circumstances to have a museum solely dedicated to
the city, an incredible archive, dedicated local societies and bodies that work
alongside development-led archaeology, it is in a prime position to get added value
out of contracts and to make sure that archaeologists can maximise the benefits they
can for society at large. Examples such as the TDP show this process in action.
Concluding Discussion: Why It Works, or Does It?
In London, more than perhaps in any other part of the UK, developers, owners and
occupiers have—at least some of the time—fully identified and valued the wider
benefits of paying for archaeology beyond simply being a ‘cost’ of doing business.
There is social, and even economic, cachet and ‘added value’ in London archae-
ology to an extent rarely seen anywhere else in Britain and even in the world. This
is particularly the case in terms of leaving elements of significant archaeological
sites ‘in situ’ as part of redevelopments: these include the Guildhall Roman
amphitheatre, the Fleet Street Ossuary, Billingsgate Roman Bathhouse and the
Temple of Mithras (Fig. 2.4). Such inclusions come at a price, yes, but are also seen
as a benefit by both community and local government—as one of the things that
makes London distinctive, a valued, high-profile place for organisations to have
their offices, within which heritage is directly seen as contributing to the quality of
life of employees. Historically, there have been incentives given under some cir-
cumstances to the developers, or the future occupiers, of new buildings that
incorporate historic (especially archaeological) features. However, such incentives
are negotiated on a case-by-case basis rather than being a standing incentive pro-
vided by government. Such incentives are usually part of the broader, highly
confidential financial arrangements associated with such redevelopments, and as
such are rarely if ever on public record. More generally, the inclusion of
historic/archaeological features within modern buildings in London is part of the
wider phenomenon (shared with other mega-cities around the world) of having
high-profile ‘prestige’ offices that incorporate a prominent location along with
distinctive architectural designs (often by well-known architects) and ‘unique
selling points’ such as the inclusion of archaeological remains, the provision of roof
gardens, the presence of cafes and other facilities like gyms on site, and the
prominent placement of major works of art (often by famous artists) around or
within the building, and other attractions to organisations to be based within a
building as both a mark of their success and an aid to staff retention. In various
publications coming out of the Greater London Authority, it is recognised that ‘our
culture…is central to promoting London as a place to visit, work and study and to
attracting foreign investment and multinational companies’ (GLA 2014, p. 11).
The wider socio-economic benefits of archaeological sites to London should be
framed in more negative lights as well, however; not all is as rosy as the picture
above might suggest. Leaving aside the constant fight for sufficient time and
funding to undertake archaeological work in advance of development that remains a
concern to this day, there are politically driven medium-long-term planning issues
that continue to seriously impact upon London’s archaeology. There has been, for
example, a continued loss of or degradation to the setting of heritage assets in
London under the current administration’s—arguably uncontrolled—programme of
introduction of tall buildings (including its impact on the Tower of London World
Heritage Site) (UNESCO 2016). There has been within this also the loss of much
public realm streetscape. This includes some areas of historical significance itself,
32 H. Morel et al.
Fig. 2.4 London’s Roman Amphitheatre in situ under the Guildhall in Central London.
Photograph taken by Valeria E.M. Bellazzi, 2016
including more ‘intangible’ elements of heritage such as historic street patterns,

names; and tangible elements such as street furniture like public realm art, statuary
and facilities like public toilets; and thus the ability to appreciate freely historic
locales. Outside of the historic City of London, there has also been the loss of
significant proportions of outer London greenbelt.
Such changes on the one hand, and losses on the other, if projected forward,
raise serious concerns about what London looks like, for example, fifty years from
now in 2065 under such a model of uncontrolled ongoing development—of a
sprawling megacity with endless outer suburbs and a giant inner core of tall
buildings of the like seen in parts of the Near and Far East and the Americas, but
not—yet—in Europe. Add in here the anticipated pressures of ongoing growth in
population, but a demographic imbalance within that (with a super-rich core sur-
rounded by miles of middle- and lower-class suburbs serving that super-rich cen-
tre); the concluding question of this chapter has to be not what lessons others can
learn from London in how to deal with archaeology, but rather, what lessons
London can learn from other big historic cities facing similar challenges?
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Chapter 3
Preservation, Participation and the Pursuit
of Knowledge: Strategic Policy
and Archaeological Practice Within
the City of York 1989–2015
John Oxley
Introduction
The historic City of York is located in the Vale of York in the north of England
(Fig. 3.1). A Roman legionary fortress, Eboracum, was established at the con-
fluence of the rivers Ouse and Foss on this site in 71AD. Over the next 2000 years,
the town flourished as an Anglian centre, Eoforwic, in the sixth, seventh and eighth
centuries, became the capital, Jorvik, of the Viking kingdom of York in the ninth
and tenth centuries, and the self-governing City of York flourished as the second
city in England during the mediaeval period. There has now been almost
2000 years of continuous urban settlement in York. This long history coupled with
specific topographic characteristics and intensity of settlement activity has led to the
accumulation and survival of deep, wet, anoxic deposits across the historic city.
These deposits preserve organic material and objects that simply do not survive on
the majority of urban sites where such conditions do not exist. The archaeological
layers preserved in the city are of international importance, and the heritage man-
agement practices developed and implemented in the city have attracted interna-
tional interest. This chapter describes the background to and development of these
practices in York since the 1960s. It focuses on the period after 1989 when the local
authority assumed an active role in heritage management in the city.
During the period covered by this chapter, there have been two major episodes
of local government reorganization in Yorkshire. These have had significant
implications for the practice and development of archaeological services and her-
itage management in York. In 1974, a two-tier, County and District system of local
government was introduced and York City Council, a new District Authority, was
created to replace the ancient County Borough and Corporation of the City of York.
At the same time, the new North Yorkshire County Council (NYCC) took over
J. Oxley (&)
City of York Council, West Offices, Station Rise, York YO16GA, UK

36 J. Oxley
Fig. 3.1 Map showing location of York in the UK. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and
database rights 2016. Open Government Licence v3.0
responsibility for education, social services, highways and the Yorkshire Museum
from York Corporation. York City Council retained the same physical boundary as
York Corporation. In 1996, a new Unitary Authority with new boundaries, City of
York Council, was created. This new municipal authority included all the area for-
merly covered by York City Council and parts of the areas of four adjacent District
Authorities: Hambleton, Harrogate, Ryedale and Selby. City of York Council also
took over responsibilities exercised since 1974 by NYCC: education, social services,
highways and the Yorkshire Museum. In this chapter, the title York Corporation is
used for the period before 1974; York City Council is used for the period from 1974 to
1996; and City of York Council is used for the period 1996–2015.
The development of heritage management practices in York can be broken down
into three periods. These periods do not coincide precisely with the episodes of
local government reorganization. The first period relates to the years before the
establishment of York Archaeological Trust (YAT) in 1972. The second period,
from 1972 to 1989, covers the years between the creation of YAT in 1972 and the
establishment in 1989 of the post of City Archaeologist within York City Council.
This period includes the statutory designation in 1984 of the Area of Archaeological
Importance the historic core of York and six smaller satellite areas. This designation
was made by the Department of the Environment under the provisions of Part 2 of
the 1979 Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act. This period also
includes the creation of the Jorvik Viking Centre by YAT. The third period covers
the years from 1989 to the time of writing. This period comprises commissioning
Ove Arup and Partners, an international engineering and environmental consultancy
to produce an innovative report on archaeology in the city, the adoption of clear
archaeological policies by the local authority and the creation of the post of City
3 Preservation, Participation and the Pursuit of Knowledge … 37
Archaeologist within both York City Council and City of York Council. It includes
adoption, implementation and review and amendment of research frameworks,
strategic archaeological policies and heritage management practices. It also sees the
creation and development of a database, now called the City of York Historic
Environment Record, to hold information on the archaeology of the city.
A significant programme of community involvement in and initiation of archaeo-
logical projects also takes place during this period. This final period also coincides
with the development of a competitive market for archaeological services within the
UK and includes the emergence of a range of archaeological organizations that in
addition to YAT deliver archaeological services within York. Overall, this com-
bination of strategic policy, heritage management procedures and protocols, data-
base development and community engagement from 1989 represents a
comprehensive municipal archaeology programme.
Before 1972
Before 1972, there was no coherent system or programme for guiding archaeo-
logical investigations in York. However, there was a long tradition of antiquarian
activity and engagement with the archaeology of the city. In the nineteenth and first
half of the twentieth century much of this activity centred on the Yorkshire
Philosophical Society (YPS) and the Yorkshire Museum. The YPS was formed in
1823 to “pursue the study of natural sciences … and to combine the private col-
lections of individual members” (YPS, n.d.). In 1828, part of the grounds of St.
Mary’s Abbey was given to the Society by royal grant. The YPS constructed a
purpose-built museum to house its collections. Members of the YPS contributed to
the collection of the Yorkshire Museum. York-based members were responsible for
making records of and gathering archaeological materials from a series of
large-scale developments within and immediately outside the walls of the medi-
aeval city. The materials and records of Roman objects and contexts proved to be
particularly important in framing future understanding of Roman York. The YPS
Annual Reports, published from 1823 and continuing, and its Communications and
Proceedings recorded notices of large and small finds from the city. The importance
of the work during the nineteenth century of the YPS and the Yorkshire Museum
can be seen in the still-authoritative publication by Royal Commission on Historic
Monuments England (RCHME) in 1962.
It was not until the 1920s that the first modern archaeological excavations took
place. These were organized by the York Excavation Committee. The Committee
appointed Stuart Miller, a lecturer at Glasgow University, to carry out the exca-
vations, which were targeted at recovering evidence for Roman York.
In the aftermath of World War II, the scale and intensity of development within
York grew significantly. However, there was no response to these threats from the
municipal authority. Volunteers, working with limited resources, carried out the
work of investigating York’s archaeology. A leading figure during this period of
38 J. Oxley
work was Peter Wenham, head of history at St. John’s College, York (now the
University of York St. John). Wenham investigated evidence for both the Roman
and later Viking and mediaeval cities. This marked a change from earlier practice,
where investigations were predominantly concerned with evidence for Roman
York.
From the middle of the 1950s onwards, staff of the RCHME carried out
archaeological investigations in the city, both to inform the production of the
inventory of historical monuments in the City of York and out of personal interest.
The RCHME was established in 1908 by Royal Warrant. Sponsored from 1970 by
Department of the Environment and subsequently by Department for National
Heritage, later the Department for Culture Media and Sport, it was a recording body
whose role was to identify, interpret, survey and record sites and buildings of
archaeological and architectural interest in England. Apart from archaeological
work carried out by the Ministry of Public Buildings and Works and most recently
English Heritage at Clifford’s Tower and a limited amount of work by Department
of the Environment Inspectors of Ancient Monuments in the 1970s, the work of the
RCHME represents the only direct archaeological work in York by a national
government organization.
Archaeological excavation led by Derek Phillips took place at York Minster
between 1967 and 1972 as part of the extensive programme of underpinning and
engineering works that were required to stabilize the central tower and transepts
(Phillips 1985). The RCHME was also involved in this campaign.
It will be apparent that archaeological investigations before 1972 were sporadic
and lacked any overall direction or guiding framework.
1972–1989
The pace of change within historic cities grew throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
One of the drivers of change was the publication of a report Traffic in Towns, for the
Ministry of Transport (Buchanan 1963). This envisaged large-scale interventions in
order to create new roads within towns and cities to accommodate the
ever-increasing amount of traffic. Four reports were also commissioned on the
historic towns of Bath, Chester, Chichester and York. The aim of the reports was to
“discover how to reconcile our old towns with the twentieth century without
actually knocking them down” (Esher 1968, Preface). The York report has become
known as the Esher Report, after its author, Viscount Esher. In York, a new inner
ring road was planned. The proposed ring road would have cut an enormous
corridor through the suburbs outside the city walls, threatening large areas of
subsurface archaeology including Roman cemeteries. Esher saw the ring road as an
essential element in removing congestion from the historic core. Esher also
envisaged conservation of historic buildings and construction of new high-quality
housing in the historic city. The Esher Report was an innovative and insightful
agenda for conservation and change. However, its agenda together with the
proposed ring road presented a significant series of threats to archaeological

deposits in the city.
The Council for British Archaeology (CBA) and the YPS commissioned a
report, published in 1971, to assess the impacts of the proposed ring road and the
Esher Report (Addyman and Rumsby 1971). Addyman (then lecturer in archae-
ology at Southampton University, subsequently became first Director of York
Archaeological Trust) and Rumsby (then chairman of the Yorkshire Philosophical
Society) suggested that in York it would be necessary to spend £50,000 a year for
10 years on archaeological excavations to respond to this threat.
It was clear that a dedicated organization would be required to carry out this
archaeological programme. The CBA and the YPS therefore proposed the estab-
lishment of a new archaeological charity, the York Archaeological Trust for
Excavation and Research Ltd (YAT). YAT came into existence in April 1972.
Since that date, YAT, a non-governmental archaeological organization, has carried
out archaeological work in York funded initially by grants from national govern-
ment. Fortunately, the immensely damaging ring road was never built. The rec-
ommendations in the Esher Report were, however, taken forward with enthusiasm.
Large areas within the city centre were cleared of semi-derelict, poor-quality
buildings. These areas, together with key sites on the ill-fated ring road, provided
the locations for YAT’s earliest interventions. From the outset, it benefitted from
grants given by the Department of the Environment, and assistance and premises
from York University.
From 1972, YAT’s work involved excavation in advance of developments and
carrying out watching briefs on all other disturbances of the ground (e.g. operations
carried out by utility companies). However, archaeological interventions were
guided from the outset by specific research objectives aimed at investigating the
“whole process of urbanization over the past two millennia” (Ottaway 2009, p. 14,
quoting Peter Addyman, first Director of YAT). The haphazard and reactive nature
of archaeological work in York before 1972 disappeared with the creation of the
YAT.
Over the next 20 years, YAT went on to establish itself as one of the
pre-eminent archaeological excavation and research organizations in the UK. It
carried out large-scale archaeological investigations, instigated an ambitious pub-
lication programme and embedded environmental archaeology and conservation
into its work. It also saw the benefit of involving the general public in archaeology.
This emerged most successfully at the excavations on the large site at 16–22
Coppergate, the location of a proposed new shopping centre (Fig. 3.2). YAT spent
over five years years between 1976 and 1981 excavating the well-preserved, deep,
wet organic deposits on the site. Access to carry out the excavations at Coppergate
was facilitated by York City Council. The excavations were funded in part by
national government through the rescue archaeology budget of the Inspectorate of
Ancient Monuments and through private donations by interested individuals, trust
funds and companies (Hall and Hunter-Mann 2002, p. 867). YAT opened the site to
the public and generated huge public interest in the excavation. This led in turn to
the creation of the Jorvik Viking Centre (JVC), a totally new form of educational
40 J. Oxley
Fig. 3.2 Plan of York showing main sites mentioned in text: 1 Coppergate Jorvik Viking Centre;
2 Queen’s Hotel; 3 Hungate; 4 Heslington East; 5 Community Stadium. Contains OS data ©
Crown copyright and database rights 2016. Open Government Licence v3.0
and tourist experience in the basement of the new shopping centre. The JVC was
created by YAT and its founding Director, Dr. Peter Addyman. The JVC was
funded initially through commercial loans and private donations and thereafter from
the income from visitors to the JVC (Addyman and Gaynor 1984). A highly
entertaining account of the design and installation of the JVC has been published
recently by the lead designer for the project, John Sunderland (Sunderland 2013).
YAT was one of several organizations set up in the late 1960s and early 1970s as
a response to the threats posed by road building and development in historic towns
and cities. In 1972, the CBA published The Erosion of History (Heighway 1972) an
agenda for how archaeological interventions should be organized and facilitated
through the planning system. It identified amongst other issues that the legislative
framework and voluntary procedures for managing archaeology had not been
successful; it recommended that the “archaeological potential of a development site
should be required by law to be considered in the granting of planning permission”
(Heighway 1972, p. vii).
Although YAT was able to gain access to sites to carry out archaeological
investigations, this was largely due to the fact that a) these sites were owned by City
of York Council and b) the costs of excavation were being met to a large extent by
barely adequate grants from national government’s Department of the Environment.
These were precisely the “voluntary procedures” that the Erosion of History con-
sidered in 1972 were already unsuccessful.
In 1979, a piece of legislation was passed that attempted, to some extent, to
address the problems identified by the Erosion of History (Heighway 1972). The
1979 Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Areas Act introduced for the first
time the concept of an archaeological area. Part Two of the 1979 Act allowed the
Secretary of State to designate an Area of Archaeological Importance (AAI) and to
appoint a Statutory Investigating Authority (SIA) for the AAI. Within an AAI,
anyone who intended to carry out an operation that flooded, tipped material on, or
disturbed a site would have to submit a notice to the Local Authority giving
notification of the operation. The Local Authority would validate the notice and
pass it on to the SIA. The SIA could make one of three responses to the person who
served the notice: that it had no interest in the operation; that it wished to attend and
observe the operation (i.e. carry out a watching brief); or it could claim a period of
up to four months and two weeks to carry out an archaeological investigation.
Crucially, the 1979 Act placed no duty on the person serving the notice to meet any
archaeological costs that arose as a consequence of a notice being served. Part Two
of the 1979 Act provided a right of access to carry out archaeological investiga-
tions, but did not cover the financial costs of those excavations.
It was not until 1984 that the Secretary of State designated the first AAIs, and
then only five “pilot” cities were designated: Canterbury, Chester, Exeter, Hereford
and York. In York, the whole of the historic core was designated as an AAI
(Fig. 3.3). YAT was appointed as the Statutory Investigating Authority for the AAI
in York. YAT has since 1972 been an independent charity with no formal or legal
links to the local authority. Between 1984 and 1990, when determining planning
applications, local planning authorities in England and Wales did not have to take
into account the impact of a development on archaeological deposits. As a con-
sequence, any advice offered by YAT to York City Council on planning applica-
tions generally was ignored. In York, the effect of AAI designation had an
Fig. 3.3 Central Area of Archaeological Importance. Contains OS data © Crown copyright and
database rights 2016. Open Government Licence v3.0
42 J. Oxley
unintended consequence. It made the local authority less inclined to consider

archaeological issues when it granted planning consent. City of York Council
considered that the appointment of YAT as the SIA meant that archaeology was
adequately provided for in the city centre. However, as has been pointed out above,
the 1979 legislation contained a fundamental flaw: it provided access but no
resources. YAT was left to continue its policy of reliance on government grants and
such funding as it could negotiate from developers. The right to claim up to four
months and two weeks to carry out an excavation became part of the negotiation
process.
At the same time as YAT was appointed SIA for the AAI in York, the Jorvik
Viking Centre opened. Jorvik proved to be a stunning commercial success and soon
provided YAT with an income stream that was to contribute significantly to the
charitable objectives of YAT. The mid-1980s saw YAT develop into a confident
ambitious archaeological organization that began to play a very important role in the
development of commercial tourism within the city. YAT was updating, reviewing
and looking at ways through which it could implement its own research frameworks
and objectives. Through astute negotiation that secured funding from developers and
the newly formed English Heritage, it had been able to carry out a number of
large-scale excavations including the important excavations at 46–54 Fishergate
(Mainman 1993; Stroud and Kemp 1993; Kemp 1996; Kemp and Graves 1996).
However, this period witnessed a growing distance between City of York
Council and YAT. The local authority was focused strongly on encouraging eco-
nomic development opportunities in the city. The economic development pro-
gramme that emerged in the late 1980s identified 35 sites in and around the city
centre that were suitable for redevelopment for offices. This programme represented
the most significant “threat” to archaeological deposits since the proposals that led
to the formation of YAT in 1972. For YAT, this programme presented both an
opportunity and a problem. In one sense, it was an opportunity to implement its
own research questions. At the same time, it presented a problem in that the AAI
procedures, YAT’s negotiating skills and access to project funding from English
Heritage would not provide the necessary resources to pay for the increasingly
expensive process of archaeological excavation and analysis.
The concept of “the polluter pays” had not as yet been recognized within the
planning system for archaeology; the majority of the costs of archaeological exca-
vation continued to be met from the public purse. The transition from public to private
funding of archaeological excavation would take several years to achieve. It was a
piece of European legislation that kick-started the process. The publication of
European Union directive 85/337/EEC in 1985 was not formally incorporated into UK
law until 1988 with the enactment of the Town & Country Planning Act’s
Environmental Assessment legislation. The EIA Directive (85/337/EEC) has been in
force since 1985 and applies to a wide range of defined public and private projects
(EIA 1985). The directive has been amended three times, in 1997, in 2003 and in
2009. The directive provides for a developer, where directed to do so by a “competent
authority” (normally the local planning authority), to provide information on the
environmental impact of a development. This legislation introduced into UK law for
the first time the concepts of impact assessment—what effect will a development
proposal have on environmental, including cultural, assets?—and of mitigation—how
will the effect of those impacts be reduced or removed? Impact assessment required a
process of evaluation of a site. In archaeological terms, this translated into looking at a
small sample of a site and using this sample to date and characterize deposits and
assess their importance. Mitigation might require excavation, or equally it might
require deposits to remain undisturbed. However, in the period between 1985 and
1989, impact assessment and the notion of the developer paying for the process of
evaluation and mitigation were neither a requirement or accepted practice.
All these contradictions came to a head in York over the site of the former
Queen’s Hotel in Micklegate (Fig. 3.2). The Queen’s Hotel had been a listed
Georgian Inn that had been demolished in 1972. Demolition had been allowed by
the Secretary of State after an appeal against York City Council’s decision to refuse
consent for demolition. The site had remained vacant and undeveloped. In 1986–
1987, the site had been identified in the council’s economic development pro-
gramme as being suitable for office development. A tenant was identified, and a
developer secured planning consent for an office building with a basement car park.
YAT using their powers as SIA gained access to the site and negotiated a limited
amount of funding from the developer and excavated what amounted to a series of
evaluation trenches. These revealed a sequence of wet, well-preserved organic
deposits dating from the tenth to fifteenth centuries. These overlay the remains of a
Roman building whose walls survived to a height of some 2 m above foundation
level. In short, here was a rich well-preserved site of national importance that would
be destroyed by the proposed office development and its basement (YAT 1989).
The planning approval for the development did not take account of any archaeo-
logical issues; the local authority took the view that the provisions of the 1979 Act
and the powers vested in YAT were there to deal with the archaeology.
The events at the Queens Hotel made local, national and international headlines.
The City of York Council stood accused of approving the destruction of this
nationally important archaeological site. From the council’s point of view, a row
about archaeology had effectively undermined its entire economic development
programme. It was clear that each of the remaining 34 sites identified in its
development portfolio had significant archaeological potential and could be ren-
dered undevelopable or categorized as “too difficult” by the development industry.
The decision taken by the city council to take a hands-off approach and leave
archaeological decisions to YAT was no longer tenable. As a consequence of the
Queen’s Hotel debacle, York City Council and English Heritage came together to
look at how this situation could be avoided in future.
1989–2015
One of the key outcomes of the discussions post-Queen’s Hotel between York City
Council and English Heritage was the decision to commission a study of Development
44 J. Oxley
and Archaeology in York from Ove Arup and Partners—the “Arup study” (Arup
1991, Fig. 3.4). Ove Arup and Partners, now Arup, were and are an independent firm
of designers, planners, engineers, consultants and technical specialists offering a broad
range of professional services. The primary purpose of the report was: “To update
knowledge of the City’s archaeological resource and to provide a framework for
ensuring the development of sites is secured in a way which can conserve the most
outstanding archaeological resources” (Arup 1991, (1)).
Fig. 3.4 York Development and Archaeology Study (the “Arup study”). Photo credit: © John
Oxley 2016
The Arup study assessed the location, character and meaning of archaeological
deposits within the study area. It also examined building construction and devel-
opment procedures in order to analyse the interrelationship between development
and archaeology.
The study area comprised the majority of the AAI in the historic core of the city.
The study considered only the archaeological deposits of the Roman, Anglian,
Anglo-Scandinavian and mediaeval periods. The study produced a database which
included records drawn from archaeological interventions in the city from the
nineteenth century to 1989. The database was used to produce a deposit model
which divided the city into 20 zones with the quality of archaeological deposits
within each zone assessed. The Arup study recommended that on-site evaluation of
all sites be undertaken “as part of the planning process” (Arup 1991, (2)).
A research agenda comprising five separate topic papers formed a key part of the
Arup study. These topic papers addressed the hinterland, the environmental
sequence, the Roman period, the early Middle Ages and the mediaeval period
(Arup 1991, pp. 29–30). A research framework was proposed “in which reactive
excavation is minimized”; the framework was expressed as nine separate projects.
These nine projects included evaluation and deposit modelling of every site (Project
1); formal excavation only for those sites of high current archaeological value
where deposit quality matches the research agenda; all other sites to be preserved
in situ (Project 2); and seven non-destructive projects (remote mapping, mediaeval
buildings, artefact assemblages, the river regime, the hinterland survey, protection
for the future and research reviews). The key recommendation of the Arup study
concerned preservation in situ. It suggested that for the geotechnical and archae-
ological conditions identified in York, it would be possible to ensure preservation
in situ by adopting construction methods that ensure that no more than 5% of the
archaeological deposit is destroyed. Chapter 6 of the Arup study (Arup 1991,
pp. 40–57) sets out the detail of this innovative and controversial approach to
preservation in situ.
The Arup study addressed the problem of how new development can proceed
within a historic city that contains deep, wet, fragile archaeological deposits. It was
designed to ensure that another archaeological disaster like the Queens Hotel would
never happen again.
The appointment of an archaeologist in 1989 at the same time as the Arup study
was commissioned to work within York City Council’s Planning Department was
critical to the successful implementation of the Arup study. Between 1989 and
1992, the post of City Archaeologist was jointly funded by English Heritage and
York City Council. Since 1992, the post has been fully funded by the city council.
The main role of the City Archaeologist is to provide advice to people applying for
permission to carry out development in York. In addition, the archaeologist (or
“curator”) maintains and updates the HER for the City of York and assists in the
development of strategic policies for archaeology and the historic environment in
York.
In 1992, after a period of public consultation, York City Council adopted the
document “Conservation Policies for York: Archaeology” (YCC 1992). This
46 J. Oxley
document, in the absence of a formal adopted Local Plan for the city, took the Arup
study recommendations and set them out as policies that the Council would
implement through the planning process. These policies were formally re-adopted
in 1996 by the new City of York Council and have formed the basis of subsequent
development control policies in successive, unfortunately unadopted, Local Plans.
Adrian Olivier writing in Frameworks for the Past (Olivier 1996) commented
that the Arup study and Conservation policies for York: Archaeology represented
“the furthest that a local authority has gone in recognizing the importance of
archaeological frameworks and demonstrates the level of commitment that can be
achieved for positive preservation policies acting in tandem with a structured re-
search program.” (Olivier 1996, p. 12).
The research behind the Arup study played a key role in informing the devel-
opment of the national planning policy guidance document published in November
1990, Planning Policy Guidance 16: Archaeology and Planning (PPG16). It is
beyond the scope of this chapter to look at the development since 1990 of national
guidance in England and Wales for protecting and investigating the historic envi-
ronment: PPG15 (1994) and PPG16 (1990); Planning Policy Statement 15 (2010);
National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF 2012). A very useful summary of
national policy development up to the publication of the NPPF and its implications
can be found in the report produced by the Southport Group (Southport Group
2011).
The Arup study linked preservation in situ of the vast majority of archaeological
deposits with the concept of large-scale excavation where “deposit quality and
research objectives coincide in sites where complete preservation of the deposit is
undesirable or incompatible with the agreed development, or where the promotion
of the City of York through a public excavation is desirable” (Arup 1991, p. 36).
The first candidate site to meet these requirements emerged in 1999. The Hungate
redevelopment area consists of a 6-ha site that lies within the historic core on the
east side of the historic city. The site is defined by the River Foss on the south and
east sides, by Stonebow and Peaseholme Green on the north and by Garden Place
on the west (Fig. 3.5). The site had been a series of nineteenth century streets
(Fig. 3.6), home to a tightly knit community, which was swept away in a frenzy of
slum clearances between 1930 and 1935. The area had then undergone piecemeal
post-war redevelopment, but by the late 1990s was largely unoccupied. It offered an
opportunity for comprehensive redevelopment. It also offered an opportunity for
extensive archaeological evaluation to take place alongside community consultation
on development options. The outcome of this programme of evaluation and con-
sultation between 1999 and 2004 was the creation of the largest programme of
urban research, including the single largest area excavation, ever undertaken in the
historic core of York. The entire cost of the project, set out in a Section 106 legal
agreement between the developer and City of York Council, has been met by the
developer. At the time of writing, the final phases of archaeological excavation,
additional evaluation and deposit monitoring are under discussion. The main pro-
gramme of excavation has been carried out by the archaeological contractor
appointed by the developer, YAT. A summary of work to date can be found on the
Fig. 3.5 Hungate, York, aerial view. © Getmapping plc (2007)
Dig Hungate website (YAT 2015a). From the outset, there has been extensive
involvement of residents and visitors in the project. The Hungate project represents
a dramatic illustration of the success of the Arup study and the Conservation Policy
document in providing a mechanism to achieve large-scale archaeological research
with enormous public benefits.
In 1996, York became a Unitary Authority within much expanded boundaries.
One of the effects of this expansion was to adjust the balance between the historic
core, as represented by the 1991 Arup study area, and its previously detached
hinterland. This offered for the first time the opportunity to explore the imple-
mentation through the planning process of the Arup study project on the hinterland
of York.
The archaeological responsibilities of the newly formed council now included
not only the deep wet deposits found in the historic core of the city but also the
largely uninvestigated archaeological resource lying below the extensive fields and
farmland surrounding the city. Deposit survival in these rural areas is very different
to that which is found within the historic core of the city. A thin layer of topsoil
covers archaeological features and deposits. They have in the past been threatened
more by agricultural activities than by development pressure. Since 1996, however,
there has been considerable pressure on these rural edgelands of York to provide
land for retail, residential and educational expansions.
In York, the strict application of the policies contained in the 1992 Conservation
Policies for York: Archaeology document supported by the guidance contained in
PPG16 had established archaeology as a material consideration in determining
planning applications. By 1996, the requirement for pre-determination evaluations
on development sites had been widely accepted by the development community.
48 J. Oxley
Fig. 3.6 Nineteenth century street surface of Haver Lane, Hungate archaeological excavations.
Photo credit: © John Oxley 2016
It was, and still is, recognized a key piece of work to assess and reduce the risk that
the presence of archaeological deposits might pose to a development proposal.
Developers have come to value archaeological evaluations in the same way that
they value geotechnical and contamination assessments. It is necessary to carry out
these surveys in advance so that at the very earliest opportunity the problems,
solutions and costs can be identified and quantified. The routine requirement for
evaluation of the urban deposits identified by the Arup study was therefore applied
to developments in the rural hinterland of York. The cost of these archaeological

surveys and subsequent mitigation work is all born by the developer.
This has resulted in an opportunity to carry out an unprecedented amount of
archaeological work in York’s rural hinterland. For instance, archaeological eval-
uation followed by extensive excavations has been undertaken since 2003 on a
116 ha site for a new campus for the University of York (Roskams and Neal,
forthcoming). The planning for this piece of archaeological research was heavily
influenced by the principles set out in the Arup study. The archaeological evalu-
ation work allowed the identification of areas where deposit survival was good and
where clear research questions about the prehistoric and Romano-British landscape
could be posed and answered. Two archaeological contractors, YAT and On-Site
Archaeology, were appointed by the University of York to carry out the programme
of formal archaeological excavation across the site. Part of the site was also used as
a training excavation by the Department of Archaeology, University of York, and
for a programme of community involvement.
Community archaeology has been an important development in this period and
particularly since 1996. There has been a growing demand amongst the general
public for access to view and take part in archaeological excavations. Television
programmes such as TimeTeam played a very important role in “demystifying”
archaeology, albeit within a particular format (the three-day excavation) designed
for television (TimeTeam, n.d.). TimeTeam visited York in August 1999 when they
excavated three sites over a three-day period. This exercise generated enormous
public interest within the city and led directly to a four-year programme of
archaeological research at St. Leonard’s Hospital. This formed YAT’s first
Archaeology Live! project (YAT 2001). Since 2001 Archaeology Live! has held
training excavations on six sites within the historic core of York. The training
excavations run for up to three months, and trainees pay a fee to attend the exca-
vation. Training is offered to anyone who wants to take part—archaeology students,
people with no archaeological experience, people of all ages and backgrounds. Over
the past three years, City of York Council has pursued a policy of procuring
archaeological evaluation and excavations as professionally led, community staffed
projects on sites where it is acting as developer. Most recently over 100 volunteers
have worked with YAT on a four-week long excavation on the site of the new
Community Stadium at Monks Cross, on the north-east edge of York (YAT 2015b,
Fig. 3.7). This excavation was also visited by over 700 schoolchildren. Between
2005 and 2010, the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) funded the post of Greater York
Community Archaeologist. This post emerged from an initiative of the York
Archaeological Forum, a body set up to advise City of York Council on archaeo-
logical research (YAT 2003). After HLF funding finished, the post was retained by
YAT until March 2015. Through the work of the Community Archaeologist, a
network of community archaeology organizations was established. This now meets
under the umbrella of Timeline York Plus. There is a web page (TYP 2015a) and a
blog (TYP 2015b) which together with twice-yearly meetings provides a means of
sharing information, experiences, skills and equipment.
50 J. Oxley
Fig. 3.7 Excavations in progress at site of York’s Community Stadium. Photo credit: © John
Oxley 2016
In 2013, a review of the 1991 Arup Study was commissioned by City of York
Council and English Heritage (Arup 2013). “The purpose of the review was to
assess the extent to which the 1991 report’s aim to allow development to go ahead
in York whilst conserving the city’s outstanding archaeological resources has been
achieved” (Arup 2013, p. 1). The conclusion of the review was broadly supportive.
It suggested that a thoroughgoing renewal of the 1991 study would not be neces-
sary. It emphasized that certain elements of the study are essential to the effective
management of the historic environment in York. It argued that “The essential
robustness of the 1991 study has been demonstrated by the extent to which the
arguments it put forward and the recommendations it made remain relevant” (Arup
2013, p. 36).
The period since 1989 has been characterized by several key policy concepts:
allowing development to proceed provided it destroys less than 5% of deposits
within the footprint of the development; routine archaeological evaluation of every
development site; the desirability of large-scale, publicly accessible research
excavation projects; and encouraging community engagement and involvement in
archaeological projects. The role of the City Archaeologist working within the City
of York planning department has been critical in ensuring the development and
implementation of these policies. The integration of the procedures and protocols
set out in the Arup study in 1991 into archaeological and heritage management
policies of City of York Council has led to the development of a successful and
comprehensive municipal archaeology programme in the City of York.
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Retrieved from http://www.yorkarchaeology.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/Interim-
Spring-1989-Queens-Hotel.pdf
York Archaeological Trust. (2001). Retrieved from http://www.yorkarchaeology.co.uk/get-
involved/archaeology-live/
York Archaeological Trust. (2003). Towards a community archaeology strategy for York,
developed by York archaeological trust for York Archaeological forum, city of York council
and the community. York, UK: York Archaeological Trust.
York Archaeological Trust. (2015a). Retrieved from http://www.dighungate.com
York Archaeological Trust. (2015b). Retrieved from https://digyorkstadium.wordpress.com/
York City Council. (1992). Conservation policies for York: archaeology. York, UK: City of York
Council.
Yorkshire Philosophical Society. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.ypsyork.org/about-yps/yps-
history/
Chapter 4
Crowdsourcing the Story of Bristol
Peter Insole
Introduction
Archaeology is the story of place. Archaeological evidence in all its forms con-
tributes to our understanding of place and should be used to inform changes and
improvements to the physical environment. In this respect, archaeology is as much
about the future as it is about the past and our current shared understanding of this
archaeology is the join between the two.
Archaeology has been a material planning consideration in the UK for over
20 years in recognition of this connection. The primary tool that aims to enable
relationships between past, present and future as well as connecting academic
research and understanding about archaeology to planning disciplines is the
Historic Environment Record (HER). The majority of Local Authorities in the UK
maintain an HER in accordance with the National Planning Policy Framework
(DCLG 2012) and adhere to data standards guidelines provided by the national
advisory body, Historic England (formerly English Heritage). Each authority takes
an individual approach to managing its HER in terms of software and resourcing.
Historic England is gradually developing the Heritage Gateway to link all historic
environment datasets, but because of differences between authorities only 60% of
HERs are currently represented on the resource (Heritage Gateway).
The HER is a spatial database of all known historic and archaeological infor-
mation within the area of a statutory local authority. Since the late 1880s, the British
Ordnance Survey (OS) has been mapping places of historic interest with symbols
that we now recognise and associate with ancient places that we value. Often these
places were visible remains like a castle ruins, but the mapping of ancient places by
P. Insole (&)
Planning Division, Place Directorate, City Design Group (Urban Design),
Bristol City Council, City Hall, P.O. Box 3176, Bristol BS3 9FS, UK

54 P. Insole
Fig. 4.1 25” Ordnance Survey map of Bristol, 1881–4 available as one of the layers on Know
Your Place. It is available in its entirety for the City of Bristol, but by 2017 will cover the historic
counties of Gloucestershire, Somerset and Wiltshire thanks to Heritage Lottery funding (courtesy
of Bristol Record Office)
the OS extended to the suggested route of a Roman Road, or former site of a

medieval priory or manor house (Fig. 4.1).
The Past in the Landscape
The connection with mapping the ancient world on an accurate modern survey
probably owes its origins to William Roy, the creator of the first baseline of the
triangulation of Great Britain at Hounslow Heath in 1784 (Hewitt 2010, p. 74). Of
particular relevance to the link between past, present and future planning, Roy,
operating as a military surveyor during turbulent times in Scotland, could empathise
with Roman generals building fortifications in the same Scottish landscape
1500 years earlier (Hewitt 2010, p. 36). It was the work of Roy that led to the
establishment of the Ordnance Survey in 1791 a year after his death.
The interest in mapping ancient places was further influenced by the Romantic
Movement in the later eighteenth century and early nineteenth century as the
concept of rambling the wild countryside of the Lake District, Scotland or the
Forest of Dean began to grow. This early origin of leisure walking was promoted by
publications such as West’s A Guide to the Lakes (1778) (Lake District UK 2008)
and the poetic writings of Coleridge and Wordsworth, see Lines written a few miles
above Tintern Abbey (1798). Although the poem makes no mention of the abbey
ruins themselves and the Romantic Movement was largely concerned with emo-
tional responses to the natural environment, Wordsworth’s use of the Abbey as a
landmark means that we can visit approximately the same awe inspiring location
today.
The visual interest of a remote overgrown ruin set in a verdant, rocky valley
epitomises the Romantic Movement; landscape designers of the period such as
Capability Brown and Humphrey Repton strove to recreate the physical form,
4 Crowdsourcing the Story of Bristol 55
erecting follies where ruins were absent and using techniques like revealed views to
simulate the visual drama of the natural landscape.
Further back, visible ancient places in the landscape have been recorded in
topographic accounts, folklore and art. Before land boundaries were officially
surveyed they were often described with reference to notable, man-made features
from antiquity whose original purpose had long been forgotten. Early medieval
perambulations contained in land charter records mostly describe natural land-
marks, but occasionally ancient remains appear in the descriptions. For example the
perambulation contained in a land charter for two estates at Caldicot, south-east
Wales recorded in the Liber Landevesis (Llandaff Charters), refers to a crug at one
corner of the land unit. A crug is a Welsh place name for a tump (a term for a
mound or tumulus) or heap (Ordnance Survey 1973), but in the Llandaff Charters
has been identified as often referring to a tumulus (Evans and Rhys 1893). In the
Caldicot example, this use of crug is very likely to refer to a Bronze Age barrow
visible in the modern landscape the location of which corresponds closely to the
perambulation description.
These examples suggest that man-made features in the landscape as much as
natural features have contributed to our sense of place, to way-finding and com-
munity identity. These points in our landscape connect us to our predecessors and
capture our imagination. They are the things that form the backdrop of everyday
lives.
Even the names of our places can provide clues to our past and are part of our
story of place, as illustrated in Translations by Friel (1981):
…we call that crossroads Tobair Vree…Tobair means a well. But what does Vree mean? It
is a corruption of Brian - (Gaelic pronunciation) Brian - an erosion of Tobair Bhriain.
Because a hundred- and-fifty years ago there used to be a well there…And an old man
called Brian…one morning was found drowned in that well. And ever since that crossroads
is known as Tobair Vree - even though that well has long since dried up (p. 53).
In this example from Brian Friel’s play, the English surveyors of Ireland added
the Irish place name to their name book, but elsewhere local names were anglicised
such as Dún Laoghaire, a port on the east coast of Ireland, was known as
Kingstown from 1821 to 1920, but was identified on earlier maps as the anglicised
Dunleary. Friel’s Translations is a demonstration of the politics of mapping and the
power of the mapmaker.
The Ordnance Survey included ancient places on its maps, although the use of
terms like ‘druidic’ or ‘Celtic’ (Fig. 4.1) hints at a mythological interest suggesting
a lack of formal academic rigour. However, this systematic 1880s survey was the
beginning of much of our current understanding of the historic landscape of Britain.
Many of those ancient remains buried and standing above ground first acquired
legal protection under the Ancient Monuments Protection Act 1882 and are now
named as Scheduled Monuments under the Ancient Monuments and
Archaeological Areas Act 1979.
It is the 1880s mapping by the Ordnance Survey and their subsequent revisions
that provided the basis for the first HERs in the 1970s, then known as Sites and
56 P. Insole
Monuments Records (SMRs). These paper map-based records with associated card
index were established by many local councils to ensure that planning decisions
could be made with consideration of the known ancient remains that had so much
public interest.
Digitising Place
These paper records have now been converted to computer-based geographic

information systems (GIS), but some of the locational information at their heart
stems from the 1880s surveys and all the data are related to twenty-first century
Ordnance Survey mapping. GIS enables robust academic information to link
directly to an accurate spatial entity. This allows us to be precise about the extent of
a heritage asset, but at the same time permits us to justify why this asset is of
historic or archaeological importance.
The use of GIS is especially important for archaeology to link into future
planning for places. It allows an immediate understanding of what the potential
heritage impacts of a proposal might be simply by drawing a plan of a proposal on
the digital map and querying what archaeological features it intersects.
GIS is a key tool for the archaeologist in the twenty-first century; however,
issues remain particularly when assessing the importance or heritage value of an
asset, what current legislation and guidance refers to as ‘significance’ (Department
for Communities and Local Government 2012). The challenge is to develop a
shared understanding of heritage and encourage residents of these places to par-
ticipate in the conversation. This latter point is especially important because her-
itage is ubiquitous. Everything in our daily lives has a connection to the past; most
of our houses are the homes of other families before, our local community centres
or cafes may be in buildings which were once places of worship, our parks are
green oases that have often been enjoyed since they were first protected from
Victorian urban sprawl. These assets are all part of the archaeological resource that
cannot be separated from the present. Understanding the factors that have shaped
our city today will be a critical part of creating quality places for the future. Historic
character of a neighbourhood takes generations to develop, it can be quickly eroded
through insensitive regeneration and it is difficult and costly to build from new
whilst embedding a strong sense of place.
In Bristol we make extensive use of GIS to manage our data about heritage.
Generally this data comes from traditional sources like the historic OS maps
mentioned above, historic accounts or archaeological investigations. The bulk of
this since the Town and Country Planning Act of 1990 comes from planning-related
archaeological interventions ranging from a full-scale excavation prior to the
construction of a new office block on the site of a medieval graveyard to the
monitoring of groundworks within the area of the Roman town of Abona at the Sea
Mills suburb of Bristol for the extension of a house. The Bristol Sites and
Monuments Record (SMR) was converted to GIS from paper records in the early
1990s. It was further funded by English Heritage to create an Urban Archaeological

Database (UAD) in the mid-1990s to inform an assessment of the archaeological
resource in the historic core. The process of creating the UAD involved a trawl of
the city archives, historic maps and images to create a comprehensive spatial his-
toric record. The UAD has now been amalgamated with our other heritage data
(including the SMR) to create the existing Historic Environment Record (HER) that
covers the whole city. However, the type of funded data enhancement as with the
UAD is becoming less available and is now usually associated with a thematic
approach; the recent influx of WWI-related data as a result of projects related to the
conflict’s centenary being a prime example.
The Heritage Information Cycle
The formation of the UAD was a project managed from within the planning
department; the data became part of a planning database and continues to be
managed by the local authority. It is used in planning decision processes on a daily
basis and continues to be directly relevant to place making in the city. As with most
Local Authorities, Bristol City Council has a Senior Archaeological Officer who
uses the HER data to provide advice to planning officers on the potential archae-
ological implications of development proposal. Working collaboratively with urban
designers and conservation officers to achieve the best result for a development site,
this advice ranges from requests for further archaeological information through the
commissioning of desk-based or fieldwork research to recommendations for the
preservation of a site either in situ or by fieldwork recording. These
planning-related archaeological projects are commissioned and funded by the
developer and continue at a rate of approximately 150 projects a year. Because
these projects are planning-related, adding the results to the HER is ensured through
conditions of a planning consent. This heritage information cycle where the HER
provides information to inform a project that then feeds back the results of this
project to the HER exponentially increases our understanding and is an invaluable
tool to further research.
This is a successful model within the planning process provided the systems are
in place such as adequate staffing and data managers (HER officers) to keep this
continual heritage information cycle progressing. The HER is a never-ending
project just as urban development, and renewal is never ending.
In order to build a comprehensive heritage database, the information needs to
include sources beyond those that are generated through the planning process. In
the past, local authorities may have had staff and capacity to continually trawl
through academic journals, local studies publications and the latest research papers
to enhance their data records, but now with diminishing resources coinciding with
the era of ‘Big Data’ where more and more information is being shared online via
blogs, Facebook, Twitter, etc.… the HER needs to adapt its data collection
strategies.
58 P. Insole
Getting to Know Your Place
In contrast to the extensive and often freely available data online, valuable infor-
mation about place and the heritage of places is locked in relatively inaccessible
locations. It is either not in digital format, or it exists only as local knowledge, or
was the subject of an unpublished thesis. Conscious of this growing issue, but also
conscious of the fact that developments in GIS and online technologies could help
to tackle this problem, Bristol City Council developed the web resource Know Your
Place. Bristol has one of the most comprehensive collections of historic maps dating
back to the first accurate survey by Jean Rocque in 1742, but with earlier fifteenth,
sixteenth and seventeenth century representations of the city. The city archives also
contain hundreds of paintings and photographs of streets and buildings from
familiar landmarks to everyday workplaces. With funding from English Heritage
the aim of this project was to create a facility that allowed online access to these
archives and enable the public to compare historic and modern mapping so that
users could form an appreciation of the historic development of Bristol. The web
resource allows members of the public to overlay one map on another to facilitate a
direct comparison (Fig. 4.2).
Historic images are accessed by clicking points on the map identified by
coloured icons. The majority of these locations were originally located during the
development of the previous UAD and include accurate painted representations of
Bristol’s streets and houses from the early nineteenth century, an early
twentieth-century photographic survey of the city docks and images of the
bomb-damaged city in the Second World War.
Fig. 4.2 Know Your Place showing the 1880s OS plan (right) compared to Rocque’s 1750 plan
(left) with sites of archaeological investigations (cross symbols) and Listed Buildings (pink
polygons) overlain
In addition to uploading many of the city’s archives to various map layers, a

public contribution facility is provided. This was to enable members of Bristol
communities to add their own images and information about their neighbourhoods
or the results of their own research providing the opportunity to add data that was
previously unavailable. Items uploaded to the site using the public contribution
function are added to a community layer following validation by the historic
environment officer. This is not an onerous task and usually takes only a few
minutes a day checking the location and submitted information against existing
HER data and historic mapping. Data submitted using the public contribution form
on the web resource are immediately added to a non-public part of the HER
database. The validation process includes a check that there are relevant permis-
sions in place for the use of any image. The Know Your Place home page provides
guidance on copyright issues as well as what types of information are relevant for
publication on the site. Once validated the data is copied across to the public facing
information layer that appears on the website. Since going live with the site in
March 2011 there have been over 1000 items added to the site by members of the
public; photographs of existing features in people’s neighbourhoods, family archive
photographs or information from local history groups. Only a small handful of
uploads has been rejected due to copyright infringement or inappropriate content.
The community contribution facility allows Know Your Place to crowdsource
heritage information and is building a shared understanding of the city’s heritage
enriching our knowledge without compromising council resources. One of the best
examples of this data enhancement occurred within the first few days of the site’s
launch; a local resident uploaded a colour photograph of five late eighteenth or early
nineteenth-century lime kilns (Fig. 4.3). This surviving evidence of an industrial
activity associated with quarrying the local limestone is not recorded on any maps
or any previous images that we know of. The kilns are only visible from privately
owned land so it is highly possible that without Know Your Place and its facility to
source data from the general public, this valuable and unique insight would not
have been made.
The historic maps and archive collections of images are grabbing the interest of
Bristolians especially with the recently added historic film archives that have started
to be uploaded. Evidence from the historic maps and layers of data on the web
resource are used to inform developers’ proposals and evidenced in supporting
design and access or heritage statements in over 90% of major planning applica-
tions. Their availability online through a map interface provides relevant infor-
mation for understanding a specific site without the need to visit physical archive
collections. This means that some of the city’s unique and fragile documents are
requested less frequently from storage, assisting with their long-term preservation.
Know Your Place is increasingly being used in schools particularly through the
Heritage Schools initiative coordinated by English Heritage. One primary school
ran a Know Your Place lunchtime club where pupils were reportedly queuing down
the corridor, eager to discover what their neighbourhood was like in the past. The
same school is planning an after school club, opening up Know Your Place to
parents and carers, increasing the likelihood of them taking a more active role in the
60 P. Insole
Fig. 4.3 Five limekilns at Coombe Dingle, Westbury-on-Trym image uploaded to Know Your
Place in March 2011 by a local resident, Matthew Rogers
scheme and hopefully uploading their own resources. Know Your Place only
requires copies, allowing people to retain their precious originals.
The site’s user-friendly interface has encouraged daily use by planners, urban
designers and conservation officers as well as by the Archaeological Officer,
communities and schools. Overlaying historic maps and historic environment data
such as heritage designations allows officers to undertake a rapid initial heritage
assessment before approaching specialist officers (Fig. 4.2)
Crowdsourcing the Story of Place
‘Crowdsourcing’ reflects the current zeitgeist, the term having only entered the
Oxford English Dictionary in 2013 (despite its own use of crowdsourcing tech-
niques since the nineteenth century) the initial appearance of the coinage generally
attributed to an article in Wired in 2006 (Oxford Dictionaries 2013). There are many
other crowdsourcing tools being used in heritage; Facebook, Flickr and particularly
History Pin, but interestingly where this appears to be happening the most is in
cultural heritage organisations, museums, libraries where the power of the crowd is
helping to digitise and catalogue hard to access parts of their collections (see Ridge
2014).
This is an invaluable approach to heritage collections made possible through
technology that is broadening public interaction with archives and contributing to
research and understanding. It does raise ethical and data quality questions that need
to be addressed through relevant research methodologies, and associated ethics
policies (Dunn and Hedges 2014), but at the same time without crowdsourcing,
present resources in the cultural sector would probably not allow for this level of
data processing.
The application of new and emerging technologies is facilitating the crowd-
sourcing approach across many sectors; however, in the heritage sector it is pri-
marily focussed on archives and curatorial processes. If the available technologies
are not employed to link the understanding of the past to planning for the future, the
danger is that though our heritage will eventually be preserved digitally, it will no
longer form part of our daily lives.
Many people might think that this is an appropriate way forward, but digitising
the past does not diminish the task of managing the resource. Just as paper archives
require management, cataloguing, referencing and storing data formats requires just
as much time and effort to allow for the effective storage and retrieval of infor-
mation. There is often an expectation that digital archives are easier to manage or
even maintain themselves, but the burgeoning of digital technologies and appli-
cations only serves to proliferate this information in this media, making issues
around data collation and maintenance even more paramount.
To permit the removal of buildings and spaces and accept only a digital record in
their place is a poor substitute and not a sustainable approach. These places contain
many kilo joules of embodied energy. They usually consist of high-quality building
materials and architecture that is often more difficult or not even possible to
reproduce.
We should see ourselves as being the curators of a living museum. One of the
aims of Know Your Place is to raise public awareness of this and to promote a
responsible approach to planning for the future of the physical environment. This
responsible approach has to be based on a shared understanding that should come
from all relevant sources. Who understands a place better than the people who live
there? The understanding therefore needs to be developed or co-produced in
partnership with historians and local communities.
Know Your Place seeks to foster an appreciation of the value of data, to promote
opportunities for people to share their knowledge and to encourage them to con-
tribute to the HER where the information will become a material consideration in
planning decisions. Most other crowdsourcing projects do not facilitate this feeding
back of information to the planning process. Closing this link, completing the loop
of information so that the past informs the decisions for the future requires
resources that are unlikely to be available. As a result, information held on a site
like History Pin is less likely to inform a planning decision process.
62 P. Insole
Towards a Shared Understanding
Failure to properly value information is a recurrent theme at all levels of heritage

interest. In a recent example, a postgraduate student who casually referred to some
aspect of her research on a unique eighteenth-century designed garden in Bristol
would have positively affected a planning decision had this information been for-
mally shared with the HER. Although this research was undertaken some time
before a planning decision was reached on the site, the academic’s information was
not shared with the HER until after the decision to redevelop the site. With an
appreciation of the value of the information a better outcome might have been
achieved rather than the destruction of the archaeology without record during the
subsequent construction works.
One good example where information on the HER led to excavation and the
preservation of significant archaeological remains comes from Portwall Place
(Fig. 4.4). This was the site of an early glass manufactory recorded on the HER.
This data was used by the Archaeological Officer to argue for a programme of
fieldwork to establish the state of preservation of the remains. When this demon-
strated that the surviving evidence was highly significant, a series of negotiations
with the project design team led to the preservation of the remains beneath a new
office development. These negotiations involved the project architect, engineer,
planning officer and urban designer with a positive outcome as a result of a detailed
archaeological understanding of the site.
At the other end of the scale, the biggest barrier to building a shared under-
standing with the help of local communities is in the fact that most people don’t
believe that their memories or their personal archives, family photos, etc., have any
value or that anyone would be interested in what they have to say. Time and again
members of the community express surprise that someone from the heritage pro-
fession might be interested in what they have to say.
When attempting to establish an online crowdsourcing tool that aims to enable
planning and heritage management to be a more democratic process, one of the
biggest issues to be tackled is digital exclusion. The utopian vision that online, open
source, freely available information creating a more inclusive world with com-
munities making informed decisions about their future is yet to be realised. There
are many barriers to achieving this dream ranging from user interface design to lack
of hardware infrastructure. However, a key issue when trying to crowdsource
information about all neighbourhoods is the likelihood of obtaining very rich data
from middle-class members with good access to hardware and sparse data from
those less wealthy, who do not necessarily have home computers and are reliant on
the limited access to the internet via the variable provision from libraries and
community centres. An uncritical view of the resulting data spread might result in
the conclusion that it is exclusively the middle classes residing in the more historic
neighbourhoods. We know this is not necessarily the case, but it highlights some
deep rooted concerns about how and what society values in terms of heritage. It is
also a reminder to consider the reliability of data and consequently the conclusions
Fig. 4.4 Archaeological excavation at Portwall Place exposing the surviving remains of an
eighteenth-century glass manufactory to enable the foundations of a new office building to be
designed to preserve this significant archaeology. image courtesy of Bristol City Council
we can safely draw from it. This can be borne out as in the example of Bristol where
the majority of the listed buildings and conservation areas are in the more affluent
north and west of the city, whilst the traditionally poorer south and east have little
or no conservation areas and less dense concentrations of listed buildings.
This type of discrepancy is being addressed in the UK and has been addressed in
Bristol. A recent study commissioned by English Heritage identified that there was
a general lack of recognition of the value of tangible and intangible heritage per-
taining to African-Caribbean communities, Asian communities, Disabled people,
Faith groups (including Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Jain, Jewish, Sikh and Black
64 P. Insole
Christian groups), Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) people, and
Women (English Heritage 2012).
To this list could be added working class communities from particular neigh-
bourhoods where academic study has not translated into an understanding or
valuing of the associated physical environment. Until recently there was not a single
element of any of the largest council estates (public or social housing areas built and
maintained by the local authority) recorded on the Bristol HER; most of which were
created in the interwar years as a response to the Housing Act 1919.
To tackle these issues it is not enough to create an online tool and expect people
to begin submitting their information. There remain many barriers, digital exclusion
being one, but also issues regarding ability to orientate with map-based sites like
Know Your Place, where only a potentially small group arguably have the capa-
bility of locating features and annotating them on an online map (Dunn and Hedges
2014). These types of barriers may explain the fact that soon after the launch of
Know Your Place, gaps in data coverage in terms of the community contributions
began to emerge. An Arts and Humanities Connected Communities project in
partnership with the University of Bristol began to address these data gaps by taking
Know Your Place to the silent communities. A series of ‘roadshow’ events were
held during 2012 and 2013 that aimed to provide opportunities for people to tell
their stories to researchers, what it had been like to grow up and go to school in the
neighbourhood, how the neighbourhood had changed. The events held at local
venues like the community centre or library collected a huge amount of information
through oral history collection and a facility to digitise personal archives. The result
was a digital archive of images and audio that could be linked to locations across
the local area adding the information to Know Your Place and thereby the HER.
This information is the archaeological record of a community that is not usually
captured spatially and rarely becomes a material planning consideration. It has the
added benefit that these people may continue to contribute to the database now that
the concept has been introduced and their data have been deemed of value by an
independent party.
Sourcing the Crowd
To achieve results like these requires external funding to cover costs like staffing,
venue hire and publicity. The staffing resource required is considerable to achieve a
successful outcome. In addition to the preparation and publicity beforehand, suf-
ficient numbers of staff are required at the venue to cover ‘meet and greet’ duties,
scanning of materials and interviewing people. Just a dozen attendees can occupy
several members of the project team for the duration of an event. After the event,
processing the digital images and editing the audio to create a formal catalogued
archive with spatial references necessitates further resource investment for the
project team.
This type of crowdsourcing is not cheap or easy because it is undertaken with the
intent to create an archive that is fit for future researchers, searchable spatially and
can be used for planning purposes. Given the level of investment required, what do
we gain from this type of approach that goes beyond a Facebook page covering
reminiscences of a school’s alumni or protests about the demolition of a local
landmark? The Know Your Bristol events added 247 records to the HER over the
course of seven one-day ‘roadshow’ events, many of them covering areas where
there was previously no information. We can point to places on the map that might
have previously been overlooked, but are of high significance to a community. One
example of this is the Dings Rugby Club at Lockleaze, a post-war housing estate on
the north east fringe of Bristol. When the estate was built there were originally no
community facilities, no place of worship and no meeting hall. The rugby club
house became the community centre, church and ran regular film nights during the
1950s. These are the sort of stories and community values that need to be captured
and used in decision-making processes. Removing what seems like an innocuous
building can tear a hole in the fabric of their heritage, undoing the seam that helped
to bind the community together.
In addition to the data gathered through these activities the community per-
ception of the value of this type of information has been raised. This can lead to an
increased sense of civic pride, community cohesion and an understanding of how
these community stories fit into a bigger picture of Bristol’s story and how these
stories can contribute in the future. In this way what is actually being crowdsourced
is informed community advocates for the historic environment that will contribute
to better care for heritage in the future.
Conclusion
The heritage, both tangible and intangible, that we are losing the fastest is the
heritage of the recent past, the late twentieth to early twenty-first century. This is
ironic given the huge technological advances, social networks and modern media
that have developed in that period. Monuments like those first mapped by William
Roy and the first Ordnance Survey are mostly well protected by an Act of
Parliament and appearing on a national list. What needs to be appreciated is that we
are living in the historic environment, that we are part of the archaeological
resource and that the past should be informing the future. Our present will become
the past, and a future will be lost if this present is not conserved.
To achieve this, research of all types, from local studies to academic disserta-
tions, need to connect better with planning. The technologies at our disposal should
be used to facilitate a process that connects understanding to planning, where the
past informs decisions for the future and where information is not locked away
behind physical, virtual or intellectual barriers.
Digital tools do not solve the problem in their own right. Data management
including validation, systems management and systems development remains
66 P. Insole
important consideration. However, the benefits of a coordinated approach where

our present digital systems become the thread stitching the past to the future will
lead to better community relations, better decision-making and better places.
Archaeology and heritage need to be part of the conversation about place, but the
whole approach is reliant on partnerships and collaborations. Know Your Place
would not be the success that it is if it were not for the partnerships within the local
authority, between archaeologists, urban designers and planners, between built
environment professionals and technical developers, between archivists and the
HER officer. The success is also built on partnerships with the local communities as
well as collaborations with universities and Historic England (formerly English
Heritage).
A question that Know Your Place posed from the outset, and a question that is
common to the principles of Localism and local democracy, when talking about the
story of place, whose story is it? Addressing this question requires a broad holistic
conversation with the widest possible demographic. The planning department has
its traditional perceptions of what comprises a quality place, but whose perspective
is this? Is this borne out by people’s experiences? Is it really representative of the
entire community? A ‘top-down’ approach and the resistance to it is what in part led
to the localism concept in the UK.
Know Your Place doesn’t try to tell the story of place from a single perspective,
but instead encourages its users to participate in a multivocal story. Know Your
Place hopes to facilitate or at least contribute to the development of a shared
understanding of place. The imperative ‘know your place’ instructing a particular
demographic to recognise and accept their low social status is overridden by the
alternative interpretation offered by Know Your Place. Mapmakers have always
understood the political power of a map, supported by relevant policies Know Your
Place provides the community with the opportunity to make their own geographic
mark, giving that power to the people.
Acknowledgements The writing of this paper would not have been possible without the help and
support of my wife, Ruth Myers. Know Your Place would not have been possible without the
immense technical skills of Andrew Ventham and his colleagues in the GIS team at Bristol City
Council. I would like to thank Julian Warren and the staff at Bristol Record Office and other
colleagues in the City Museum and Art Gallery and Bristol Central Library for allowing us to
publish so many of the city’s archives on the web resource and English Heritage (now Historic
England) for all their support. I also owe a huge debt of gratitude to Professor Robert Bickers,
Angela Piccini, Kate Miller and the Know Your Bristol team at the University of Bristol.
References
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gwynsanene manuscript. Oxford, UK: Oxford University.
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from https://www.english-heritage.org.uk/publications/responses-from-the-consultation-on-
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January 31, 2015.
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Publications.
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from http://wayback.archive.org/web/20081011064752/, http://www.lakedistrict.uk7.net/
tourist_development.html January 31, 2015.
Ordnance Survey. (1973). Place names on maps of Scotland and Wales. Southampton, UK:
Ordnance Survey.
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Ridge, M. (Ed.). (2014). Crowdsourcing our cultural heritage. Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate.
Chapter 5
Archaeological Resource Management
in Toronto: Planning, Preservation,
and Interpretation
Ronald F. Williamson, David A. Robertson and Susan Hughes
Introduction
The legislative requirements for archaeology related to public and private devel-
opment in Ontario are among the most comprehensive in North America. Decisions
related to archaeological resources are made at the municipal level, where the role
of development approval resides. Many of the municipalities experiencing the
greatest development pressures, including the City of Toronto, seek to ensure that
planning decisions are informed by detailed archaeological management plans.
These plans consider the known and potential archaeological resource base and
define the process by which sites should be identified, evaluated, and mitigated. In
this paper, we will discuss the legislative background to the undertaking of
archaeological planning in Ontario with a focus on the City of Toronto’s Official
Plan policies, archaeological management plan process, and efforts at community
involvement and public outreach. Toronto recognizes explicitly the roles of
descendant communities and other local interest groups in collaborative decision
making in this process and the importance of public interpretation and commem-
oration of archaeological sites.
R.F. Williamson (&) D.A. Robertson

Archaeological Services Inc., 528 Bathurst Street, Toronto, ON M5S 2P9, Canada
S. Hughes
City Planning Division, Urban Design, City of Toronto,
100 Queen Street West, Suite 17E, Toronto, ON M5H 2N2, Canada

70 R.F. Williamson et al.
Legislative Background
In Canada, there is no overarching federal legislation concerning archaeological

resource management; federal regulations apply to crown lands only and each
province has crafted its own approach to heritage conservation. Ontario, the largest
province in Canada in terms of population, and for much of the post-World War II
era arguably the economic engine of the country, boasts some of the most com-
prehensive legislation related to archaeological resource management and the land
development process in North America. The legislative basis for this mandate was
first enacted in the 1970s in response to the realization that development poses the
most serious threat to the archaeological record. Between 1951 and 1991, for
example, it has been estimated that over 8000 archaeological sites were destroyed
within the Greater Toronto Area, the most heavily urbanized region in the province,
as a direct result of development and land-use change (Coleman and Williamson
1994). The majority of this destruction took place between 1951 and 1971 and was
not accompanied by any significant degree of archaeological mitigation.
Since the 1970s, however, and increasing in effectiveness since the mid-to-late
1980s, the Ontario Planning Act and the Ontario Environmental Assessment Act
have required that archaeological resource assessments, as well as built heritage and
cultural landscape analyses, be carried out in advance of most forms of
land-disturbing activities, whether these are public initiatives, such as infrastructure
projects, or private developments related to housing or industrial subdivisions. In
the case of private development, this requirement applies to any land development
project where a planning application is submitted and in the case of public sector
environmental assessments, any project that involves land modification. The
Renewable Energy Approval Regulation under the Environmental Protection Act
also constitutes a relatively new tool in terms of incorporating archaeology in
infrastructure projects. Natural resource extraction activities are also subject to
archaeological requirements according to legislation such as the Aggregate
Resources Act and the Ontario Mining Act. All archaeological assessments in
Ontario are on a proponent pay basis; there is no government funding for propo-
nents in meeting these responsibilities.
Direct control over the archaeological process is articulated through the Ontario
Heritage Act, primarily through issuing archaeological licenses to practitioners,
who carry out almost all of the archaeological work in Ontario. The Archaeology
Unit within the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, the ministry
responsible for implementing the Ontario Heritage Act, reviews all archaeological
reports, regardless of triggering legislation, to ensure that they meet the require-
ments of the Act and, if so, enter the reports into the Ontario Public Register of
Archaeology Reports. The Archaeology Unit also maintains the Ontario
Archaeological Sites Database. In 2011, the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture
and Sport (2011a, b) released Standards and Guidelines for Consultant
Archaeologists as well as a new technical bulletin entitled Engaging Aboriginal
Communities in Archaeology. The Standards and Guidelines, which were designed
5 Archaeological Resource Management in Toronto … 71
collaboratively by the Ministry and cultural resource management industry,

describe technical expectations for archaeological assessments ranging from
background reviews to full-scale salvage excavations. Standards set out the mini-
mum requirements for fieldwork, analysis, and reporting to which the Ministry
holds licensees accountable while the Guidelines represent practice undertaken as a
matter of professional judgment on the part of the licensee. Together they provide
an expression of expectations while allowing consultants to respond to special
circumstances, all of which it was hoped would make the review process more
transparent and efficient. While clearly advancing archaeological resource man-
agement in the province, the overly prescriptive character of the standards has been
problematic in application, especially in urban contexts for which they were not
designed.
The technical bulletin addresses the interests of descendant communities in the
identification, evaluation, and conservation of archaeological sites and material
culture. It encourages archaeologists to engage communities early in the life of a
project, preferably during the planning phase. While engagement is recommended
during all stages of an archaeological assessment on lands with potential for
Aboriginal sites, it is required at the detailed site test excavation phase, when
evaluating the cultural heritage value or interest of an archaeological site that is
known or appears to have sacred or spiritual importance, is associated with tradi-
tional land uses or geographical features of cultural heritage interest, or is the
subject of oral histories. It is also required when formulating and implementing
strategies for mitigating the impacts on Aboriginal archaeological sites through
protection and/or salvage excavation. This engagement process was not intended to
replace any Crown responsibility to consult with First Nations concerning their
asserted or established rights and interests on lands slated for public or private
development but rather to address the long-standing professional commitment on
the part of Canadian archaeologists to consult with descendant communities about
their work (Nicholson et al. 1996).
The Environmental Assessment Act applies to public sector infrastructure pro-
jects and designated private sector projects. Private sector projects that are desig-
nated by the province as subject to the Act are usually major projects such as
landfills. In cases of environmental assessments, documents must be prepared that
include examinations of how projects might impact cultural heritage features. The
heritage sections of these reports contain detailed inventories and evaluations of
heritage resources, comparison of the impacts posed by design alternatives, and
discussions of mitigation options. It is subject to formal government review and
public scrutiny and, potentially, to a tribunal hearing. There are also Municipal
Engineers Association (MEA) class environmental assessments for municipal
projects that require similar considerations, but entail a simplified review and
approval process. Toronto carries out approximately 40 class environmental
assessment projects annually. Various provincial ministries have also established
protocols related to activities subject to the environmental assessment process, in
order to ensure that heritage concerns in their respective jurisdictions are addressed.
The Ontario Ministry of Transportation (2006), for example, ensures that
archaeological surveys are undertaken in advance of all new road construction in

order to preclude destruction or damage to archaeological sites.
In planning contexts (most private land development), the Ontario legislative
approach to archaeological resource conservation has evolved to one of shared
responsibilities with local governments. In 1990, the province suggested a
re-allocation of roles, in which the provincial government would maintain an
advisory function and municipal governments would assume the day-to-day
responsibility for monitoring those archaeological features in their jurisdictions.
The rationale for this approach was that planning and land-use control are pre-
dominantly local municipal government responsibilities and that the impact of
municipal land-use decisions on archaeological resources is significant, especially
since locally approved developments constitute the majority of land-disturbing
activities in the Province. With adequate screening at the municipal level, it was
thought the provincial government would be able to ensure protection for valued
archaeological resources.
Underlying this approach is that in most cases, the province is not the approval
authority for the developments that will have effects on archaeological resources.
This power lies with local governments, be they large upper- or lower-tier
municipalities. It is the municipal government that reviews the development
application, makes the determination as to the need for archaeological assessment,
and ultimately allows the development to go ahead after the assessment and any
mitigations that may be required have been completed to the satisfaction of the
provincial archaeological regulators, although some municipalities with trained
heritage staff do not wait for provincial sign-off on the resulting license reports.
The authority for municipalities to manage this process flows through the
Ontario Planning Act and the Provincial Policy Statement. A key issue is that the
custodians of heritage resources are often private property owners. It is neither
possible nor desirable that all resources be brought into public
ownership. Conservation management, therefore, is undertaken by a variety of
actors, and it is necessary, through legislation and education, to bring all of these
actors together in pursuit of a common goal. In many instances, these are traditional
planning mechanisms that are used to ensure that cultural heritage resources are
conserved within the process of change.
The Province of Ontario is clear that it expects cultural heritage features will be
conserved in the review and approvals process as outlined in its recently updated
vision for land-use planning (Provincial Policy Statement, Ontario Ministry of
Municipal Affairs and Housing 2014):
The Province’s natural heritage resources, water resources, including the Great Lakes,
agricultural resources, mineral resources, and cultural heritage and archaeological resources
provide important environmental, economic and social benefits. The wise use and man-
agement of these resources over the long term is a key provincial interest… (p. 4).
This vision and policy statement now guides all provincial and local planning
authorities in their decisions. With respect to archaeological resources, the
Provincial Policy Statement states that:
Development and site alteration shall not be permitted on lands containing archaeological
resources or areas of archaeological potential unless significant archaeological resources
have been conserved... [Conservation] means the identification, protection, management
and use of built heritage resources, cultural heritage landscapes and archaeological
resources in a manner that ensures their cultural heritage value or interest is retained under
the Ontario Heritage Act. This may be achieved by the implementation of recommendations
set out in a conservation plan, archaeological assessment, and/or heritage impact assess-
ment. Mitigative measures and/or alternative development approaches can be included in
these plans and assessments (p. 29, 40).
For this policy statement, significant archaeological resources are defined as

those “that have been determined to have cultural heritage value or interest for the
important contribution they make to our understanding of the history of a place, an
event, or a people.” The identification and evaluation of such resources are based on
archaeological fieldwork.
Thus, all decisions made during the land development process, regardless of the
identity of the development proponent or the relevant approval agency, must
address potential heritage resource impacts. The statements in the Act are sufficient
for a municipality to require that an archaeological assessment be completed on
public or private lands prior to the approval of a planning application.
Archaeological assessments must be completed and submitted with an application
for approval of a plan of subdivision. The applicant shall identify for the approval
authority whether the subject land contains any areas of archaeological potential or
a known site and, if so, provide an archaeological assessment prepared by a licensed
archaeologist as well as a conservation plan for any archaeological resources
identified in the assessment. By enacting these requirements, development propo-
nents will have sufficient time to plan for archaeological site protection, rather than
salvage excavation, by considering alternative site plan designs. A basic require-
ment for assessments in advance of private land development has been in place for
over three decades now in Ontario and the private land development industry now
accepts this requirement in the same way as they do all other legislative conditions
of approval; improvements to the Provincial Policy Statement and the timing of
these assessments have eliminated some of the strains in the process as has its
uniform application in all planning jurisdictions across the province.
Cultural heritage landscapes are also broadly recognized in the Provincial Policy
Statement, establishing an alternative path for conserving certain types of archae-
ological sites. Cultural heritage landscapes are classified as “a defined geographical
area that may have been modified by human activity and is identified as having
cultural heritage value or interest by a community, including an Aboriginal com-
munity. The area may involve features such as structures, spaces, archaeological
sites, or natural elements that are valued together for their interrelationship,
meaning, or association.” Examples may include, but are not limited to, “heritage
conservation districts designated under the Ontario Heritage Act, villages, parks,
gardens, battlefields, main streets and neighborhoods, cemeteries, trailways,
viewsheds, natural areas and industrial complexes of heritage significance, and
areas recognized by federal or international designation authorities (e.g., a National
Historic Site or District designation, or a UNESCO World Heritage Site)”

(Provincial Policy Statement, Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing
2014, p. 40).
While it had always been possible to protect cultural heritage landscapes through
designation under Part IV or Part V of the Ontario Heritage Act, generally Part IV
designations have been used to protect individual built properties whereas Part V
designations have been used to protect heritage conservation districts—areas which
may consist of several properties which together retain cultural heritage signifi-
cance. The Provincial Policy Statement now provides a wider and renewed focus
on establishing identification frameworks and policies for fully protecting a wide
range of types of cultural heritage landscapes including those that encompass
archaeological sites.
Municipalities also have the opportunity for establishing their own tailor-made
heritage conservation policies within their Official Plans. The Ontario Planning Act
and the Provincial Policy Statement give municipalities the tools to do so while a
provincial growth plan called Places to Grow (Ontario Ministry of Municipal
Affairs and Housing 2005) requires municipalities to implement those policies
within a framework centered on intensifying already built-up areas.
Toronto’s Heritage Policies
Toronto established new policies for heritage resources in 2013 as a component of

the statutory periodic review of their Official Plan. While consistent with the most
recent changes to provincial planning legislation, the new policies improve heritage
resource conservation practices throughout the City in ways that recognize its
cultural diversity. The new policies also concede that preservation can only be
achieved through coordinated ventures between the private sector, the City, and the
general public.
An extensive consultation process was thus undertaken in 2012 that included the
establishment of an inclusive Official Plan Review Heritage Advisory Committee
that helped plan and implement meetings and interviews with members of City
Council, the City Heritage Preservation Board, representatives of the Preservation
Panels of the various wards in the City, resident and ratepayer groups, the devel-
opment community, provincial heritage officials, representatives of faith groups,
and heritage consultants. Written submissions were received from many of these
people as well as the ministries of Municipal Affairs and Housing and Culture,
Tourism, and Sport. Comment was also requested from First Nations and Métis
groups and a separate meeting was held with representatives from several First
Nations within whose traditional territory Toronto is situated. This was followed up
with a well-publicized open house to discuss the proposed new heritage policies.
The new proposed Official Plan policies reflect the views that emerged from
public consultations as well as the new more rigourous provincial policy framework
for heritage preservation, and best municipal practices in heritage resource
conservation. An official plan amendment with new heritage policies was subse-
quently passed by City Council in the spring of 2014. The new policies reflect the
new powers and responsibilities available to Council to conserve heritage properties
and archaeological resources. They also articulate a new vision of heritage con-
servation in the context of well-designed development that protects important
heritage attributes on heritage properties and raises heritage awareness throughout
the neighborhoods of the City.
The archaeological policies, for example, while laying out the process for
archaeological assessment in areas with archaeological potential as defined by the
City’s archaeological management plan (see next section), also encourage protec-
tion as the preferred option to mitigate the impacts of proposed development on any
archaeological feature, acknowledging that this is most feasible in greenfield con-
texts and those where the discovery is on publically owned land. In keeping with
provincial regulations laid out in the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport bul-
letin Engaging Aboriginal Communities in Archaeology, in the case of Aboriginal
sites, Toronto’s policies require the landowner to give, prior to development, the
archaeological reports to the First Nations or Métis group(s) with the closest cul-
tural affiliation and in whose traditional territory the archaeological resources were
found. The landowner is further required to consult with those First Nations or
Métis groups to discuss conservation of the sites and interpretative approaches. The
new policies also state the City will henceforth take possession of artifact assem-
blages recovered from all archaeological sites within the City, as well as the
accompanying records. In the case of Aboriginal sites, the ultimate disposition of
assemblages will be subject to the development of an Aboriginal consultation
protocol.
In regard to municipally initiated public works projects, the Ontario Planning
Act states that where there is an Official Plan in effect, no public work shall be
undertaken that does not conform to the Plan. In summary, a municipality must
ensure that archaeological concerns are addressed in connection with any planning
application and that they are able to regulate the use of land, through the enactment
of zoning by-law(s), which contain significant archaeological resources. The City of
Toronto has been a leader in not only following these regulations but in articulating
an all-encompassing vision for archaeological resource conservation. The basis for
that vision has been the design and implementation of an archaeological manage-
ment plan for the city.
Archaeological Management Planning in Ontario: The

Toronto Process
Not surprisingly, the ability, or willingness, of municipal governments to embrace

these responsibilities has not been universal across the province. Smaller munici-
palities do not necessarily have the resources or expertise to evaluate the potential
implications of a development in terms of archaeology. Many have tended to rely

on generic information developed by the province to assist municipal planners in
evaluating archaeological potential and there has been a degree of inconsistency,
within and between municipalities, in terms of placing appropriate conditions on the
applications they receive. Sometimes, planners in smaller, more rural, municipali-
ties are also afraid that the application of rigourous demands on proponents will
discourage growth in their communities. It is the responsibility of the Ontario
Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing to ensure that the policies of the
Provincial Policy Statement are applied uniformly across the province.
Also, the recognition that proposed disturbances to archaeological sites and their
associated cemeteries is often at the center of controversies between modern
development and First Nations interests, led Provincial Justice Linden (2007,
p. 369) to recommend in his Report of the Ipperwash Inquiry,1 that the provincial
government should encourage municipalities to develop and use archaeological
management plans across the province.
One of the major problems in planning for archaeological site conservation is
that we do not know where all the sites are located. Comprehensive archaeological
surveys of entire municipal jurisdictions to complete inventories are clearly not
feasible. As an alternative, therefore, planners and managers must depend on pre-
dictive site location models. The main purpose of an archaeological management
plan is to design predictive models specific to a particular jurisdiction.
Fortunately, many of the municipalities where the pace of development has been
greatest have commissioned detailed archaeological management plans or archae-
ological potential studies to provide themselves with a more accurate means of
determining archaeological potential and the need for the assessment of specific
properties or land areas; all but three of these studies were undertaken by archae-
ological consultants while municipal staff with archaeological expertise conducted
the others. To date, 22 such municipal studies have been completed (three are local
municipalities within York Region whose previous studies were superseded by
York Region’s plan), mostly in southern Ontario, encompassing a total area of some
20,000 km2 (Fig. 5.1). For the most part, each of these municipal study areas tends
to subsume a vast range of natural, rural agricultural, and urban landscapes. And
naturally, the scale of research and analysis that goes into the development of these
models and management plans varies according to the size and character of the
1
The Ipperwash Crisis occurred in 1995 over a long-standing land claim to Ipperwash Provincial
Park, Ontario, filed by the Chippewas of Kettle and Stony Point First Nation with the federal
government. The land had been expropriated from them during World War II by the federal
government to establish a military training facility. The government had promised to return the
land at the cessation of international hostilities. Failure to do so along with denied access to a
former community burial ground led to occupation of the park and the death of one of the
protesters during a violent confrontation with the Ontario Provincial Police. The land was returned
to the nation in 2007. The inquiry into the death of the protester, Mr. Dudley George, also involved
deliberations by Justice Linden on the formulation of policy that would help avoid similar situ-
ations in the future.
Fig. 5.1 Municipalities in Ontario that have undertaken detailed archaeological management
plans (drawing by ASI)
specific study area, the available funding, and the perceived immediate needs of the
municipality, but in general they all proceed using a similar approach and under-
lying logic. The role and input of the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport has
varied with each plan; they have not regularly reviewed and approved these plans.
Precontact Aboriginal site modeling is developed through a combination of
deductive and inductive approaches, using known archaeological site locations and
paleoenvironmental criteria such as hydrology, soil texture and drainage, slope,
vegetation patterns, and wildlife ecology. The City of Toronto modeling process
involved a primarily deductive assessment of the paleoenvironmental constraints
that may have affected precontact land use in the region as well as an inductive
analysis of the locations of the 135 known sites in the City. An additional 186 sites,
situated in a four-kilometer zone immediately surrounding the City, were also
employed. This assessment began with a review of the most fundamental deter-
minants of the landscape, namely bedrock and Quaternary geology, and proceeded
through considerations of hydrology—using topographical and historical clues to
map the former paths of streams that no longer exist, having been subsumed within
the urban landscape—soils, climate, flora, and fauna. Modeling criteria were
established through the consideration of both paleoenvironmental and cultural data,
and zones of archaeological potential were digitally mapped on a GIS platform
(ASI 2015a).
Post-contact Euro-Canadian potential zones are developed through primary and
secondary source research, often beginning with the identification of historical
themes related to the growth and development of the municipalities or the settle-
ment centers within their jurisdictions and the compilation of inventories of features
identified on historical maps. Urban growth is often conceived as ever-widening
circles expanding outward over time from a primary core. Although to some extent
the City of Toronto can trace its origins to the ten-block radius of the Old Town of
York, the history of the City and how it formed over time is a far more complicated
process. The contemporary City, made up of the original historic townships of
Etobicoke, York, and Scarborough, is actually the product of coalescent settlement
centers, the evolving patterns of industrial and agricultural development and the
transportation networks that emerged to support them. The needs of the growing
population, and the demands of political economy, drove these patterns, while
practical necessity and historical memory determined settlement areas (ASI 2015b).
In most archaeological management studies, including Toronto, areas of large-scale
development that have clearly resulted in deep subsurface disturbances (e.g., foun-
dation and basement excavation) or alteration of the original topography (e.g., iden-
tifiable cutting/filling/grading events) that may be expected to have removed any
archaeological deposits that were present are generally excluded from the archaeo-
logical potential zones. The only exceptions to this tend be the historic cores of
settlement centers, which may retain significant archaeological deposits within and
among the existing structures, but which generally cannot be identified in detail within
the context of a municipal potential study or management plan due to the level of
effort that would be required. Within these settlement centers, far more detailed
assessments of individual properties, involving the development of comprehensive
land-use histories and compilation of large-scale nineteenth-and-twentieth-century
map sources, are completed at the development application stage. In essence, the
historic archaeological potential zonation overrides integrity in settlement cores.
A consequence of such caution is that many properties may be unnecessarily or
inappropriately flagged as having archaeological potential.
In the case of the City of Toronto, however, efforts are being made to refine this
process through a number of means. A second level of review was undertaken by
ASI for the over 1100 city-owned parks and public “green spaces” that fall within
the general potential zone to refine the integrity review, as in most plans these types
of property are, by default, assumed to have integrity. This work involved con-
sulting available historical mapping and earlier aerial photography, to permit a more
accurate diachronic understanding of the land-use histories of these parcels, as well
as use of Google Earth’s Street View tool to examine existing conditions in “three
dimensions” (ASI 2015c). This process resulted in removal of approximately 50%
of these public properties from the general potential zone. Given that the parks and
public properties represent a varied portfolio of property types and functions, this
review also led to a categorization of properties according to the types of archae-

ological resources that may be expected to have survived within them, which was
based on their general landscape and development histories. This work has led to
the identification of a series of protocols, specific to each park, as to what types of
maintenance or infrastructure improvement activities should be preceded by an
archaeological assessment.
One assumption made at the outset was that playing fields, such as soccer pitches
and baseball diamonds, even though they have likely been formed through some
degree of landscaping and leveling, must still be considered to exhibit potential.
This came into stark relief with the discovery of an ancestral Wendat village and
ossuary under a soccer pitch in north Toronto (Fig. 5.2). While the almost one
hectare village itself has only been subject to test excavation, the associated oss-
uary, located on the perimeter of the site, was subject to detailed excavation
(Williamson and Pfeiffer 2003). It contained the commingled remains of
eighty-seven people representing the earliest ancestral Wendat community ossuary
yet excavated; the remains have since been reinterred elsewhere. The mapping and
removal of each bone in the ossuary afforded a rare opportunity to document the
structure of an early Wendat ossuary and to evaluate the health and diet of a
population at that time.
A similar process is being undertaken by consultants retained by the City within
two Heritage Conservation Districts within the historical core of the City.
Approximately 700 individual properties are being evaluated through overlays of
historical maps and aerial photographs to refine the potential determinations and to
identify, on a property-by-property basis, the types of maintenance, servicing, or
development activities that are of concern in terms of any impacts to potential
archaeological resources.
On the basis of such general and specific mapping exercises, 50–70% of the total
landmass of large jurisdictions and 40–50% of smaller municipalities are typically
found to exhibit potential for the presence of hitherto undocumented Aboriginal and
Euro-Canadian archaeological sites. In the case of Toronto, only 28% of the City
has archaeological potential because there has been so much late twentieth-century
urban core redevelopment (Fig. 5.3). For purposes of comparison, the application
of the Province’s generic criteria, which have been circulated to most municipalities
in southern Ontario for the purposes of applying archaeological assessment con-
ditions in the approvals processes, will capture about 85–95% of any given
jurisdiction.
These modeling exercises are the first approximations of archaeological site
distributions, and they are intended to provide to land-use planners and heritage
resource managers a theoretically supported estimate of the scope of a resource for
which there is generally only limited substantive data available. Given the hypo-
thetical nature of such models, however, users must be aware of their limitations in
order to employ them appropriately.
It is also anticipated that the locations of certain site classes, sacred ones, for
example, will not necessarily be captured by modeling exercises of this nature.
Residual sites of this kind, and sites in localized zones of potential that could not be
Fig. 5.2 Moatfield Ossuary, an ancestral Wendat village and mass burial feature found to survive
in a previously developed recreational complex (photo courtesy of ASI)
Fig. 5.3 Areas of archaeological potential within part of the historical core of the City of Toronto
as identified by the modeling exercise undertaken for the archaeological management plan
(drawing by ASI)
resolved at the mapping scales utilized by the studies, can be expected to occur.
These are reasons why the implementation sections for such studies typically rec-
ommend that, where any part of a development application falls into a zone of
archaeological potential, the entire application should be subject to assessment. This
provides the opportunity for examining lands outside of the archaeological potential
zone identified in the model, sometimes representing the majority of development
lands, thereby improving the site sample and avoiding the self-fulfilling prophesy of
only finding sites where one thinks they should be found. In the case of Toronto,
city planners make the decision on whether to require archaeological assessment
using the archaeological potential mapping in this manner. To ensure the viability
of the models, it is always recommended that they be subject to comprehensive
review on a five-year basis. Such reviews consider any changes in provincial cri-
teria for site significance, an analysis of the distribution of sites discovered since the
last review, changes required to the archaeological potential modeling, and all
associated planning procedures and protocols. At least seven of the municipalities
have had regular updates to their plans.
These potential models and management plans are used by the municipalities to
identify those land developments that have the potential to impact archaeological
sites and should therefore be subject to archaeological assessment in advance of
land-disturbing activities. In Toronto, this procedure is applied to all large-scale
land-use alterations in the form of Official Plan Amendments, Zoning By-law
Amendments, and Draft Plans of Subdivision. Site Plan Control applications which
may involve both residential properties and large parcels of undisturbed land
(recreational, industrial, or commercial projects, such as golf courses, industrial
parks, and shopping malls) are also reviewed for archaeological potential like any
plan of subdivision. The archaeological resource assessment reports and any
site-specific mitigation reports arising from this work must be submitted for review
with the proposed land development applications to the City’s Heritage
Preservation Services Unit (Planning Division) as well as the Ontario Ministry of
Tourism, Culture, and Sport. This minimizes development delays and provides for
opportunities to ensure that any heritage concerns are identified and possibly
resolved well in advance of final registration of the development. Plans to preserve
or salvage excavate are typically time-consuming to develop. It is, therefore, to the
advantage of the proponents to identify, schedule, and budget for any mitigation
measures at the earliest opportunity.
In the cases of some municipalities that are particularly rigourous in their
application of the model, like Toronto, these archaeological procedures are also
applied to small-scale consent and minor variance applications as well as municipal
development and/or infrastructure projects that involve construction of a building or
structure. In addition, other activities such as topsoil removal, site grading, placing
of fill, and new drainage works are all subject to the same procedures. Also, in
recognition of the demonstrated or potential sensitivity of some complex archae-
ological sites, a number of municipalities have defined them and their surroundings
as Archaeologically Sensitive Areas or ASAs. Within such an ASA, even
small-scale activities, such as private swimming pool construction or house addi-
tions, and small-scale municipal activities, such as parks and recreation facility
upgrades that will result in subsurface disturbance to previously undisturbed or
potentially undisturbed lands, are recommended for an archaeological assessment.
They are only recommended as it is not possible within the existing legislative
framework to require such assessments in those contexts. Landowners and pro-
ponents are nevertheless reminded that, under the Ontario Heritage Act, it is
unlawful to knowingly disturb an archaeological site. While the City has not
maintained compliance statistics in this regard, anecdotal evidence suggests the
majority of public sector proponents do comply while private landowners are less
willing unless neighbors have encountered archaeological features such as burials.
This has occurred twice within one of the City’s seventeenth-century sites; com-
pliance by neighboring private landowners has been excellent.
The process of approvals-driven archaeology at the core of these management
plans and potential studies, even in jurisdictions where these studies are absent, but
the general provincial requirements are still met, has resulted in a vast increase in
the number of archaeological sites discovered yearly. Between 2005 and 2010, for
example, the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport has reviewed some
10,000 archaeological projects across the province resulted in the recording of over
4000 new sites by cultural resource management archaeologists (Williamson 2010,
p. 10). City of Toronto planners review approximately 300 development applica-
tions under the Planning Act per year, including applications to the Committee of
Adjustment, for impacts to potential archaeological resources. This does not include
numerous reviews of inter-divisional city activities such as parks projects.
Community Involvement and Public Outreach
An appreciable number of newly documented sites represent types not previously

subject to much consideration by the wider archaeological discipline, at least in
Ontario, and the salvage excavations carried out on an annual basis have dramat-
ically altered our understanding of Ontario’s past. In some cases, large complex
sites have been found in phased developments where some phases encompassed
areas of less than ten acres. The late-fourteenth-century to early-fifteenth-century
Alexandra site, for example, was located in the City of Toronto adjacent to a minor
tributary of West Highland Creek and consisted of a five-acre unpalisaded village
with seventeen long house structures of which fifteen represented permanent or
year-round dwellings (ASI 2008). The site’s location adjacent to a school and
community center provided an ideal opportunity to commemorate the former
presence of the village with plaques erected by Heritage Toronto, which were
unveiled in 2008 by representatives of the Huron-Wendat from Wendake, Quebec.
A problem that has emerged as a direct result of this massive increase in
archaeological excavation, and is not being addressed by either the province or
municipalities, is the need for the systematic curation of the millions of artifacts that
are being recovered. Existing municipal museums are generally unwilling or unable
to house archaeological collections due to funding and capacity constraints. New
curation and research facilities, funded through federal and provincial development
grants, have been established at Western University in London, Ontario and
McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, to attempt to fill this gap. Their success
at attracting the participation of the CRM industry and financial support from that
quarter remains to be seen. Such support has not been forthcoming since to remain
sustainable, these facilities must charge several hundred dollars for each box
transferred, which is not affordable by consultants for legacy collections. There are
two initiatives that should be undertaken by the Ontario Ministry of Tourism,
Culture and Sport to address these problems. The first is to mandate, after a certain
point in time, transfer of all new assemblages to these facilities. This would be a
further requirement of provincial licensing and would persuade all consultants to
include the box transfer fees in their cost proposals to proponents. The second
necessary provincial initiative is to provide several million dollars in financing to
help with the transfer of all legacy collections to these facilities from both public
and private holdings. At the very least, Toronto has assumed responsibility in their
Official Plan heritage policies for curation of those assemblages derived from within
their jurisdiction although they have not yet identified where that will occur.
Another downside of the situation is that the objective of conserving archaeo-
logical resources through means other than excavation, analysis, and report
preparation has been rather less well realized until recently. While the archaeolo-
gist’s and the Province’s default preferred recommendation for a significant site is
that it be preserved within the context of the proposed development project, this has
seldom been achieved because of the absence of planning policy needed for their
protection and the lack of incentives such as tax relief for proponents to follow this
course of action. There is room for some optimism though. This is due, in large
part, to the increasing participation of First Nations in the design, implementation,
and review of municipal archaeological management planning studies and the
recent insertion of policies in municipal Official Plans requiring protection of cer-
tain significant sites. As these policies were negotiated with the representatives of
the development industry at the table, they are not opposed largely due to the fact
that the zones of protected archaeological sites would be far smaller in extent than
that already protected by them for natural heritage reasons.
While it has not always been the case, management plans are now undertaken in
the context of comprehensive Aboriginal consultation, providing the relevant
Aboriginal groups the opportunity to have a decisive role in directing the conser-
vation of their cultural heritage. In addition to Toronto, the plan recently completed
for the Regional Municipality of York, situated immediately north of Toronto (see
Fig. 5.1), for instance, involved consultation with 14 First Nation communities and
organizations in establishing preferred mitigative options for Aboriginal sites of
various types. These options include a stronger commitment to protecting a range of
sites, where possible and appropriate, including undisturbed sites of any kind, burial
sites of any kind and Late Woodland villages, among others (York Region 2014).
Similar processes of First Nation consultation in relation to development protocols
elsewhere in southern Ontario have resulted in protection of Late Woodland vil-
lages as well and are part of the broader process in which archaeologists, munic-
ipalities, and the Province have become aware of their need to engage with these
descendant communities. This engagement process holds out the promise for the
increased direct participation of First Nations in managing the archaeological
remains left by their ancestors, and in establishing the means by which these
remains can be used for the long-term cultural and educational benefit of their
communities. Complex urban centers like Toronto have also had to consult with
their urban Aboriginal citizens; Toronto has the largest urban population of
Aboriginals of any Canadian city numbering 25,675 (11% of Ontario’s Aboriginal
population) (Environics Institute 2010).
In a similar vein, it is an axiom of cultural resource management that archae-
ology conducted in advance of development is in the public interest as it preserves
knowledge of the past that would otherwise be lost and provides the opportunity to
disseminate the results of this work to the public. Discussion of the issues that stand
between making this assertion and making it a reality is all too familiar. But it is
worth noting that the City of Toronto, in its archaeological management role, has
embraced the concept of public interpretation of archaeological excavations, not
only in policies but in implementation of those policies. The city routinely requires
development proponents to fund and maintain permanent commemorative and
interpretive displays related to the history and archaeology of their properties. The
initiatives that have been completed to date have all been paid for by the proponents
and typically included didactic panels and signage or artifact displays in public
realm spaces. The excavation of the Bishop’s Block site (Fig. 5.4) in the core of the
City, for example, involved the exposure of the foundations and backyard features
of four townhouses, three of which were constructed in 1832, and the other in 1860
(ASI 2012). By the end of the excavations, almost 70,000 artifacts had been
uncovered, which together with structural remains and the documentary record
demonstrate a changing landscape from a semirural, upper-middle-class range of
single-family homes to a fully urban, working-class enclave of boarding houses and
commercial businesses by the early twentieth century. While the excavation was
considered an active construction site and therefore subject to the Ontario
Occupational Health and Safety Act, special tours of the site were arranged for
university school classes and interested personnel from the Ontario Ministry of
Tourism, Culture and Sport and Heritage Preservation Services, City Planning
Fig. 5.4 Salvage excavation of the mid-nineteenth-century townhouses making up the Bishop’s
Block site (photo courtesy of ASI)
Division, Urban Design, Toronto, although all visitors were required to wear per-
sonal safety equipment. The story of the block and its archaeological investigations
are now revealed in an installation near the entrance to the new hotel built on the
property (Fig. 5.5), as required by the City. The display encompasses large
glass-fronted panels on portions of the north and east walls of the earliest town-
house, which was retained and repurposed by the proponent at the direction of the
City. In other cases, interpretation has taken more abstract artistic or landscape
approaches, such as paving the locations and outlines of former structures or wall
treatments evoking stratigraphy and artifacts.
The City is also currently working with a development proponent to preserve,
in situ, the partial remains of the foundations of an 1841 military barracks building
within the entrance walkway of a new hotel (Fig. 5.6). In another case, the city has
negotiated a land transfer with a private developer to secure the archaeological
remains of Upper Canada’s 1797–1824 Parliament buildings (Dieterman and
Williamson 2001). The outcomes of this acquisition, in terms of future public
interpretation and programming, remain to be seen as there are substantial issues of
environmental contamination and future site uses to be resolved. It is, nevertheless,
a project that has received the general support of a broad range of public agencies
including the Citizens for Old Town, St. Lawrence Neighbourhood Association,
Heritage Toronto, Ontario Heritage Trust, and Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture
and Sport all being coordinated by the office of Councilor Pam McConnell, Ward
28, Toronto Center-Rosedale, under the rubric of the First Parliament Working
Fig. 5.5 Part of the interpretive installations near the entrance to a luxury hotel built on the
Bishop’s Block site (photo courtesy of ASI)
Fig. 5.6 Excavation of the remains of the East Enlisted Men’s Barracks at the “New Fort,” built
in 1841 and to be incorporated within the entrance walkway of a hotel currently under construction
(photo courtesy of ASI)
Group. These public initiatives underscore another aspect of the artifact curation
issue. While Toronto is pursuing individual interpretation projects, the City does
not have a museum devoted to its own history, archaeological or otherwise, despite
many years of discussion and proposals of various sorts. Although the reports
generated through the archaeological assessment and excavation process are
available through the Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport’s Pubic
Registry, the artifacts recovered from the many excavations that have taken place,
along with the accompanying field and analytical records, remain in the hands of
the private archaeological industry. Public interpretation of Toronto’s past takes
place only as opportunities, based entirely on specific development projects, arise.
While addressing the City’s need to present the results of the archaeological work it
requires by proponents to its own citizens, the process inhibits the creation of a
unified program of presenting the archaeological history of the City to the public.
Conclusion
The Province of Ontario is characterized by an admirably progressive planning and

environmental assessment legislation related to archaeology, one that not only
encourages, but requires, the active participation of the municipalities in managing
these resources. The most proactive municipal governments, like Toronto, have
seen the need to develop archaeological management plans tailored to the archae-
ological and environmental records of their jurisdictions to ensure that development
review for archaeological concerns is as effective as possible. A few municipalities,
like Toronto, have retained individuals with broad heritage and planning experience
to help coordinate these processes. We are also seeing these plans evolve in
response to wider issues, beyond those of mere site identification and mitigation
through excavation, to embrace larger issues of descendant community participa-
tion and the encouragement of greater awareness on the part of their citizens of the
archaeological records of the places where they live. There is still much to be done,
but these recently emerging trends can only reinforce the protection and wise
management of the archaeological resource base.
Acknowledgements We thank Sherene Baugher and William Moss for their invitation to par-
ticipate in the Society for Historical Archaeology session for which a draft of this paper was
prepared and to contribute to this volume. They along with Douglas Appler also provided helpful
comments on this paper. We also thank David Cuming and Rebecca Sciarra for their help in
clarifying certain Ontario planning issues. Shady Abbas prepared the location of archaeological
management plans and archaeological potential maps.
References
ASI (Archaeological Services Inc.). (2008). Report on the stage 3-4 salvage excavation of the
Alexandra site (AkGt-53), Draft plan of subdivision SC-T20000001 (55T-00601), Geographic
township of Scarborough, now in the City of Toronto, Ontario.
ASI (Archaeological Services Inc.). (2012). Stage 4 mitigative excavation of the Bishop’s Block
site (AjGu-49), 180-188 University Avenue, Site plan application 05 152737 STE 20 OZ, City
of Toronto, Ontario.
ASI (Archaeological Services Inc.). (2015a). Archaeological resource management plan, City of
Toronto, Technical report—Aboriginal archaeological potential model. Report on file,
Heritage Preservation Services, City of Toronto, ON.
ASI (Archaeological Services Inc.). (2015b). Archaeological resource management plan, City of
Toronto, Technical report—EuroCanadian potential model. Report on file, Heritage
Preservation Services, City of Toronto, ON.
ASI (Archaeological Services Inc.). (2015c). Archaeological resource management plan, City of
Toronto, Planning Report. Report on file, Heritage Preservation Services, City of Toronto, ON.
Coleman, D., & Williamson, R. F. (1994). Landscapes past to landscapes future: Planning for
archaeological resources. In R. I. MacDonald (Ed.), Great Lakes archaeology and paleoe-
cology: Exploring interdisciplinary initiatives for the nineties (pp. 61–80). Waterloo, ON:
Quaternary Sciences Institute Publication No. 10.
Dieterman, F., & Williamson, R. F. (2001). Government on fire: The history and archaeology of
upper Canada’s first parliament buildings. Toronto, ON: eastendbooks.
Environics Institute. (2010). Urban aboriginal peoples study, Toronto Report. Scarborough, ON:
The Interprovincial Group.
Linden, S. B. (2007). Report of the Ipperwash inquiry. Toronto, ON: Publications Ontario.
Nicholson, B., Pokotylo, D., & Williamson, R. F. (Eds.). (1996). Report of the Canadian
Archaeological Association Aboriginal Heritage Committee, Statement of principles for ethical
conduct pertaining to aboriginal heritage. Canadian Archaeological Association.
Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing. (2005). Places to grow (Ongoing program).
Retrieved from https://www.placestogrow.ca/index.php. Accessed February 11, 2015.
Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing. (2014). Provincial Policy Statement.
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11, 2015.
Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport. (2011a). Standards and guidelines for consultant
Archaeologists. Retrieved from http://www.mtc.gov.on.ca/en/publications/SG_2010.pdf.
Accessed February 11, 2015.
Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport. (2011b). Engaging aboriginal communities.
Retrieved from http://www.mtc.gov.on.ca/en/publications/AbEngageBulletin.pdf. Accessed
February 11, 2015.
Ontario Ministry of Transportation. (2006). Environmental reference for highway design (Part of
the environmental standards and practices). Ministry of Transportation, Toronto, ON.
Williamson, R. F. (2010). Planning for Ontario’s archaeological past: Accomplishments and
continuing challenges. Revista de Arqueologia Americana, 28, 1–45 (Mexico City, Mexico:
Pan-American Institute of Geography and History).
Williamson, R. F., & Pfeiffer, S. (Eds.). (2003). Bones of the ancestors: The archaeology and
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Gatineau, Quebec: National Museum of Civilization.
York Region. (2014). Bylaw No. 2014-13, Official Plan Amendment No. 6. Retrieved from http://
www.york.ca/wps/wcm/connect/yorkpublic/a7860fb9-615e-48b3-bb7d-0aab55da0745/2014-
13.pdf?MOD=AJPERES. Accessed February 21, 2015.
Chapter 6
Under the Old Stones of Kingston,
Ontario: The City of Kingston
Archaeological Master Planning Process
(1987–2011)
Marcus R. Létourneau
Introduction
While the City of Kingston (Ontario, Canada) is known in Canada for its architec-
tural heritage, it also has significant archaeological resources that require consci-
entious management. In addition to over 8000 years of FNMI1 archaeology,
Kingston is one of the oldest European settlements in Canada, dating to the 1673
establishment of Fort Frontenac. Within the Province of Ontario (Canada), archae-
ology is a matter of provincial interest. However, the approval agents for most
planning works are local municipalities. In response to provincial requirements, the
Corporation of the City of Kingston (Ontario), drawing upon past archaeological
initiatives, embarked on a multiyear archaeological planning project starting in 2005
that was designed to integrate archaeology into not only the land-use and heritage
conservation approval processes, but also broader municipal operations. The project
resulted in the development of new policies, bylaws, and an Archaeological Master
Plan (completed 2010); new municipal processes; and a draft Urgent Archaeological
Protocol. However, there were also a number of challenges to the project that
illustrate issues related to integrating archaeology into municipal policies and pro-
cesses. Still, the process served as a catalyst for new archaeological discoveries
important to the Kingston community and to the province.
1
FNMI (First Nations, Métis, and Inuit) has been used in this work as a more inclusive term to
identify Canada’s aboriginal community including formally recognized First Nations communities,
the Inuit, the Métis, and individuals not formally affiliated with a particular community.
M.R. Létourneau (&)

Department of Planning and Geography, Queen’s University at Kingston, Kingston, Canada
M.R. Létourneau
Letourneau Heritage Consulting, Inc., 347 McEwen Dr, Kingston, ON K7M 3W4, Canada

92 M.R. Létourneau
Municipal Planning and Archaeology
The local land-use planning process is a critical juncture for the identification and
protection of archaeological resources. Planners and archaeologists have long recog-
nized the interrelationship between archaeology and the land-use planning process
(Castillo and Menéndez 2014; Keers et al. 2011; The Scottish Government 2011; Seip
2006; Güçer 2004; ‘Archaeology’ 2000; Ross 1996; Zukowsky 1983). Scholars such
as Lipe (2012) have identified the need for archaeologists to provide insight into the
land-use planning process on the potential impact of surface disturbance on archae-
ological resources, while others, such as Zukowsky (1983) and Dulaunany (1987),
have identified planners as key agents with specialized knowledge that are able to
understand the risks associated with land-use changes and development processes.
Both Sullivan (2012) and Martha Demas (2012), when considering planning in its
broadest sense, identified the importance of practical and engaged planning for the
conservation of archaeological resources. This is particularly the case in the
post-World War II era with changes in the scale and intensity of development (Trotzig
1987). The planning process can result in significant impacts on archaeological
resources, which are inherently fragile and non-renewable resources (Ministry of
Environment—Northern Ireland 1999). Within Ontario, it is estimated that between
1951 and 1991, over 8000 archaeological sites were destroyed within the Greater
Toronto Area alone (Ministry of Attorney General 2007; Coleman and Williamson
1994). Of these 8000 sites, it is estimated that approximately 25% represented sig-
nificant archaeological resources (Ministry of Attorney General 2007). Ultimately,
there is a need to integrate archaeological considerations into the land-use planning
process through ongoing dialogue among archaeologists and planners; this requires
understanding the scope and limitations of each other’s profession (Dulaunany 1987;
Regina and Querrien 2012).
However, there are currently many challenges to the effective integration of
archaeology into municipal land-use planning. Strategic approaches for archaeo-
logical resources conservation require a more holistic approach that is often
undertaken in contemporary land-use planning practice (Caitlin 2005). In addition,
as King et al. (2011) found in their analysis of British Columbia municipalities,
although local governments are well positioned to bridge the various publics they
represent, there are often very divergent perspectives and understandings about
archaeology and the archaeological process. Further, in the absence of preexisting
knowledge about archaeological resources, there are often limited tools available to
municipal planners (Ross 1996). Municipal planners also work within established
frameworks that may not prioritize the protection of cultural heritage or lack basic
inventory information about cultural heritage resources in their jurisdiction resulting
in reactive decision making. This can be further complicated if there are questions
about jurisdiction and authority (Keers et al. 2011) As RESCUE, The British
Archaeological Trust (2012), noted in its analysis of changes to planning legislation
in Britain, municipal planners require particular skills and training to enable them to
make appropriate decisions:
6 Under the Old Stones of Kingston, Ontario: The City of Kingston … 93
How far heritage concerns can be properly addressed during the planning process is not
simply dependent upon having policies in place that require it to be, however. It also
depends upon an appropriate knowledge base and professional expertise being available to
the appropriate authorities to allow it to be taken into proper account (p. 11).
This is echoed by Ferris (2002), who argues that the existing process in Ontario
often results in non-specialists having the responsibility to identify, implement, and
defend archaeological requirements. Lastly, although the benefits of a positive
working relationship between the two disciplines have been repeatedly identified,
they often work apart (Güçer 2004). Nonetheless, there are municipalities in both
Canada and the USA that have actively sought to integrate archaeology into
municipal operations (Appler 2012, 2013; Williamson 2010; Williamson et al.
2010; Seip 2006; Muller 2007; Poulton 1986). Further, it has been recognized that
municipal archaeology programs enable the active engagement of local residents in
the archaeological and planning processes (Appler 2012).
The Ontario Context
Within Canada, under the Constitution Act 1867–1982, planning and heritage are
generally considered provincial matters. Within Ontario, the identification and protection
of archaeological resources is a matter of provincial interest and is a requirement under a
number of provincial acts regarding planning, heritage conservation, human remains,
environmental assessments, energy development, and aggregate resource extraction.
Ontario has developed some of the most progressive policy and legislation for the
identification and protection of cultural heritage resources, and municipalities have
specific obligations to fulfill (Williamson 2010; Williamson et al. 2010; Pearce 1990).
Archaeological management plans have been used within Ontario for over 25 years.
In the 1980s, the Province of Ontario actively encouraged municipalities to develop
archaeological management plans as a tool to assist with the identification, evalu-
ation, and protection of archaeological resources (Wilson and Horne 1995). At the
time, the Ministry of Culture and Communications had funding to assist with the
process; as a direct result, a number of municipalities, including London, Vaughan,
Markham, Walpole Island, and the Regional Municipality of Waterloo, engaged
with the process.2 However, with the loss of funding in the 1990s, despite Ministry
statements regarding the value of such plans, few municipalities undertook the
process (Ministry of Culture 1997).
2
The ministry responsible for archaeology and heritage has undergone a number of name changes
since 1975. These have included: Culture and Recreation (1975–1982); Citizenship and Culture
(1982–1987); Culture and Communications (1987–1993); Culture, Tourism, and Recreation
(1993–1995); Citizenship, Culture and Recreation (1995–2001); Culture, Tourism and Recreation
(2001–2002); Culture (2002–2010); Tourism and Culture (2010–2011); and Tourism, Culture, and
Sport (2011–Present). For the purpose of this work, any references to the Ministry (including
publications) will use the name used at the time.
94 M.R. Létourneau
In 2005, there were significant changes to the Provincial Policy Statement (is-
sued under the provincial Planning Act) and the Ontario Heritage Act that shifted
the milieu for the protection of cultural heritage resources in the province. In
particular, the 2005 Provincial Policy Statement mandated that development and
site alteration must take into account both known archaeological resources and
areas of archaeological potential. As the policy stated:
2.6.2 Development and site alteration shall only be permitted on lands containing
archaeological resources or areas of archaeological potential if the significant archaeolog-
ical resources have been conserved by removal and documentation, or by preservation on
site. Where significant archaeological resources must be preserved on site, only develop-
ment and site alteration which maintain the heritage integrity of the site may be permitted.
As the Ministry of Culture noted in 2006, this change required municipalities to

better integrate archaeological conservation into their planning processes (Ministry
of Culture 2006).
The 2005 Provincial Policy Statement was reinforced by the 2007 Ipperwash
Inquiry Findings. The Ipperwash Inquiry was established by the Government of
Ontario in 2003 to investigate the death of Dudley George, a First Nations protester
who was killed during a 1995 protest at Ipperwash Provincial Park (Ministry of the
Attorney General 2007). The Inquiry Report specifically highlighted the importance of
archaeology, and archaeological management plans, to government decision making.
In particular, archaeological management plans were identified as an important pre-
dictive tool; however, the report also noted that the effectiveness of such plans is
contingent on their active implementation (Ministry of the Attorney General 2007).
The 2007 Ipperwash Inquiry also highlighted the dangers of oversimplifying
FNMI notions of sacredness and heritage. Further, it reinforced the importance of
FNMI’s engagement in the process:
[E]xperience has shown that Aboriginal burial and heritage sites can be identified in the
appropriate circumstances if First Nations are actively and meaningfully involved in the
planning and development process. Traditional knowledge is the most important source of
information about the location or nature of Aboriginal burial and heritage sites currently
used in living memory. For older sites, archaeology is an important supplement to tradi-
tional beliefs and understandings. (Ministry of Attorney General 2007, pp. 135–136)
This echoes the findings of Sullivan (2012), who argued that there is a danger of
‘heritocrats’ (p. 642) appropriating minority or indigenous cultural heritage.
This provincial framework was accentuated in 2014 with the issuance of a new
Provincial Policy Statement that introduced more stringent language requiring the
conservation of archaeological resources and introduced new policies recom-
mending the development of archaeological management plans and aboriginal
consultation (Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing 2014). This document
echoed a 2010 publication produced by the Ministry of Tourism, Culture, and Sport
that identified archaeological management plans as an important tool for ensuring
the conservation of archaeological resources and a means to ensure compliance
with provincial legislation and policy (Ministry of Tourism, Culture, and Sport
2010). Ultimately, within the Ontario context, there is an increasingly litigious
environment resulting in the onus resting with municipal decision makers and
planners to be aware of all lands containing archaeological resources or areas of
archaeological potential. However, within the Ontario context, the responsibility for
paying for the archaeological work is the responsibility of the property owner.
Indeed, despite this onus resting with municipalities, the archaeological pro-
fession is regulated in Ontario by the Ministry of Tourism Culture and Sport. An
archaeological license is required to excavate an archaeological site in Ontario, and
methodology is highly structured according to provincial standards and guidelines.
Although formally adopted on January 1, 2011, the Provincial Standards and
Guidelines for Consultant Archaeologists were developed over several years, and
prior to their adoption, archaeologists were encouraged to ensure that their
archaeological assessments conformed (Ministry of Tourism, Culture, and Sport
2011; Ferris 2007). All archaeological assessments undertaken within Ontario are
submitted to the Ministry and municipalities may or may not receive copies of
assessments undertaken within their boundaries. Within Ontario, archaeological
assessments are divided into four stages:
Stage 1: Background Study and Property Inspection: At this stage an archaeologist
determines whether there is potential for archaeological sites on the property. A Stage 2
assessment is required when archaeological potential is identified.
Stage 2: Property Assessment: At this stage, an archaeologist surveys the land to identify
archaeological resources on the property being developed. The archaeologist uses this stage
to determine whether any archaeological resources found are of sufficient cultural heritage
value or interest to require Stage 3 assessment.
Stage 3: Site-specific Assessment: This stage is used to determines the size of an archae-
ological site, evaluate its cultural heritage value or interest and, where necessary, makes
recommendations for Stage 4 mitigation strategies.
Stage 4: Mitigation of Development Impacts: This stage involves implementing conser-
vation strategies for archaeological sites that are of cultural heritage value or interest
(Ministry of Tourism, Culture, and Sport 2013).
The licensed archaeologist also is responsible for the safekeeping of all artifact
collections recovered from fieldwork; other than Sustainable Archaeology (a
repository developed from collaboration between the University of Western Ontario
and McMaster University), there is no provincial repository.3 The transfer of arti-
facts to another entity (such as a municipality) is only possible under specific
circumstances. As a result, artifacts are often removed from the municipality in
which excavations occurred. Thus, what has resulted from this structure is a dis-
juncture between those responsible for ensuring that municipal decisions are con-
sistent with provincial archaeological requirements and the archaeologists who
undertake the archaeological work.
3
For more information in Sustainable Archaeology, please see their Web site at http://
sustainablearchaeology.org/.
96 M.R. Létourneau
Placing Kingston
Located at the confluence of Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence River, and the
Cataraqui River, the City of Kingston has been the site of human activity for over
8000 years, and continuous human habitation of the Cataraqui River Basin for the
past 3000 years (Fig. 6.1) (Williamson et al. 2010).4 However, although several
small prehistoric and post-contact aboriginal settlement sites and seasonal camps
have been found (including the Arbour Ridge Site), the paucity of the soils in the
area appears to have limited the size and purpose of these settlements with many
showing evidence of use as seasonal fishing and hunting centers (Williamson et al.
2010; Adams 1986, 2003, 2006). Indeed, as Adams (2006) has noted, despite
ongoing archaeological work in the City, there is still a relatively poor under-
standing of the prehistory of the area. Nevertheless, it was the presence of First
Peoples in the area of Kingston that attracted European interest, and it became a
focus of early trade (Willes 2014; Osborne and Swainson 2011; Williamson et al.
2010; Burleigh 1973, 1979; Preston and LaMontagne 1958).
By the late seventeenth century, the St. Lawrence–Lake Ontario route was
already a well-established corridor into the interior of North America (Osborne and
Swainson 2011; Williamson et al. 2010). In 1673, Governor Louis de Buade, Count
Frontenac chose the site as the location for the new fort. Although primarily
established for the purpose of trade and maintaining a military presence, the fort
supported some small-scale agricultural activities with several seigneurial estates in
the area. In August 1758, British troops serving under Lieutenant Colonel John
Bradstreet captured the fort following a three day siege, and the area came under
British rule (Bradstreet 1759).
The American War of Independence had a significant impact on the area sur-
rounding Kingston. Immediately after the war, the British government specifically
identified the north shore of Lake Ontario as a resettlement area and, in 1783,
selected the former site of Fort Frontenac as the site of a regional town (Willes
2014; Osborne and Swainson 2011). The new community quickly became one of
the largest in Canada and served as a hub for both government and commerce
(Osborne and Swainson 2011). Kingston was also one of the few communities to
have a permanent military garrison at this time; in addition to rebuilding Fort
Frontenac, the British forces established a naval dockyard across the river on a
peninsula named Point Frederick (Fig. 6.2).
By the 1840s, Kingston was still an important in stitutional town. This was rein-
forced by the construction of Kingston Penitentiary in 1833–1834. The City’s
fortunes were further bolstered by the establishment of the Province of Canada in
1840. Following the loss of the capital in 1843, the community declined. Yet, by
4
For a more detailed discussion on the City of Kingston’s history, there are a number of valuable
sources including: Willes 2014; Osborne and Swainson 2011; McKendry 1995; Patterson 1989;
Errington 1988; Patterson 1985; Tulchinsky 1976; Preston 1959; Preston and LaMontagne 1958;
and the Kingston Historical Society’s publication Historic Kingston (1953 to present).
Fig. 6.1 The City of Kingston is located at the confluence of Lake Ontario, the St. Lawrence
River, and the Cataraqui River
Fig. 6.2 James Peachy. c. 1783. A South East View of Cataraqui [Kingston] (Courtesy of
Toronto Reference Library. Accession No. JRR 1355 Cab IV.)
the 1850s, Kingston re-emerged as a regional center for transhipping and manu-
facturing (McKendry 1995). In 1856, the Grand Trunk Railway arrived in
Kingston, linking it to other major centers to the east; by 1860, a spur line was
constructed to link the Grand Trunk mainline to the waterfront (Smithson 2000). In
the 1860s, Kingston boasted industrial enterprises such as breweries; foundries;
98 M.R. Létourneau
Fig. 6.3 Kingston Waterfront. c. 1919. (Courtesy of Archives of Ontario. Accession

No. C 285-1-0-0-327)
various mills; and shipyards (Osborne and Swainson 2011; Warmington 2002). The
Second World War saw an expansion of its manufacturing enterprises including the
local shipyards; the opening of a new Aluminum Company of Canada (ALCAN)
plant that employed over 700 people; and the opening of a new Canadian Industries
Limited (DuPont) nylon plant. Amalgamation of the old City of Kingston with the
neighboring Pittsburgh and Kingston Townships in 1998 greatly expanded the size
of the City proper (Fig. 6.4). Today, the City of Kingston, with a population of
approximately 123,000 people, remains dominated by the service and public sector
industries, although more recently there have been initiatives to develop it as a
leader in the cultural and knowledge economies (Fig. 6.3).
Kingston Archaeology
With such a complex prehistorical and historical record, it is perhaps surprising that
formal archaeological activities in Kingston were relatively late compared to
neighboring areas. Indeed, while the community is known for its architectural
heritage, archaeology was not formally undertaken until the 1930s (McKendry
Fig. 6.4 The boundaries of Kingston before the 1998 amalgamation of the old City of Kingston
with the neighboring Pittsburgh and Kingston Townships
1995; Angus 1966, 1971).5 While archaeological finds were discovered throughout
Kingston’s history, the first exploratory archaeological excavations in Kingston
were undertaken at Fort Frontenac in 1937–1938 by Hagarty (1953) and in 1952 by
Brigadier-General (later Major-General) Kitching (1953). These works remain
exposed within today’s Fort Frontenac as a visual reminder of the site’s past
(Williamson et al. 2010; Bazely 2001; Cataraqui Archaeological Research
Foundation 1988) (Fig. 6.5). However, it was the discovery site of human remains
in the western part of Kingston in 1949 that became the City’s first formal exca-
vation. While grading a hill, a homeowner discovered two skeletons covered with
red ocher (Williamson et al. 2010). Dr. William Ritchie, State Archaeologist for the
New York State Museum and Science Service, spent four days investigating the site
in 1952 (Williamson et al. 2010; Ritchie 1955) (Fig. 6.6). A contemporary to
Ritchie, James Pendergast undertook test excavations of the Kingston Outer Station
Site (BbGc-2) in 1952 and 1953. In 1961, Pendergast collected material from the
Treasure Island site (BbGc-4), a campsite situated on an island in the St. Lawrence
River at the mouth of Abbey Dawn Creek on the eastern end of the City. In 1968,
under the auspices of Lt.-Col. P.T. Nation, works were undertaken at the circa 1812
Fort Frederick blockhouse (Williamson et al. 2010; Berry 2003). In the 1970s, the
National Historic Parks and Sites Branch of Indian and Northern Affairs, Canada
5
For a more detailed discussion of Kingston’s archaeological record, see the two volume 2010 City
of Kingston Master Plan (Williamson et al. 2010) and the four volume Archaeological Master Plan
prepared by the Cataraqui Archaeological Research Foundation (CARF) 1988–1990.
100 M.R. Létourneau
Fig. 6.5 Reconstructed remains of the historic Fort Frontenac located within today’s fort
(Photograph by M.R. Létourneau, 2007)
Fig. 6.6 William Ritchie’s archaeological excavation. 1952 (Courtesy of New York State
Museum Accession No. A1952-04I-002S)
(now Parks Canada), carried out several archaeological excavations including at

Kingston Market Shoal Martello Tower (1972) and Bellevue House National
Historic Park—former home of Prime Minister John A. Macdonald (1979) (CARF
1988). However, it was several developments in the early 1980s that served to
highlight Kingston’s archaeological past.
Kingston’s Archaeological Master Plans
The 1980s was a period of significant archaeological research within Kingston.

Among the major excavations were the Kingston Harbourfront Project (BbGc-7)
(September to December 1980); excavations at Fort Frontenac (1982–1984; 1987);
the Frontenac Village site (BbGc-11) (1984); and the Bajus Brewery site (BbGc-12)
(1985). As Bazely (2001) notes, many of these early projects were salvage or rescue
excavations; in the absence of clear requirements mandating that archaeological
work be undertaken, funding often came from government sources and heritage
foundations. Many of these projects were pilot projects within the province and
helped to inform the development of province practices. In July 1981, Preserve Our
Wrecks Kingston, a local organization dedicated to the conservation of marine
archaeological resources, was established (Preserve our Wrecks, 2012). In 1982,
W. Bruce Stewart completed a M.A. Thesis on the Kingston Harbourfront Site at
Wilfrid Laurier University, and in 1983, Ron Zukowsky completed a Master’s
report in planning on the development of archaeological master planning using
Kingston as a template (Zukowsky 1983; Stewart 1982). In 1987, the Cataraqui
Archaeological Research Foundation, a local research foundation that had been
established in 1983, was commissioned by the City of Kingston to develop an
Archaeological Master Plan for the old City of Kingston. As Williamson et al.
(2010) note, the project was significant for Kingston:
In the course of this project, 35 properties were assessed within the City, the majority of
which pertained to the historic Euro-Canadian occupation. These investigations, which are
detailed in the Stage II report of the first Kingston Archaeological Master Plan study,
yielded further information on two previously registered archaeological sites, four new
significant archaeological sites, fourteen properties for which further assessment was rec-
ommended prior to any proposed land development, and fifteen properties for which no
further archaeological concern was recommended (p. 36).
While the Plan was never formally adopted, it did provide significant insight into
the history and archaeology of Kingston, and many of its principles were integrated
into the City’s Official Plan. Shortly after this process, the neighboring Kingston
Township (now amalgamated with the City of Kingston) adopted a heritage strategy
to augment its Official Plan in 1993. This strategy contained a broad definition of
cultural heritage resources and included specific provisions for the conservation of
archaeological resources such as the development of an Archaeological Master Plan
(Township of Kingston 1993). The former Pittsburgh Township (which was also
amalgamated in 1998) also had specific provisions for the protection of
archaeological resources in its Official Plan as well as the 1992 Barriefield Heritage
Conservation District Plan. Since the 1990s, a considerable amount of historic
archaeology has been carried out throughout the City and its environs, usually in
response to Planning Act and environmental assessment requirements. However,
following amalgamation in 1998, there was no concerted policy or approach from
the whole of the amalgamated City of Kingston, and archaeology was being
addressed according to the existing policies for three former municipalities. By
2005, with the changes in provincial legislation and policy, the City recognized that
a more comprehensive and consistent strategy was required.
The development of an Archaeological Management Plan must be understood as
a process requiring more than just the development of a study and plan; it requires a
shift in approach and the development of tools to facilitate effective decision
making. In 2010, Ontario’s Ministry of Tourism, Culture, and Sport published an
information guide to archaeological management planning. Within this document,
the Ministry identified the goal of archaeological management planning to:
[I]nventory, classify and map significant archaeological resources and provide direction for
their appropriate assessment and protection, as required. There are also conservation
policies and procedures that are developed as part of an AMP that can be integrated into the
municipal Official Plan and other municipal strategic documents (Ministry of Tourism,
Culture, and Sport 2010).
However, this statement belies the challenges associated with such a plan’s
development and implementation. As Ron Williamson argues (Williamson 2010;
Williamson et al. 2010), one of the values of an archaeological management plan is
its development of predictive models specific to a particular context. Indeed, the
understanding of a particular milieu in which one wants to develop and implement
an archaeological management plan requires care and diligence. Kingston’s
Archaeological Master Plan process revealed some of the issues and challenges of
such projects and also provided key lessons for future projects.
The 2010 City of Kingston Archaeological Master Plan’s origins stemmed from
a February 2005 meeting of Kingston’s municipal heritage committee, where a
discussion identified the need to consider archaeology more systematically. As
noted although the City of Kingston amalgamated in 1998, in 2005 there were no
consolidated heritage policies for the City; each of the three former municipalities
still had their own heritage policies resulting in tremendous variations in how (and
if) archaeology was addressed. The motion from the heritage committee meeting
resulted in budget funding for the project. In 2006, Archaeological Services Inc,
supported by a local heritage planning firm, Bray Heritage, was retained. From the
outset, the project had three main objectives:
1. The compilation of inventories of registered and unregistered archaeological
sites within the City and the preparation of an overview of the area’s settlement
history as it may be expected to pertain to archaeological resources;
2. The development of an archaeological site potential model, based on known site
locations, past and present land uses, and environmental and cultural–historical
data; and,
3. A review of the current federal, provincial, and municipal planning and man-
agement guidelines for archaeological resources, as well as the identification of
a new recommended management strategy for known and potential archaeo-
logical resources within the City.
The Archaeological Master Plan was intended to be a key reference document
for planning decisions (including public works and infrastructure renewal projects);
culture and tourism policies (including the City’s Cultural Plan which was in
development); and a consideration in the City’s economic development models
(City of Kingston 2010a).
However, early in the process it was recognized that the development of the Plan
alone was insufficient. In May 2006, as part of the project’s initiation, several
actions were undertaken to facilitate the development of a culture of archaeological
conservation (City of Kingston 2006a). These included the following:
• Formally adopting the Ministry of Culture’s checklist for archaeological
potential as the standard interim criteria against which all planning applications,
including applications to the Kingston Municipal Heritage Committee and the
Committee of Adjustment, were to be evaluated;
• The development of new standard conditions concerning unexpected archaeo-
logical discoveries to be included in all planning applications for all properties
within the City of Kingston for which an archaeological assessment is not
required;
• The establishment for Legal Deposit for Archaeological Assessments under-
taken within the City6;
• The repeal of several outdated bylaws that were replaced with a new bylaw to
regulate the discovery of archaeological resources on City of Kingston property;
and
• The development of new confidentiality protocols.
All of these actions were necessary to help create a culture of archaeological
conservation within the City. Prior to its adoption, the provincial checklist was only
used intermittently and inconsistently by City staff; through the formal Council
adoption, there was a clear Council directive that it was to be used, providing the
necessary justification to both staff and community members. Standard Planning
clauses were developed to replace outdated statements and to ensure that there was
some direction in place for unexpected archaeological discoveries. The Legal
Deposit, a Kingston innovation, was identified as necessary as detailed archaeo-
logical site data were not shared with the City by the Ministry of Culture. Although
the City had a data sharing agreement in place with the Ministry, the Ministry only
6
The “Legal Deposit” bylaw required that copies of all archaeological assessments undertaken
within the City be provided to the City’s Heritage Planners.
provided the geographic locations of registered archaeological sites7; information

concerning areas that were assessed and where nothing was found and detailed
information on registered archaeological sites was not provided. With the provincial
obligations stemming from the Planning Act, particularly the changes to the 2005
Provincial Policy Statement, City staff were in a position of having to be respon-
sible for ensuring the protection of archaeological resources without always having
the required data. As a result, there were several duplicate studies prepared or
requested as City staff was not aware that sites had already been assessed and were
under provincial review. As part of the review of existing documentation and
regulations within the City, it was found that not only were some of the existing
regulations outdated, but also some were contrary to provincial law. Lastly, the
confidentiality protocols were specifically developed when it was discovered that
some City departments were posting archaeological assessments to the City’s
Webpage, including an assessment with detailed pictures of human remains.
The project was also designed to provide input into municipal initiatives, while the
formal Plan was in development. As a result, as the City was developing its first
consolidated Official Plan (2010b) and the Kingston Cultural Plan (2010c), the
information and policies that were being developed as part of the Archaeological
Master Plan were also integrated into these documents. The Official Plan includes a
specific section of policies for the conservation of archaeological resources, and the
Kingston Culture Plan specifically recognizes the importance of cultural heritage
resources (including archaeology) and the need to develop a broader cultural her-
itage strategy for the City that helps to better tell the stories of Kingston’s past (City
of Kingston 2010b, c). It also includes developing working relationships with a
number of internal City departments to help integrate archaeological considerations
into their operations and to assist with tendering guidelines.
Indeed, consultation and engagement, along with an understanding of the local
context, were central to the development of the Kingston Archaeological Master
Plan. The project included the development of a Technical Working Group that
included representatives from various City departments as well as relevant stake-
holders, including professional archaeologists, local heritage groups, and the local
development community. Complete drafts of the Plan were circulated to all local
archaeological firms as well as several FNMI feedback. There were two public
meetings, one open house, education sessions, and consultations. The completed
Plan was designed to reflect the local context and identified specific archaeologi-
cally sensitive areas and areas of non-interest, and helped to develop a refined
potential map for the City. Indeed, using the Ministry of Culture’s checklist, more
than 90% of the City was identified as having archaeological potential; the
community-specific mapping reduced this to approximately 66% (Williamson et al.
2010; City of Kingston 2010a). Still, this engagement and consultation with local
7
In Ontario, a registered archaeological site refers to any property that contains an artifact or any
other physical evidence of past human use or activity that is of cultural heritage value or interest
and that has been registered by the Province of Ontario in its database.
community members and FNMI communities, which was initially not expected,
resulted in an extended timeline for the project; in the end, Kingston City Council
adopted the Plan on May 18, 2010, nearly 5 years after the initial heritage com-
mittee meeting.
However, the formal adoption only demarked the next phase of archaeological
conservation for the City. A draft implementation plan was developed, and a series
of next steps were identified, including the completion of supporting studies, further
community engagement and education, and additional work with internal depart-
ments (Létourneau 2010). While many of the recommendations were already in
practice or implemented prior to the formal adoption of the plan, including the use
of the Plan’s archaeological potential mapping, several key future actions were
identified. These included the following:
• The development of a public awareness campaign;
• Preparing both an accurate and comprehensive inventory of the archaeological
collections currently held by museums and consulting archaeologists and a
guideline encouraging the curation of material from archaeological sites within
Kingston at local museums;
• The development of a Contingency Plan for the Protection of Archaeological
Resources in Urgent Situations;
• The preparation of additional studies/reports/protocols including a Marine
Archaeological Protocol; Aboriginal Protocol; an Internal Protocol for the
Discovery of Human Remains (in conjunction with Kingston Police); a Protocol
of Works on City Roads; and the exploration of creating a staff position for a
City of Kingston archaeologist; and,
• The development of Stage 1 Archaeological Assessments for Archaeologically
Sensitive Areas (ASAs).
ASI was retained to develop the Contingency Plan for the Protection of
Archaeological Resources in Urgent Situations. An innovative document it iden-
tified key actions for the accidental discovery of both human remains and
non-human archaeological resources; it was one of the first of kind in Canada to be
developed (Williamson et al. 2011). Unfortunately, the City, to date, has not chosen
to adopt it. City staff did develop several educational materials on the
Archaeological Master Plan and archaeology, but since 2011, public engagement on
archaeology through the planning department has been limited due to shifting
priorities and changing staff. Indeed, many of the identified initiatives have since
failed to materialize, including discussions around the possibility of hiring a City
archaeologist.
The project revealed a number of challenges with the development and imple-
mentation of archaeological management plans. These included the following:
• A persistent lack of understanding concerning legislated archaeological
requirements by both community members and staff;
• The persistence of a negative understanding of heritage/heritage planning and
archaeology as a process that prevents change rather than facilitating it;
• The inherent nature of municipal government and the political process that
results in changes in Council and municipal management over the duration of
any long-term project; and,
• Other heritage people.
This latter point was surprising to the project team. Nevertheless, some of the most
vocal objectors were members of Kingston’s heritage community. Some were
archaeologists who did not understand the archaeological master planning process.
Others were members of the local architectural conservation community who viewed
funding for archaeology as a direct threat to the funding for architectural conservation.
In the end, there were several important lessons gleaned from the Kingston
experience. The first, and perhaps one which was not as successful as hoped by the
project team, was the need for strong engagement. This was one of the main reasons
for the project’s delay. Several additional meetings and information sessions were
required to facilitate community and staff buy-in. It was not sufficient to state that
archaeology was a legal requirement; the process required a meaningful dialogue with,
and education for, both stakeholders and staff. Council, senior management, and
municipal decision makers (including planners) must be aware of and understand
archaeological requirements, the legislative/policy basis, and the implications of failure
to consider archaeology (legal and otherwise). They must also buy-into the process in
order to ensure long-term implementation and sustainability of archaeological con-
servation. Indeed, archaeology must be understood as an important part of not only the
planning process but all municipal operations. Assertions made during the project that
archaeology is only a heritage issue (not a planning issue) and that archaeology was
exclusively the heritage planners’ job revealed the need for continuous and meaningful
training. An archaeological management plan, in and of itself, is not enough to ensure
that archaeological issues will be adequately considered. There must be an imple-
mentation strategy, and there must be clear links made between other municipal
policies and the archaeological management plan. This includes succession planning
for key staff. In the Kingston case, the process also revealed the need to enhance
dialogue between the municipality and more senior levels of government. The
Kingston Archaeological Master Plan required several conversations with provincial
bodies to relay concerns around data sharing, the need for more context specific
policies, and issues with the provincial archaeological assessment review process.
Lastly, municipalities must be prepared to dedicate staff time to archaeology; if it is to
be treated as more than just a regulatory requirement, staff must be able to engage and
educate in a meaningful way with their colleagues and their community.
The Outer Station Site: The Benefits of Creative Planning
Planning tools have tremendous potential to ensure the conservation of archaeo-

logical sites; still, there are a variety of tools available that are not often considered
by planners or archaeologists. A solution developed for the Outer Station Site
(BbGc-2) illustrates one creative approach that was applied in Kingston as part of
the negotiations between a private developer and the City of Kingston.
Located on the western shore of the Cataraqui River, the Outer Station Site
(BbGc-2) was first excavated by James Pendergast in 1952–1953. This limited
work revealed the remains of a late Woodland, Pickering, fishing station (Heritage
Quest 1999). The site was revisited in the summer of 1988 as part of the 1980s
Kingston Archaeological Master Plan study which revealed a variety of material
dating over a period of 600–700 years covering an area of approximately 4000 m2
(Heritage Quest 1999). The site was re-examined in 1999, and additional material
was discovered.
In August 2006, in the early stages of the Master planning process, an appli-
cation was submitted for the development of the lands surrounding the Outer
Station Site. This project, which was originally designed to include 96 residential
townhouse units, was not the first application for the property, which had been the
subject of several planning applications since 2000 (City of Kingston 2006b). As
part of these previous applications, several archaeological assessments were
undertaken by Heritage Quest, now part of Golder Associates Ltd. These excava-
tions revealed the need for further work on the site, and as part of the rezoning
application, initially a Holding Provision was recommended by the author for the
section of the property where the Outer Station Site was located (City of Kingston
2006b).8 However, as the application proceeded, it was revealed that local FNMI
communities had expressed an interest in the site and, in particular, did not want to
see it disturbed through further excavation. The situation resulted in a potentially
challenging situation; while the typical archaeological practice at the time would
have included mitigating the entire site, the FNMI communities were not in
agreement with the provincial requirements.9 The issue had the potential to stall the
project as the excavation was required to remove the Holding Provision and allow
the project to proceed. Following discussions with the City’s Legal Services
Planning and Parks staff, an innovative solution using existing planning tools was
developed. To facilitate the development project, negotiations with the developer
resulted in the transfer of the archaeological site to City ownership through existing
parkland conveyance provisions as part of the Draft Plan of Subdivision
Application (City of Kingston 2007). In total, the proposed land conveyance
constituted approximately 16% of the total area of the property. This was under-
taken with the understanding that the City would be responsible for negotiations
with the local FNMI communities concerning the future of the archaeological site
8
A Holding Provision is a planning tool that is used when zoning bylaws or codes are amended.
This is done to delay development until a specific requirement, such as the provisions of local
municipal services, or measures mitigate negative impacts are in place. When development is
ready to occur and conditions are met, the holding provision is removed by an amending bylaw. In
Kingston, policies were put in place to enable using Holding Provisions for the protection of
cultural heritage resources.
9
Changes to archaeological requirements in Ontario since 2006 now necessitate engaging FNMI
communities during the archaeological process.
and that any lands conveyed to the City were not to be altered in any way. As part
of this process, the archaeological site was fenced. The development project was
also set back from the archaeological site which was (and continues to be) moni-
tored by a provincially licensed archaeologist to ensure that no work or unexpected
impacts occurred (or occurs) on the archaeological site. As part of this process, the
developer was also permitted an additional 20 townhouse units on the remainder of
the development site as part of the project redesign (City of Kingston 2007). This
solution enabled the developer to commence building while ensuring that this
important site remained under City auspices. As of 2015, the project has been
developed (by another development company who took over the project from the
initial developer), and talks are still occurring with local FNMI communities con-
cerning the future of the archaeological site.
The Artillery Park Project
Archaeological management planning must be understood as more than merely the

development of policy and operational frameworks; it is an important tool for the
identification, protection, and promotion of a community’s heritage. The archaeo-
logical management planning process can help to highlight key areas of interest
and, through community education, can facilitate innovative work. One such
example in Kingston is the Artillery Park Project.
As noted, the City of Kingston Archaeological Master Plan informed other
municipal initiatives. This includes the Kingston Culture Plan which included
specific recommendations for the development of new educational materials and
exhibits on Kingston history (City of Kingston 2010c). The Archaeological Master
Plan also served a key educational role in raising staff awareness on the importance
of archaeology.
The Artillery Park facility, located in the historic core of Kingston, is a major
community recreation facility with community pools and activity spaces. It is also
located on the site of a historic military facility founded during the War of 1812.
Located at the head of Barrack Street, the site contained its own parade ground, gun
sheds, forges, stables, barracks, and a residence for the commanding officer
(Williamson et al. 2010). Parts of grounds remain in military use, including the
Kingston Armouries, which is currently occupied by The Princess of Wales’ Own
Regiment. In 2012, the City of Kingston owned Artillery Park recreation facility,
which was originally constructed in the 1940s, was closed for extensive renova-
tions. As part of the work, an archaeological assessment was commissioned by the
City for the site; subsequent excavations uncovered approximately ten thousand
artifacts. Based on these discoveries, the City’s Director of Recreation and Leisure
Services approached the City’s Cultural Services Department (which oversees the
City’s museums) to discuss how the renovated recreational facility could integrate
these discoveries. The result was an exhibit entitled History beneath our feet:
Artillery Park (1800–2014) that was in place when the facility reopened in 2014
Fig. 6.7 Display panel from the Artillery Park History Beneath Our Feet Exhibit (Photograph by
M.R. Létourneau, 2015)
(Fig. 6.7). Specially designed exhibit cases were integrated into the building at the
design stage, and a long-term temporary installation was developed. The parking lot
of the facility also featured in situ markings showing the locations of the former
military building on the site. The project was viewed as a unique opportunity to
provide wider community access to Kingston’s history and archaeology in a
non-traditional (albeit extremely popular) venue while meeting regulatory
requirements. The process was also seen as contributing to the City’s efforts at
developing a culture of heritage conservation through the implementation of both
the Kingston Culture Plan and the City of Kingston Archaeological Management
Plan. Based on the success of the program, Cultural Services as of 2015 was
exploring the development of similar exhibitions in other facilities. However, this
project was challenged by existing provincial legislative requirements concerning
the deposition of artifacts with a licensed archaeologist. The municipality was
obligated to show that it was able to conserve the artifacts at a much higher standard
than the licensed archaeologist who had the items in storage. While the City was
ultimately able to achieve this requirement, it raised the question as to the ability of
other municipalities to meet them, and whether or not this requirement is beneficial.
If the aim of the provincial requirements is to ensure the protection and promotion
of archaeological resources, then ultimately there is still a need to determine how
source communities can better access their own heritage. Without it, there is a
danger that the heritage of many communities will remain in permanent storage.
Conclusions
Ultimately, the development of the 2010 City of Kingston Archaeological Master

Plan was a significant project that not only highlighted important aspects of
Kingston’s past, but also continues to serve as an important document for its future.
Indeed, the archaeological management planning process must be understood as
more than about planning and archaeology; it is about a community and how it
addresses change. In retrospect, while the stated objectives of the 2010
Archaeological Master Plan project were met, there remains, as in all things, areas
that merit reflection and reconsideration. The critical components of engagement
and education, taking into account local understanding and experiences, needed to
be one of the foremost considerations. Arguably, this was one of the weakest areas
of the project. While projects such as Artillery Park illustrate the benefits and
opportunities for innovative interpretation, there is a danger that archaeological
management plans (and more broadly heritage planning) are only seen as an
extension of land-use planning. In order to be successful, these plans must be
implemented broadly across municipal departments. Consideration must be given to
the practical and political barriers to success. As the Kingston experience demon-
strates, implementation efforts must broadly consider the available opportunities for
innovation and creativity. Nevertheless, often it is the responsibility of individuals
to ensure that the products of the archaeological management planning process are
implemented, and it is here that any process must start.
Acknowledgements I must thank several of my professional colleagues for their input during the
development of this work. In particular, Dr. Ron Williamson (ASI), Mr. Hugh Daechsel (Golder
Associates Ltd), Mr. Ben Holthof (Golder Associates Ltd), and Mr. Paul Robertson (City of
Kingston) all contributed in meaningful ways to its development. I must specifically thank Ron for
his efforts to encourage me to speak on my experiences. I must also thank audience members who
listened to previous versions of this work and provided valuable feedback in the session organized
by William Moss and Ron Williamson at the Canadian Archaeological Association Conference in
Montreal in 2012; at the Society for Historical Archaeology Conference in Quebec City in 2014;
and at the Ontario East Municipalities Conference in Kingston in 2014. This includes several of
my former colleagues from the City of Kingston. Any errors and omissions are my own.
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Chapter 7
Quebec City’s Archaeological Programme
and Provincial Cultural Heritage
Legislation
William Moss
Introduction: Quebec City
France first attempted to establish a colony in what is now Quebec City between
1541 and 1543 near the Iroquoian village of Stadacona, but it was not until 1608
that Samuel de Champlain founded an outpost at the narrowing of the St. Lawrence
River, known as Kebec to native Algonkians, that the seeds of a city were sown.
Quebec would grow into one of the major cities on the North American continent.
The city became the capital of New France, and following the independence of
England’s American colonies, the capital of British North America. It later became
the capital of Lower Canada and finally that of the province of Quebec. Situated at
the strategic entrance to the Great Lakes’ watershed, Quebec has been fortified
since its foundation and, until the beginning of the railroad era, it was a major port.
Indeed, in 1830, Quebec was the third most important port on the continent, after
New York and New Orleans. Champlain recognized the strategic importance of the
city he had founded, but he would be amazed to see how his frontier post has
changed over time. The inclusion of the city on the United Nations Educational,
Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)’s list of World Heritage Sites in
1985 would not have been the least of his surprises! (Fig. 7.1).
Quebec is now a city of 536,000 people in an urban region of 790,000 inhabitants;
it covers a territory of 463 km2 or 178 square miles (CMQ 2015). This territory
includes four historic districts defined by the province’s Cultural Heritage Act, which
together represents one-third of designated districts in the province. One of the four,
Old Town Quebec, is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage city, and it is one of two
such sites in Canada. The city is comprised of over twenty former village centres,
several going back to the first decades of the French colony in the New World. They
were subsumed by the modern city in a long series of annexations beginning in 1889,
W. Moss (&)
Ville de Québec, 295 Boulevard Charest Est, Québec, QC G1K 3G8, Canada

116 W. Moss
Fig. 7.1 Map of Quebec City and the four historic districts defined by the provincial Cultural
Heritage Act. (Graphics by André Tanguay; courtesy of the Ville de Québec.)
the most recent taking place in 2002. The city sits at the junction of the three major
geological regions of the north-eastern portion of the continent and has been the site of
succeeding biomes and physical environments during the Holocene. For these reasons
and many more, Quebec City has a particularly rich and varied heritage, to which
archaeology can and does attest regularly (Moss 1993; Moussette and Waselkov 2013,
pp. 217–257). In 1985, the City created a municipal archaeologist’s position, the first
in Canada. This position, which has moved through several departments within the
City, is fully embedded in the municipal administration and the team working under
the archaeologist’s direction is active on all fronts. The team itself is composed of
full-time regular and temporary as well as seasonal employees, depending on the scale
of operations from one season to another.
Numerous institutions are involved in research, site preservation and site inter-
pretation within the city. These include the federal government’s Parks Canada
Agency, the provincial government’s Ministère de la Culture et des
Communications (MCC) and its Commission de la Capitale-Nationale du Québec
(CCNQ), Université Laval and the municipal administration of the City of Quebec.
The City occupies a central position in this matrix, one reason being its direct
relations with citizens of every stripe, be they members of the corporate or private
sector, property developers or simple residents. Also, as is generally the case,
municipal administrations are the closest level of government to the population and
numerous individuals and associations are active participants in municipal pro-
cesses. The City adopted a general heritage policy recognizing the contribution of
7 Quebec City’s Archaeological Programme and Provincial Cultural … 117
archaeological heritage to the general economy (Ville de Québec 2007, p. 47), but it
has not adopted bylaws on the matter. The City has played an exceptionally active
role over the past quarter century and has had considerable success, particularly
through partnerships with different stakeholders. This chapter will examine several
of these partnerships and situate them in the context of recently adopted heritage
legislation that will change the stakes for decades to come.
Heritage Legislation and Approaches to Archaeology

in the Province of Quebec
Several analysts have defined a continuum of government-controlled versus

market-controlled archaeology (Demoule 2007; Willems 2008; Willems and van
den Dries 2007). Polar extremes of these two approaches are found in France and
Anglo-Saxon countries, respectively. The approaches applied in Canada and the
province of Quebec fall somewhere between the two.
In France, the Code du patrimoine was adopted in 2001 in order to implement
the prescripts of the Council of Europe’s Valletta Charter (1992), thus bringing
France to comply with a general European approach that obliges promoters to cover
the cost of archaeology on a preventive basis (Demoule 2007). The Code du
patrimoine defines developers’ financial and procedural responsibilities and
requires them to pay an archaeological levy on all large-scale property development
projects. The government’s National Institute for Preventive Archaeological
Research (INRAP) was created and charged with all preventive, development-led
archaeology in France. It is financed by the levy on property development in the
country. The Code du patrimoine was modified in 2004 to allow developers to
directly contract with free-market service providers (Demoule 2010).
Practice in the Anglo-Saxon world is somewhat different as archaeology relies
almost entirely on free-market service providers responding to development pro-
jects. In the USA, this process is generally development-led, as witnessed by
section 106 of the Historic Preservation Act (Peacock and Rafferty 2007). In the
UK, planning-led archaeology is the major source of archaeological activity though
it is under considerable pressure (Southport Group 2011).
In Canada, there is no overarching federal heritage legislation as heritage issues
come under provincial jurisdiction (Pokotylo and Mason 2010). Each province
adopts its own legislation and, consequently, defines its own approach to heritage
matters. Political objectives and programmes vary from province to province.
In the province of Quebec, renewed heritage legislation was adopted in 2011 and
came into effect in 2012. The new Cultural Heritage Act (National Assembly 2011)
replaces the 1972 Cultural Property Act (see MCC 2012b for a brief history of
heritage legislation in the province of Quebec). It imposes legal constraints on the
practice of archaeology–compulsory permits for archaeologists, obligation to
118 W. Moss
declare all discoveries, possibility of halting work on construction projects to

protect sites and vestiges and offers municipalities additional powers. It is inter-
esting to note that certain provisions of this legislation are renewed prescriptions of
the preceding Cultural Property Act, notably the provisions concerning permitting.
They are based on legislation enacted by France’s Vichy government in 1941 with
the intent of protecting archaeological heritage from the Nazi occupying power
(République française 1941; Karlsgod 2011, p. 296)! The 1941 Vichy legislation
was replaced in France by the Code du patrimoine in 2001.
The 1941 Vichy legislative framework was, paradoxically, maintained in Quebec’s
2012 Cultural Heritage Act. No provisions were introduced to define developers’
financial or procedural responsibilities. By not replacing this approach, Quebec rein-
forced its ambiguous position on the continuum of government-controlled versus
market-controlled archaeology. In Quebec, consultation with First Nations is done by
the MCC on a nation-to-nation basis. Individual archaeologists have no individual
obligation to consult First Nations other that prescribed by applicable codes of ethics
(see Canadian Archaeological Association 1996). It is also noteworthy that collections
and moveable heritage are treated differently in the province. Indeed, artefacts are the
property of the owner of the land where a site is found. This, too, is half-way between
the French model where the state is owner of all collections and that of another
Canadian province, Ontario, where the individual archaeologist is responsible for
collections generated by research carried out under his licence.
In short, the 2012 Cultural Heritage Act can trace its origins to
mid-twentieth-century French legislation. It did not adopt the later modifications to
its French model which led to the implementation of the Valetta-based approach
defined by the European Convention on the Protection of the Archaeological
Heritage (Council of Europe 1992) and now predominant in most European
countries. Nor did it adopt a compliance-driven approach as is now generally
practised in North America. As such, Quebec’s cultural heritage legislation is also
notably different from that of its Canadian neighbours such as Ontario (see
Williamson et al. this volume). The province of Quebec thus asserts its particular
cultural specificity within Canada through different facets of its archaeological
legislation.
The provincial Loi sur la qualité de l’environnement (Environment Quality Act),
administered by the Ministère du Développement durable, de l’Environnement et de
la Lutte contre les changements climatiques (MDDELCC), both defines and
enforces a development-led environmental assessment approach where project
proponents have the legal and financial responsibility to mitigate the impact of their
projects on archaeological resources. However, this Act does not often apply in
urban contexts (see MDDELCC 2015). In a similar manner, Quebec’s municipal
planning legislation, the Loi sur l’aménagement et l’urbanisme (Act Respecting
Land-Use Planning and Development) administered by the Ministère des Affaires
municipales et de l’Occupation du territoire, has no provisions concerning
archaeology (see MAMOT 2015).
In general—and insofar as urban archaeology is concerned—the Cultural
Property Act and the Cultural Heritage Act that replaced it in 2012 assure tight
control of archaeology within provincially designated historic districts. Once out-

side the limits of these districts, control rests largely on the shoulders of project
promoters and citizens who are obliged to declare any discovery of archaeological
sites and artefacts to the MCC. Developers, particularly state agencies such as
Hydro-Québec and the Ministère des Transports du Québec, have mostly adopted a
proactive methodology and carry out their projects in a manner similar to a
planning-led approach.
A general understanding of the place of archaeology in the Cultural Heritage Act is
required to fully understand the provisions that specifically concern municipalities (see
MCC 2012a, pp. 37–40 for a general description of the Act). In general, the Act allows
the government to designate historic persons, events and sites (Division II) and cul-
tural landscapes (Division III). Though designation does not afford any protection, it
does indicate that the tangible or intangible heritage element identified by this process
has collective importance. Individual properties may acquire a degree of protection by
being classified (Division IV), and districts can be declared heritage sites (Division V).
Archaeological sites and moveable objects, such as archaeological collections, can be
classified. A full division of the Act applies specifically to archaeology (Division VI).
Two general prescriptions apply to all citizens. Firstly, any person wishing to
undertake archaeological activities involving excavation or survey must obtain an
archaeological research permit from the provincial government (s. 68). A permit may
only be issued to qualified persons, and it is valid for one year; a report describing the
work carried out must be submitted in order to be eligible for another permit (s. 72).
Secondly, any person who discovers an archaeological property or site must inform
the Minister without delay, whether the discovery is made under the conditions of an
archaeological research permit or is a chance find (s. 74). These two provisions
provide the government with an important window of opportunity in that it may
subsequently undertake investigation of the find or halt work in order to undertake
investigation at the expense of the promoter (s. 76). Costs for research generated by
the discovery that led to the stoppage are assumed by the party responsible for the
excavations though no definition of the extent of costs or scale of projects is provided.
This is the only financial provision of the Act concerning archaeology. The approach
applied by the Act can safely be characterized as rescue archaeology in the purest
tradition, and it is merely an extension of the legislative prescriptions of the 1972
Cultural Properties Act.
The 2012 Act introduces new powers for municipalities that mirror the powers
held by the provincial government. These new powers will permit municipalities to
adopt an approvals-driven approach for specific parts of their territories on an
elective basis. Firstly, municipalities may adopt bylaws protecting archaeological
heritage resources: they may recognize sites within zones previously identified
within a planning programme (s. 127). This is analogous to the powers of desig-
nation held by the Province (s. 13). Municipalities may also issue orders to halt
work and carry out an archaeological evaluation where there is a perceived threat of
significant degradation to a property that may have heritage value (s. 148). This too
is analogous to the powers that may be exercised by the Province (s. 76). Finally,
municipalities may determine the circumstances in which a person who must obtain
120 W. Moss
a permit or authorization from the municipality is required to carry out archaeo-

logical excavations or surveys before carrying out a project in a zone of heritage
interest identified in the land-use planning and development plan in force in the
municipality’s territory (s. 150). This section, and this section alone, defines the
planning-driven aspects of the Act concerning archaeology.
As powers delegated to municipalities are accepted on an elective basis, their
implementation may be hindered. Indeed, the Act creates an uneven playing field in
that some municipalities may decide to implement heritage powers and others not.
Few financial responsibilities are clearly attributed to developers: promoters are
required to assume the cost of archaeology only if section 76 is applied by the
Province or if section 148 is applied by the municipality. There are no other explicit
financial directives in the new legislation. Finally, there is an overlap in provincial
and municipal powers; it is yet to be seen how this will play out in contentious
situations. No municipalities in the Province of Quebec have yet applied any of
these new powers.
In conclusion, despite the absence of explicit legislation requiring preventive
archaeology in most contexts and circumstances, there is now an expectation on the
part of the provincial government that municipalities will apply a
compliance-driven approach. Archéo-Québec (2012), a non-profit heritage associ-
ation, produced a guide to preventive archaeology with funding and guidance from
the MCC. This guide, Archéologie préventive. Guide pratique à l’intention des
municipalités du Québec, explicitly defines an approach similar to that developed
by France’s INRAP with the stated intention of counselling municipalities with no
in-house expertise in the art and science of archaeology. It is an articulate
expression of the MCC’s new expectations.
Archaeology and the Municipal Administration
Archaeology in the City of Quebec may be seen as a logical and noteworthy

extension of the province of Quebec’s distinctive approach to archaeological
practice! The City is probably unique insofar as it has developed an approach that is
substantively different from other models within Canada or even within the North
American continent. The City is particularly distinctive in the emphasis it puts on
developing and renewing knowledge of the city’s archaeological heritage, creating
attractive urban spaces through innovative placemaking and actively fostering
public education. These axes of development are expressed in the master plan,
L’avenir maintentant. Plan directeur d’aménagement et de développement, adopted
in 2005 following the amalgamation of thirteen municipalities into a new City of
Quebec administration in 2002 (Ville de Québec 2005, pp. 137–168). A frequently
used advertisement proclaiming Quebec City as the wellspring of archaeology in
the province of Quebec is an eloquent expression of the City’s recognition of the
importance of its archaeological heritage resources and its pride in them (Fig. 7.2).
Fig. 7.2 The City has put

considerable effort into
interpreting its archaeological
heritage for the general
public. This advertisement,
used in local newspapers and
regional heritage magazines,
proclaims Quebec City as the
wellspring of archaeology in
the Province of Quebec.
(Courtesy of the Ville de
Québec.)
122 W. Moss
General Approach
Quebec City—the geographic entity, as opposed to the political administration, the City
of Quebec—is characterized by a community of researchers working for a series of
important institutions: the City of Quebec, the Province of Quebec’s MCC and CCNQ
the federal government agency Parks Canada and Université Laval. Each organization
has its own mission and mandates, but their researchers have several things in common.
Apart from their appreciation of their city, they share the knowledge and the know-how
of their discipline as well as the expertise they have developed during their research
over the years. The federal government, represented by the Parks Canada Agency, has
spearheaded numerous projects on sites and around the city such as the Saint-Louis
Forts and Châteaux National Historic Site and the network of sites associated with the
fortifications of which it is largely the owner. The federal government owns several
other major properties in the city of Quebec which are not under the direct control of
Parks Canada, including the Defense Department’s Citadel, the Port Authority’s Old
Port and the National Battlefield Commission’s Plains of Abraham. Parks Canada may
act as a consultant for work carried out on these sites. The government of the province
of Quebec has been involved in several initiatives focused, for example, on
Champlain’s Habitation and the Place-Royale sector as a whole. Parks Canada’s
archaeological services were affected by wide-ranging cuts in 2012 (Society for
American Archaeology 2012). These cuts have affected functioning and programmes in
Quebec City and across the country but their full impact has yet to be measured. The
provincial government also works in partnership with other organizations such as the
CCNQ and the City of Quebec. The City, for its part, has undertaken research on
several major sites, such as the Séminaire de Québec, Îlot Hunt (or Hunt Block) and the
Îlot des Palais (or Intendant’s Palace). Université Laval has carried out research on a
number of sites in collaboration with the City in the context of the university’s annual
field school. This synergy has generated important results, the most recent example
being a roundup of research in the context of the 400th anniversary of the founding of
the city in 2008 (Moss 2009b). All of these sites are an important part of the regional
economy, which is largely based on tourism (ranking second after government).
The City administration itself has had an active archaeological programme since
the eve of the listing of the Old Town Historic District on the UNESCO World
Heritage Sites list in 1985, at which time it created a City Archaeologist’s position, the
first of its kind in Canada. The City has vigorously promoted a collaborative approach
in partnership with a number of institutional and corporate partners. The approach is
characterized by the concept of “vivre ensemble” or “living together”, which is fun-
damentally important in an urban context where archaeologists, town planners, pro-
moters and whole populations must live, work and advance into the future together.1
The most penetrating examples of this are the City’s long-standing collaborations with
the provincial government’s MCC and with Université Laval.
1
Dufay et al. (2014: 3) describe “vivre-ensemble” as: “Ce territoire si particulier, où se succèdent et
cohabitent des populations diverses, est par définition le siège du ‘vivre ensemble’”.
Under the Cultural Properties Act, which preceded the 2012 Cultural Heritage Act,
the bulk of the City’s actions was carried out within the terms of a series of memo-
randa of agreement concluded with the provincial MCC beginning in 1979. Known as
the Ententes sur le développement culturel, these long-term memoranda of agreement
(for five- or, more recently, three-year periods) covered a wide range of cultural and
heritage projects, including archaeological research and site interpretation. The ori-
entations and programmes were identified by each agreement, and projects were
elaborated through yearly, jointly approved programming. Costs were shared on a
50/50 basis between the provincial MCC and the City of Quebec. Though archaeology
was only a very small portion of each memorandum of agreement’s objectives and
concomitant budgets, the availability of funds guaranteed on an annual basis greatly
enhanced the City’s capacity for action. It also allowed development of new projects
and perspectives that went beyond the simple rescue of sites and data, contrary to what
often occurs in urban development projects.
Development projects for historic districts were submitted to the City Archaeologist
by the City’s planning department and the respective boroughs. The nature and scope
of research, site protection and site interpretation were negotiated with project pro-
moters by the City Archaeologist. Research was carried out by the City’s archaeo-
logical team or with private contractors mandated and funded by the City within the
annual budget of each Entente sur le développement culturel. Public utilities com-
panies, such as Hydro-Québec, are responsible for their respective projects within the
historic districts. Hydro-Québec has an active team of archaeologists who have
assured a strong presence in all the organization’s projects, be they inside the limits of
historic districts or not. Provincial government agencies, such as the CCNQ, are also
responsible for their projects. The CCNQ contracted with the City’s archaeological
team to carry out research and, more recently, has mounted research teams for specific
projects such as the well-known sixteenth-century Cartier-Roberval Site (Moss
2009b). All research was subject to permitting and quality control by the MCC under
provisions of provincial heritage legislation.
The City and Université Laval have been particularly close partners and have
worked together without interruption since 1982. They have concluded a series of
memoranda of agreement mirroring the Ententes sur le développement culturel
since 1985. These memoranda offer financial and technical support to the univer-
sity’s field school, which has been held on a municipal property since 1982
(Fig. 7.3), except for a brief period when it was held on the Hunt Block (Roy 2012).
This collaboration has notably produced a series of publications by Laval students
and City-mandated archaeologists in the series Les cahiers d’archéologie du
CÉLAT as well as in earlier series.2 Université Laval developed an ecosystemic
model for use by the City to orient research on major and minor sites in the context
of urban infrastructure programmes in an early agreement between the two orga-
nizations (L’Anglais 1994). This model is due for updating, but it has fostered
2
The CÉLAT’s web page provides a full list of these publications: www.celat.ulaval.ca/
recherches-2/publications/cahiers-darcheologie-du-celat/.
124 W. Moss
Fig. 7.3 The City of Quebec and Université Laval have collaborated on the university’s field
school since 1982. The Palais de l’intendant site, shown here, has undergone extensive research.
(Photograph courtesy of Université Laval.)
internal coherence amongst initially disparate small-scale projects in different parts

of the city (Moussette and Moss 2010). The City Archaeologist and the university’s
faculty responsible for the long-term agreements supporting the field school are
members of the CÉLAT, and their collaboration is fully congruent with the central
“vivre ensemble” concept for the CÉLAT’s research activities. The City programme
has obtained considerable scientific results. Examples of early research projects
carried out on private properties with the collaboration of owners include the
Séminaire de Québec (Moss 2005; Simoneau 2008a), the Anglican Cathedral
(Rouleau et al. 1998b) and the Auberge Saint-Antoine, also known as the Hunt
Block (Simoneau 2008b). General overviews of these and other projects can be
consulted in several publications (see Auger and Moss 2001, 2009b; Rouleau
2014). The university’s CÉLAT research centre adopted “vivre ensemble” as its
central research focus in 2009 (CÉLAT 2009; see also Moss 2009a).
Public Benefits
There have been many benefits to the community. One project in particular, the
Auberge Saint-Antoine hotel complex developed by a private owner in the heart of
the Old Town Historic District, has had considerable tourist benefits. Université
Fig. 7.4 The Auberge Saint-Antoine has archaeological interpretive modules throughout the
public and private parts of the hotel complex. Université Laval held its archaeological field school
on this property, the Hunt Block site, from 1993 to 1996. (Photograph by Victor Diaz Lamich;
courtesy of the Auberge Saint-Antoine.)
Laval held its field school on this site from 1992 to 1996 with the support of the
Entente de développement culturel. The university continued to participate in the
development of the project during the hotel’s expansion in 2000. Though this was
entirely a private sector initiative, both the City and the Province worked closely
with the developer to ensure the harmonious integration of the new construction
into the historic fabric of the Old Town. The very rich archaeological heritage of the
site was fully integrated into the design concept of the complex which is considered
as an archaeological hotel.3 Vestiges and interpretive displays are open to the
general public in several areas of the hotel such as the lobby, the conference zone,
the Artefact Café and hallways (Fig. 7.4). Each of the six floors in the complex is
associated with a period and an historical figure linked to the site. Special artefact
displays representing the appropriate period are placed in controlled-access portions
of the hotel, such as elevators and room-block corridors; custom-designed furniture
displays artefacts from the corresponding period in each room. A publication for the
general public prepared on the project (Lapointe 2007) complements several sci-
entific publications prepared on this site (Cloutier 2006; Rouleau et al. 1998a;
3
The hotel’s web page provides ample examples of this: www.saint-antoine.com/en/hotel.
126 W. Moss
Simoneau 2008a). The City has further contributed to this project by marking three
former states of the St. Lawrence River shoreline in the street pavement besides the
stabilized ruins of stone wharves from the eighteenth century. The Auberge
Saint-Antoine is routinely cited as an example of private–public collaboration for
archaeological heritage promotion in Quebec, and it can be seen as an innovative
fusion of placemaking and commercial development. Apart from a long series of
awards from the hotel industry (Auberge Saint-Antoine 2015), the Auberge Saint-
Antoine won the prestigious Heritage Canada The National Trust National
Achievement Award in 2008, notably “…for the restoration of its hotel and
museum, and its commitment to heritage conservation … to incorporate and display
the artefacts found on the site during the eight-year archeological dig. Used as a
cannon battery in wartime and a centre of merchant trade in peace time, the site,
known as Îlot Hunt, produced an array of artefacts that can now be seen in the
Auberge’s museum” (Heritage Canada The National Trust 2008).
Several other sites have been developed and interpreted for the public by the
City under the terms of the Ententes sur le développement culturel. Projects are
based on intensive research on each site, and they are developed as a part of a
general movement of placemaking and, more generally, public education. Several
municipal departments participate in these projects, particularly the Service de
l’aménagement et du développement urbain, the equivalent of a planning division,
and the Service de la culture which has a mandate to interpret the city’s rich
heritage for the public. The massive ruins of the church Notre-Dame-de-la-Foy in
Sainte-Foy, now the Parc de la Visitation Historical Site, have been stabilized and
are used for open-air concerts (Fig. 7.5). Another park, the Parc du Vieux-Passage
in the Limoilou district, contains a scaled-down reconstruction of a temporary
fortification, a bridgehead hastily constructed in 1759 to prevent the invading
British from crossing the Saint-Charles River and reaching the fortified Upper
Town. This reconstruction is Lower Town’s response to Upper Town’s citadel, and
it sets a contemporary heritage project squarely in the middle of well-known
sociological debates going back to the nineteenth century when Lower Town was
considered as being on the wrong side of the tracks! Another display module
interprets the results of excavations on the site of Royal shipyards and
nineteenth-century markets at the entrance of the Gare du Palais multimodal train
station, one of the principal points of entry to the city’s tourist area (Fig. 7.6). The
station is a stone’s throw from the Îlot des Palais archaeological site, Université
Laval’s Intendant’s Palace field school. An archaeological interpretation centre was
opened in 2014 on the Îlot des Palais, a municipal property, by a heritage asso-
ciation affiliated with the City.
Interpretive modules have been installed in Place D’Youville, a public square
situated at another entrance to the Old Town Historic District in front of the
eighteenth-century ramparts so characteristic of the fortified city. These modules were
first constructed by the City in 1989 on the site of the town’s first suburb, and they
presented artefacts recovered during 1986 and 1987 research on artisans living just
outside the city walls in the eighteenth century. The modules were refurbished in 2014
to showcase the contribution archaeological research has made to knowledge of the
Fig. 7.5 The ruins of a burned-out church have been stabilized and developed as an open-air
interpretive site, the Parc de la Visitation. (Photograph by Robert Greffard; courtesy of the Ville de
Québec.)
Fig. 7.6 Archaeological interpretive modules have been placed in two public squares at important
entry points to the Old Town Historic District, Place D’Youville in front of the ramparts and Place
de la Gare in front of the intermodal train station. (Photographs by Chantal Gagnon and Robert
Greffard; courtesy of the Ville de Québec.)
128 W. Moss
UNESCO World Heritage Site (Fig. 7.6). Another module, completed in 2014 in the
Charlesbourg Historic District’s Parc du Sacré-Coeur, was constructed at the request
of the parish’s heritage committee and the borough council to commemorate the
town’s first church (Fig. 7.7). This collaborative project involving the City’s borough
council and the parish council, designed by City personnel including architects,
landscape architects and archaeologists, has produced a large-scale open-air evocation
of the church. It was designed in a manner to protect the very rich subsurface of the
park, including the archaeologically located vestiges of the church, the remains of
hundreds of early parishioners still buried in the now-forgotten cemetery and the root
structure of mature urban trees.
Another project took collaborative efforts with local groups, a step beyond what
had been achieved in the past. The City of Quebec worked in close partnership with
several local organizations while improving the public space surrounding the
Nativité de Notre-Dame de Beauport church in the heart of the Beauport Historic
District (Fig. 7.8). The City worked with the parish council and the local historical
society, the Société d’art et d’histoire de Beauport, to design the new public space
and the monument erected in honour of the founding families of one of New
France’s first communities. The Société d’art et d’histoire de Beauport assumed the
role of promoter for the archaeological research project, hiring archaeologists and
crews over three years for stratigraphic excavations and watching briefs monitoring
Fig. 7.7 The City installed a full-scale module over the vestiges of a former village’s first church
in Parc du Sacré-Cœur at the heart of the Charlesbourg Historic District. (Photograph by Robert
Greffard; courtesy of the Ville de Québec.)
Fig. 7.8 The local Société d’art et d’histoire de Beauport carried out several seasons of
excavation on the site of the Beauport Historic District’s first church, Notre-Dame-de-la-Nativité
de Beauport. (Photograph by Christian Dionne; courtesy of the Société d’art et d’histoire de
Beauport.)
construction activities. A general synthesis of three years of research on the site was
produced by the Société in 2014 (Roy 2014). All of the preceding projects were
financed by the memorandum of agreement between the City and the province’s
MCC.
Finally, the City has budgeted $1.5 M over 2015 and 2016 to create a new
archaeology laboratory and collections reserve adjacent to Université Laval’s
complex of seven archaeological laboratories, the Laboratoires d’archéologie, in a
historic building in the Old Town Historic District. Prior to that time, such services
were made available by the MCC in the province’s Laboratoire et Réserve
archéologiques du Québec.
130 W. Moss
The City and the 2012 Cultural Heritage Act
The new Cultural Heritage Act will be a major game-changer, and the Ententes sur
le développement culturel will be modified in the context of the new Act, especially
given the MCC’s expectation that municipalities will implement a
compliance-driven approach to preventive archaeology. The City of Quebec has
adopted a proactive position in order to assure continuity with past successes and
newly created traditions. The City will continue fostering stewardship through
partnerships with community heritage groups, enhancing the knowledge base
through research on minor sites and supporting site development and interpretation
in both public and private projects. Quebec City fully intends to consolidate
25 years of achievements while implementing the new legislation.
The City is notably preparing the adoption of a bylaw congruent with sec-
tion 150 of the new Act. It is hoped that funds traditionally available in the
memoranda of agreement can be used to support projects carried out by private
citizens or small-scale developers under the new programmes. Though not required
to do so by law, the City of Quebec archaeological team is preparing an archaeo-
logical master plan to underpin the proposed bylaw. This plan will be integrated
into the corporate GIS-based management system.
The master plan is based on a database of over 900 sites in the province’s
Inventaire des sites archéologiques du Québec (MCC 2014) and series of potential
archaeological sites identified through predictive modelling. The identification of
potential Aboriginal prehistoric-period occupation sites is based on environmental
data: distance from sources of water, slope (less than 10%), soil drainage and
land-disturbing activities. Over 1000 potential sites have been selected for future
examination (Plourde 2013). Historic-period sites are identified through various
documents including very abundant historic maps, written sources and reports
about the history of the city. Over 15,000 potential sites have been identified. This
number was reduced by applying a series of criteria to the whole territory and by
tailoring them to each borough and to each of the four historic districts. Fourteen
chronological periods ranging from 1500 to 1940 were identified, and 17 functional
categories were applied. The methodology and preliminary results were validated
by a scientific committee made up of the City’s archaeological team, Université
Laval archaeologists and MCC personnel. Archaeologists from Hydro-Québec,
Parks Canada and designated consulting firms participated on an ad hoc basis. The
master plan, named Système intégré de gestion en matière d’archéologie (SIGMA),
is an open system; new data can be added or existing data corrected at any time
(Simoneau 2011, 2014).
The City is currently considering the creation of zones of heritage interest as per
new powers offered through section 150 of the Cultural Heritage Act. This will
permit the subsequent adoption of a bylaw specifying the type of control that can be
exercised through the permitting system to ensure the protection of archaeological
heritage resources.
The efficacious application of an archaeological bylaw and the full use of the
archaeological master plan will require policy and programmes fostering public
interest and promoting participation in the process. As the Act does not ascribe
financial responsibility to any particular actor in this context, the City has deemed it
important to respect the financial capacity of property owners. The City
Archaeologist is thus drafting a programme offering financial support for
small-scale property owners or promoters to accept these responsibilities.
Otherwise, it will be the responsibility of the promoter to assume all associated
costs, which would in all likelihood impose a political barrier to the implementation
of the desired approach.
The management system is being implemented through 2018. It will be inte-
grated with the electronic permitting system already in place throughout the
municipal administration. Each concerned department is advised of requests for
building permits and can apply its restrictions before issuance. It is foreseen that the
archaeological component of the permit analysis process will be applied in two
manners depending on the status of the territory concerned under the Cultural
Heritage Act. Firstly, any construction project requiring ground-breaking activities
within the four heritage districts will be analysed by the City Archaeologist, and the
project promoter will be required to undertake mitigation as defined by the
provincial government archaeologists. Secondly and elsewhere, any construction
project requiring ground-breaking activities on specific sites outside of the historic
districts will be subject to analysis and mitigation as defined by a municipal
archaeologist. The bylaw should be implemented through 2018.
Using the system will require the presence of an archaeologist to evaluate
construction projects in real time. The SIGMA database sorts projects on the basis
of preliminary criteria, but actions to be taken are defined by an in-house profes-
sional. All projects from the four historic districts involving excavation and projects
from selected sites outside of these districts will be submitted for analysis by the
City Archaeologist to determine what type of archaeological fieldwork may be
required.
Under the Cultural Heritage Act, it is mandatory to report any and all finds to the
government. Also, an individual must have a permit to undertake research. This
will, in principle, ensure that no projects or excavations will be undertaken outside
of the system. But will the manpower and the political be there to enforce this?
Another problem is entailed by the difficulty of ensuring the coherence of profes-
sional and scientific actions done under the system. With multiple actors come
multiple approaches. Only provincial staff enforcing the current permitting system
can counterbalance these centrifugal tendencies, especially in the absence of
methodological guidelines on the part of the MCC.
In short, the integration of this new approach and the application of the tools
necessary to its working are a new and major stake in the management, protection
and development of archaeological heritage resources in Quebec City. By contin-
uing to provide financial and technical support to private and corporate citizens, the
City expects to be able to consolidate past successes with new approaches.
132 W. Moss
Conclusion
The 2012 Cultural Heritage Act recently changed some, but not all, aspects of
archaeological practice in the province. The Act extends a tradition stemming from
legislation adopted in France in 1941. Though France recently modified its
archaeological legislation to conform to the 1992 European Convention on the
Protection of the Archaeological Heritage, revision of Quebec’s 1972 Cultural
Property Act did not follow the same path. Nor did it integrate the precepts of
planning-driven approaches adopted by neighbouring Anglo-Saxon provinces
through the 1990s. The new legislation offers the possibility to willing munici-
palities to protect archaeological heritage through the permitting process within
heritage zones, particularly within provincially constituted heritage districts. The
provincial government expects that municipalities will apply an admixture of these
different approaches by adopting bylaws controlling building permits. In response
to the new law and with a view to being proactive, the City of Quebec has
developed an archaeological master plan based on the SIGMA database and is
currently developing a bylaw in conformity with elective provisions of the new law.
The City also intends to develop a joint programme with the MCC in order to offer
financial support to selected projects. The City intends to consolidate archaeological
heritage management and site development within the new legislative context by
building on a quarter century of achievements. The City intends to maintain part-
nerships with private and corporate citizens and to foster the archaeological con-
tribution to the process of placemaking, site development and resource protection in
one of North America’s premier heritage cities.
Acknowledgements I would like to thank Marcel Moussette and Alison McGain for their
comments and suggestions. I would also like to thank the City of Quebec—particularly the
members of the archaeological team, the Ministère de la Culture et des Communications and
Université Laval for their support and participation in the numerous projects mentioned in this
chapter.
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document]. Retrieved from http://www.saa.org/Portals/0/SAA/GovernmentAffairs/
CANADIAN_INFO.pdf
Southport Group. (2011). Realising the benefits of planning-led investigation in the historic
environment: A framework for delivery. London: Chartered Institute for Archaeologists.
[Electronic Document]. Retrieved from www.archaeologists.net/sites/default/files/node-files/
SouthportreportA4.pdf
Ville de Québec. (2005). L’avenir maintenant. Plan directeur d’aménagement et de
développement. [Electronic document]. Retrieved from https://www.ville.quebec.qc.ca/
planification_orientations/amenagement_urbain/pdad/
Ville de Québec. (2007). Politique du patrimoine. [Electronic document]. Retrieved from http://
www.ville.quebec.qc.ca/publications/docs_ville/politique_patrimoine.pdf
Willems, W. J.H. (2008). Archaeological resource management and preservation. In H. Kars & R.
van Heeringen (Eds.), Preserving archaeological remains in situ, geographical and
bioarchaeological studies (Vol. 10, pp. 283–289).
Willems, W. J. H., & van den Dries, M. (2007). The origins and development of quality assurance
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archaeology (pp. 1–12). Oxford: Oxbow Books.
Chapter 8
Archaeology Down Under: Management
and Outcomes in the First State
in Australia
Siobhán Lavelle
Introduction
This chapter examines the management of historical archaeology in the Australian

state of New South Wales (NSW) and its capital city of Sydney. Australia is a
federation of six states, each of which was until 1901 a separate British Colony. The
states—New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, South
Australia and Tasmania—each have their own governments, and there are also two
self-governing territories, the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital
Territory. The federal Australian government is known as the Commonwealth of
Australia. Each of these jurisdictions has separate legislation related to the man-
agement of cultural heritage; this is considered further shortly.
NSW was the location of the first British Colony on the continent in 1788.
Within the state, there are 129 local government areas designated as cities,
municipalities and shires. These local Councils are concerned with matters such as
building regulations and development, public health, local roads and footpaths,
parks and playing fields, libraries, local environmental issues, waste disposal and
other community services. Local government has some heritage responsibility
through the process of including heritage items or places within planning instru-
ments (local environmental plans).
The NSW Heritage Council has worked with various local government
authorities on collaborative day-to-day management of development proposals
within key towns and cities where these may encounter significant historical
archaeological sites. Sydney does not have a city archaeology programme, but other
strategies for managing the city’s archaeology are discussed below. For nearly
40 years, there has been legislation to protect historical archaeology in NSW, but
this has not always resulted in protection or best practice outcomes, and this chapter
S. Lavelle (&)
10 Valentine Avenue, Parramatta, NSW 2134, Australia

138 S. Lavelle
will discuss examples of both success and failure. An important strategy has been
the preparation of Archaeological Zoning or Management Plans for early settlement
areas and also management across the heritage and planning systems. This is
important because although archaeological sites may be identified and scheduled by
local government it is the state authority which retains responsibility for manage-
ment of archaeology through the issuing of permits to excavate and investigate, or
ultimately remove, sites. As might be expected there are different levels of capacity,
resourcing, political will and interest in the management of archaeology within the
sphere of local government. In many areas, there remain opportunities for increased
collaboration and enhancement of archaeological outcomes, some of which will be
foreshadowed in this chapter.
Early Concerns and Initial Legislation
In NSW, concern for historic sites and relics grew in parallel with the conservation
movement as a whole. There were preservation and recording efforts from the early
to mid-twentieth century with the formation of private organisations such as the
Royal Australian Historical Society (1901) and the NSW National Trust (1945),
both concerned with the disappearance of historic buildings and early landmarks
due to the march of progress. In the 1970s when historic heritage legislation
emerged, national achievement was observed through the lens of white, universalist
and progressivist history.
NSW is Australia’s oldest state, and it still has the largest population and
economy (7.3 million of 23.13 million people; $320 billion or about 33% of
Australia’s GDP; 10.4% of Australia’s land area) (Australian Bureau of Statistics
2015). In 1770, the HMS Endeavour, captained by Lieutenant James Cook, sailed
into Botany Bay where Cook claimed dominion over the territory for Great Britain
under the name ‘New South Wales’. The arrival of the First Fleet in January 1788
led by Governor Arthur Phillip established the first European settlement (or inva-
sion) in what is now Sydney. The colony became a state in 1901 after Australia was
proclaimed a nation.
Australia’s six states and two territory governments all have legislative
responsibility for the management of significant cultural places. Most legislation
was enacted in the 1960s and 1970s initially to protect ‘Aboriginal sites’ and
‘relics’ as the artefacts of a (presumed) vanished culture or way of life. Legislation
to protect non-indigenous or historic sites and heritage places came slightly later, in
some states not until the 1990s. A corollary of the legislation was the subsequent
creation of government agencies and management positions.
The Commonwealth Australian Heritage Commission was established under the
Australian Heritage Commission Act, 1975 (Commonwealth). It was followed in
New South Wales by the Heritage Council, established under the NSW Heritage
Act, 1977. The Heritage Council is a government statutory body appointed by the
relevant Minister—either environment, planning or (rarely) heritage, subject to the
8 Archaeology Down Under: Management and Outcomes … 139
political and administrative tides of the time. The Council is comprised of experts in
specified fields—such as archaeology, architecture, Aboriginal heritage, planning,
cultural landscapes; government representatives; and a nominee of the NSW branch
of the National Trust of Australia (NSW Heritage Act 1977, Section 8). A small
specialised staff was also established to provide the administration and assessment
needed for the Heritage Council to operate, with skills in architecture, town plan-
ning, landscape architecture, engineering, history and historical archaeology.
Although its staff has migrated between different departments and ministerial
portfolios, the Heritage Council of NSW has been a constant presence since the
commencement of the Heritage Act. This has allowed for reasonably consistent
policy directions and application, despite different administrative arrangements.
Although local government has responsibility for the approval of new devel-
opment, this tier of government does not manage or resource archaeology, even
where sites are likely to be encountered. As will be discussed shortly, there are no
municipal- or city-based archaeological units or programmes in NSW or Australia.
Despite this, there have been important projects and findings, made in the early and
foundational towns and cities in the state of NSW. These have occurred since the
commencement of the Heritage Act, and several examples indicate that leadership
by the NSW state government has been important in resourcing major excavation
programmes. These were important in generating the idea of public archaeology as
a process where the public can see, experience and understand key archaeological
findings, especially the significant archaeology of the city of Sydney, the Colonial
foundation capital of NSW.
Colonial Sites in Sydney
Soon after the commencement of the NSW Heritage Act, excavations of very
significant sites occurred with permits issued under the new Act. An early case was
Hyde Park Barracks (1817–1819) where one of Sydney’s first large public
archaeological excavation programmes began in 1980 after a NSW Government
decision to make this building a public museum. As restoration works began,
artefacts were revealed under the floors of the main building and within the grounds
of the compound. Opened to the public as a Museum in 1984, the Barracks is one of
11 historic places that form the Australian Convict Sites UNESCO World Heritage
property (World Heritage Convention 2015, p. 1306).
A site that came to public attention in the same era—the first decade of the
Heritage Act—was that of the First Government House at the corner of Bridge and
Phillip Streets in Sydney. In 1982, the NSW Government invited proposals to
develop the site with a 38-storey building. An historic memorial noted this as the
site where Arthur Phillip and successive governors including Hunter, King, Bligh,
Macquarie, Darling and Bourke, administered the colony from 1788 to 1845. The
Heritage Council requested investigation to assess whether any remains of the
House were present, and in early 1983 a two-week excavation and initial historic
140 S. Lavelle
report were completed. More archaeology directed by Anne Bickford took place
throughout 1983 and 1984. In 1985, it was announced by the NSW Premier,
Neville Wran, that the site would be conserved and that there would be an archi-
tectural design competition. The Museum of Sydney on the First Government
House site was opened to the public by the (government) Historic Houses Trust in
1995 (Sydney Living Museums2015).
These were important early initiatives by the state government, which funded the
costs of the archaeology; $80,000 for Hyde Park Barracks and $400,000 for First
Government House (Temple 1988, p. 1). There were additional hidden costs from
forgone development, completion of in-house work by government agencies or staff
and subsequent reporting and publication costs.
In the same era as the Heritage Act, broader environmental concerns were also
reflected in New South Wales in the cognate Environmental Planning and
Assessment Act, 1979 (EP&A Act). The EP&A Act controls land-use planning and
development by establishing the need for zoning, permissions, factors to be con-
sidered in relation to development—including environmental, social and economic
factors—and penalties. The EP&A Act also establishes Local Environmental Plans,
which usually include a Heritage Schedule listing those places and items assessed to
be of local significance.
The National Level
After a series of events saw the Commonwealth government using its powers to
regulate environmental issues where particular States had a major stake, the Council
of Australian Governments 1997 Heads of Agreement on Commonwealth/State
Roles and Responsibilities for the Environment formalised a national partnership
between all levels of government on environment issues based on principles of
cooperation and minimisation of duplication and overlap between governments.
The Agreement stated that policy, programmes and decision-making should be the
responsibility of the level of government best placed to deliver agreed outcomes
(Council of Australian Governments 1997).
One consequence of the 1997 COAG agreement was the repeal of the 1975
Australian Heritage Commission Act and new legislation, the Environment
Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Commonwealth). This resulted
in devolution of many heritage functions to the States, through the implementation
of bilateral agreements, which is in line with the federal principle of subsidiarity,
whereby responsibility lies with the lowest level of government possible.
The Local Level
In Australia, local government—Municipal, Shire or City Councils—is usually

described as the third tier of government (below Federal/Commonwealth and State
government). However, local government is not formally recognised within
Australia’s federal system, and there has been little interest in providing formal
constitutional recognition for it. Local government may act only to the extent that a
State legislature grants it the power to do so. States do regularly grant local
authorities power, in recognition that they have responsibility for development and
implementation of relevant policies at the local level.
Currently, NSW has 129 local government areas, plus unincorporated lands,
islands and waterways. Heritage is managed at local government level by Local
Environmental Plans (LEPs) made under the NSW EP&A Act, 1979, which include
schedules or lists of heritage items and heritage maps. Archaeological sites may be
included in local heritage schedules, although this is still relatively rare (approxi-
mately 7% of scheduled sites). All scheduled items are protected and managed by
the heritage provisions included in the planning instrument, which generally require
lodging of applications to seek consent for major changes or development.
The NSW Government initiated the Standard Instrument LEP Program in 2006
to create a common format and content for LEPs. This was intended to simplify the
plan making system in NSW by providing a standard approach as a response to an
increasingly complex local planning system with many plans and diverse approa-
ches. Standard LEPs and ‘model provisions’ require that an LEP shall contain
provisions that facilitate the conservation of: items, places, buildings, works, relics,
moveable objects or precincts of environmental heritage significance to an area, in
relation to the historical, scientific, cultural, social, archaeological, architectural,
natural or aesthetic value of the item, area, object or place, identified in a study of
the environmental heritage of the area. There are also requirements to address
Aboriginal objects or Aboriginal places that are protected under the NSW National
Parks and Wildlife Act 1974, which manages Aboriginal cultural heritage (NSW
Planning & Environment, Standard Instrument Local Environmental Plan
(LEP) Program 2015).
The NSW Heritage Act and Archaeology
The NSW Heritage Act 1977 (as amended) protects the State’s natural and cultural
heritage, and it also contains broad measures to protect historical archaeological
relics, effectively the study of the British colonisation and subsequent occupation of
NSW after 1788 AD. Aboriginal archaeology is specifically excluded as it is
managed under separate legislation, the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Act,
1974. This may change in future as work is currently underway within government
142 S. Lavelle
to progress Aboriginal cultural heritage reform (NSW Office of Environment and

Heritage 2015a).
The purpose of the Heritage Act is to conserve the environmental heritage of the
State, which is defined as: ‘those places, buildings, works, relics, moveable objects,
and precincts, of State or local heritage significance’ (Heritage Act, Section 4).
State heritage protection includes listing on the NSW State Heritage Register and
provisions for the making of Interim Heritage Orders or Emergency (stop work)
orders. The effect of listing on the State Heritage Register is that a person cannot
damage, destroy, alter or move the item, building or land without approval from the
Heritage Council. Less than three per cent of approximately 1700 items on the State
Heritage Register are archaeological sites, but the legislation’s ‘relics’ provisions
provide another means of protecting unlisted sites.
The ‘relics’ provisions apply to all land in NSW whether in public or private
ownership and exist separately from and in addition to, the controls for land which
is listed on the State Heritage Register. This has provided an unusual situation
whereby archaeology on public and private land is managed by the state agency
whether it is of State or local heritage significance.
The ‘relics’ provisions require an excavation permit to be obtained if the person
knows, or has reasonable cause to suspect that they might discover, expose, move,
damage or destroy a relic (Heritage Act, Part 6, Division 9, Sections 139–146).
Under the Heritage Act, relics are: ‘any deposit, object or material evidence which
relates to the settlement of the area that comprises New South Wales, not being
Aboriginal settlement, and which is of State or local heritage significance’. This
particular definition is the product of relatively recent amendments made in 2009. In
the 1977 Act, a relic was time-limited to material dated ‘prior to the 1st of January
1900’; in 1987, amendments changed the timeframe to ‘50 or more years old’.
In 2007 when a government-appointed expert panel reviewed the Heritage Act, it
made comments and recommendations regarding the archaeological ‘relics’ pro-
visions. The panel noted that submissions by consultant archaeologists considered
the provisions essential to the maintenance of archaeology and heritage in the State
because many archaeological sites of State significance are not on the State Heritage
Register (Independent Expert Panel 2007, p. 7). The expert panel, however,
expressed concern that:
To obtain an excavation permit, an applicant is required to prepare an Archaeological
Assessment and a “Research Design”, which sets out the methodology and rationale for the
proposed excavation. The preparation of these reports in addition to the excavation itself can
have a substantial time and cost impost on a project and in many circumstances does not appear
to result in any tangible benefit to the community (Independent Expert Panel 2007, p. 77).
The panel also commented ‘it was not the original intent of the Act to capture
such a broad range of potential ‘relics’; rather, the intent was to ensure archaeo-
logical places of significance to the State were recognised and investigated’
(Independent Expert Panel 2007, p. 78). The definition was amended in 2009 to
refer to significance rather than age, in accordance with the review’s recommen-
dations (Heritage Council of NSW 2009a).
As an example, if a private developer wants to build a new office tower with

basement car parking in an area where it is known or suspected that there is a
likelihood of historical archaeological ‘relics’ present, then a permit under the Heritage
Act would be required to affect those relics. In practice unless the site is on the State
Heritage Register, local government will be responsible for approval of the devel-
opment application. They may or may not require an Archaeological Assessment
report as part of the application, although this is encouraged by the state agency. Many
local governments issue development consent with conditions that require the nec-
essary permits under the NSW Heritage Act to be obtained later, for example prior to
the issue of a construction certificate for the building. By the time the state agency is
contacted about an archaeology permit, consent may already be issued for the new
building. The developer may believe they have the ‘go-ahead’ in the form of a valid
consent for the new building, but at this point the NSW Heritage Act will require an
Archaeological Assessment and Research Design to accompany a permit application.
These will usually be prepared by private contract archaeology firms. The docu-
mentation submitted will be reviewed by the state agency archaeologists, and there
may be a need for amendments to proposed methodologies or requests for additional
work and information. Frequently, the opportunity for early discussion about in situ
conservation or other alternatives will have passed, often due to the holding costs and
other financial arrangements for a project.
In other cases, development approval may have been given by local government
without any indication that historical archaeology may be present on a site. Excavation
commences and once the project, its timelines and finance are on a critical path,
archaeology emerges and then must be dealt with as a matter of urgency. A permit
must be sought to continue. In these scenarios, it is even more difficult to get com-
prehensive and considered outcomes. As a response for many years, the NSW
Heritage Council has provided funds for predictive studies such as Archaeological
Management Plans to enhance the available knowledge about the likelihood of
archaeology being present and needing to be addressed as part of development.
The City of Sydney
New South Wales does not have any city-, municipal- or shire-based archaeologists.
The City of Sydney employed a full-time archaeologist from 1997 to 2001, which
changed to a part-time contract position before disappearing. Sydney City’s annual
income is reported at more than $500 million, with an operating surplus of more
than $110 million; however, the categories of heritage or archaeology do not
specifically feature in the City’s annual reports. There is a small team of heritage
specialists (no archaeologists) within the heritage planning team that assesses
development applications. This usually means decisions affecting archaeology are
made by non-archaeologists. In cases where an Archaeological Zoning Plan iden-
tifies the site, the city planners might consult an archaeologist at the state level but
this is not routine.
144 S. Lavelle
Fig. 8.1 Members of the public queuing for the open day at Sydney Town Hall in January 2008
(Photograph S. Lavelle)
The City of Sydney Town Hall is built upon the site of the Old Sydney Burial
Ground dating back to the 1790s. In 1869, the site was acquired by the City and all
graves which could be found were exhumed, with the remains transferred to the
new Rookwood Necropolis, west of the central business district. Remains of burials
and coffins have periodically been found during ground disturbance works. In 2007,
works to the Lower Town Hall necessitated an archaeological salvage excavation,
completed by Casey and Lowe Pty Ltd, which found remnants of more than 60
graves (Casey and Lowe Pty Ltd 2008). Public interest was manifest when 3000
people queued for up to 1½ hours to visit the site during the Open Day on 22
January 2008 (see Fig. 8.1).
The Rocks
Some NSW government agencies employ archaeologists in-house, but these pro-
fessionals tend to coordinate advice within the agency regarding its own work
programmes or heritage requirements; very few engage in ‘hands-on’ archaeolog-
ical work or public interpretation. A notable exception is the Sydney Harbour
Foreshore Authority (SHFA) which functions somewhat like a local government
body in that it is a small agency tasked with the management of a specific geo-
graphical land area. It funds its own operations principally from rental and other
property income, with an annual income just below $300 million and 140
employees. The Authority directly manages about 100 State-listed heritage items
and spends around $10 million for property-/heritage-related capital works each
year (SHFA 2014). A small archaeology team, led by Dr. Wayne Johnson since
1993, also conducts public outreach archaeology programmes and ensures on-site
interpretation of archaeological results.
SHFA has directly undertaken a number of archaeological projects including
excavations at Dawes Point Battery in 1995, 1999 and 2000 (Johnson 1998). This
was the site of Sydney’s first fortification shortly after the arrival of the First Fleet.
Extensive remains, including two underground rooms for storing gunpowder, were
incorporated into a redesign of the public park. The Dawes Point Battery is now on
the State Heritage Register (NSW Office of Environment and Heritage 2015b).
There are other interpreted sites and public art, and The Rocks also features a
purpose-built Discovery Museum opened in 2005 in a restored 1850s warehouse.
The museum houses a unique collection of images and archaeological artefacts
found in the area. It receives 125,000 visitors per year (SHFA 2014).
The most spectacular project in The Rocks has been the adaptive reuse and
redevelopment of a key archaeological site into a Youth Hostel. Dating from 1795,
the Cumberland Street Archaeological Site is listed on the State Heritage Register
(SHR number 1845) for its outstanding cultural significance as rare surviving
evidence of the mostly convict and ex-convict community established on The
Rocks at the time of Australia’s first European settlement. The site contains remains
of 46 historic houses, two lanes and other features on two early Sydney town lots.
Excavation undertaken by Godden Mackay Logan Pty Ltd in 1994 recorded
structural remains and recovered over 750,000 artefacts (Godden Mackay Logan,
Astarte Resources, & Historic Houses Trust 2000). About 30% of the site was left
unexcavated at that time (Crook et al. 2003).
In 2006, SHFA called for development proposals for the site. The winning
proposal was by Youth Hostels Australia for a state-of-the-art, energy-efficient
106-room hostel and education centre. Construction of Sydney Harbour YHA and
The Big Dig Archaeology Education Centre took place in 2008–2009. The build-
ings are supported by structural-steel trusses spanning over the archaeological
remains, allowing over 85% of the site to be visible at ground level. Cleverly
designed grouped column bases limit the physical impacts on the site; the original
laneways were reinstated as thoroughfares through the building and site, voids
within the building allow views of the archaeology, and the Big Dig building is
used for education about the site (see Figs. 8.2 and 8.3) (NSW Office of
Environment and Heritage 2015c).
Although outstanding as an adaptive reuse, the YHA development was a rather
unusual model, which will not be easily replicated on other archaeological sites.
One key factor is the type of development. The hostel style accommodation has
clustered central services (communal kitchens and bathrooms), and as the main
market is independent travellers, there was no need for provision of car parking.
146 S. Lavelle
Fig. 8.2 The Big Dig Archaeology Education Centre, part of the new YHA at The Rocks, Sydney
(Photograph S. Lavelle)
Both these factors meant that excavation into the site was limited. Another key
factor was that the YHA is a not-for-profit organisation and was interested in
innovative design and public outcomes for the site (Godden Mackay Logan 2014).
In July 2016 SHFA was amalgamated into a larger agency, Property NSW, as part
of a whole of government approach to property management.
The Push for Public Outcomes
In New South Wales, due to an absence of government-funded archaeology units,

actual fieldwork projects are usually delivered by consultant archaeology compa-
nies as part of development consents. As evidenced by the submissions to the 2007
Heritage Act review, for many consultants, a scientific paradigm of archaeology
being essential to recover ‘evidence’ of the past in an ‘objective’ way is sufficient
justification for their existence and simultaneously for the ‘relics’ provisions. By
contrast, the incumbents of the public archaeology jobs in the State regulatory
agency have consistently displayed considerable anxiety that the archaeology
emperor enshrined within the state legislation might be found to have little or no
clothes (Temple 1989, p. 5).
Fig. 8.3 The YHA building, supported on grouped columns above the ground-level archaeology,
The Rocks, Sydney (Photograph S. Lavelle)
In 1985, the first NSW state archaeologist, Helen Temple, completed a study
tour of the USA and the UK to examine aspects of the management and protection
of historic and archaeological sites. She suggested the development of (govern-
ment) urban archaeological field teams; more publicly oriented site
investigations/excavations/interpretation; and the need for a specific organisation to
curate collections of archaeological relics from historic sites and provide research
facilities (Temple 1987, p. 4). In 1988, Temple wrote: ‘Historical Archaeology in
NSW must be publicly oriented and accountable. …The public pays, directly or
indirectly, for archaeological research; it deserves to know whether the expenditure
is justified’ (Temple 1988, p. 2). Nearly 30 years later, few of these have been
delivered. Artefact storage and on-site interpretation are now addressed through
statutory conditions attached to site-specific excavation permits. This remains,
however, a limited approach both spatially and temporally. It might be regarded as
an interim rather than a definitive solution. Whilst each permit will require that how
and where the artefacts have been catalogued and stored is documented, there is no
agreed system (each firm can use its own) and no central repository where artefacts
can be made available for future researchers. In practice, several contract firms have
formed links with universities, and in those cases major collections will be stored
and accessed by students.
148 S. Lavelle
In 2002, state archaeologist Natalie Vinton undertook a ‘public archaeology’

tour to the USA. Programmes and practices were again examined for their relevance
and application to NSW, with a particular eye on the potential economic, tourism,
cultural and educational benefits of archaeology for cities and local communities
(Vinton 2002). Insights gained on this tour were used to promote public outcomes.
Site interpretation became routinely included as a consent condition on archaeo-
logical permits issued by the NSW Heritage Council from 2003 onwards. This is
usually in the form of permanent signs or panels which include descriptive text,
historic images and photographs or graphics related to the archaeological findings.
Permits may also require websites where archaeological reports can be hosted, open
days, and occasionally public talks by the site archaeologist. Talks or lectures
would usually be timed to coincide with National Archaeology Week, which is a
relatively recent initiative in NSW organised by a small committee of archaeology
professionals and held in the third week of May each year. It has a Facebook page
that lists events.
The Quadrant
Significant in the early 2000s was the Quadrant site in Ultimo which occupied two
full city blocks on the fringes of the Sydney CBD. Excavation directed by con-
sultant archaeologist Dana Mider occurred in 2001 ahead of a mixed use residential
and commercial redevelopment of the area by Australand Holdings (Property
Council 2002). The initial woodland, creek, estuarine and marine environments
supported the Cadigal people’s Aboriginal lifestyle of hunting, fishing and gath-
ering. By the 1830s, the presence of Blackwattle Creek attracted a variety of
polluting industries including tanneries, slaughterhouses, and breweries. The area
became known as the Eau de Cologne Valley due to its offensive odours. The
innovative use of website information, the connections made between the archae-
ological team and the public, the media interest, and the preparation of an education
kit by the developer ‘Trowels and Tribulations’, have been previously described
(Cressy and Vinton 2007).
Despite the early promise the Quadrant project showed for a new approach, a
final report was never completed. As the new building had development approval,
construction work commenced once the archaeology team left the site. It is rare for
an archaeological report to be a requirement for an occupation certificate to be
issued under a local development consent as two different pieces of legislation are
involved, and here the lack of integration between state and local government
requirements may hinder archaeological outcomes. The main record of the findings
other than media or web articles and the education kit became the on-site inter-
pretation. There are small printed interpretative panels displayed on building col-
umns around the central courtyard, with themed headings such as Chamber Pots,
Decoration, Making Do, Money, Many Cultures, Morality Tales, Religion, Play,
Smoking, and Eating. Larger panels near the entrance to the courtyard discuss the
archaeological project and environmental evidence recovered. There was also a

substantial artefact display case in the internal, but publicly accessible, apartment
foyer. The nearby University of Sydney used this as a resource for teaching
archaeology students. Two articles about the faunal remains from the site were also
published (Colley 2005, 2006).
In February 2008, a deliberately set explosion in a chicken shop in one of the
ground floor commercial tenancies rocked the nine-storey building, causing $3.5
million worth of damage (Tadros 2008). The distraught property manager contacted
the (then) NSW Heritage Office and advised the writer that the carefully conserved
archaeological artefacts in the foyer display case, already fragmentary, had literally
been ‘blown to bits’. This left the small thematic panels and the larger more
technical panels as the main result of the project. These panels have a somewhat
didactic tone and have been criticised for their ‘large slabs of text…engraved in
indigestible chunks’ with ‘rapid-fire …facts and truncated stories’ which are con-
sidered ‘at odds with..[the]… aim to communicate effectively the stories of the past
to a casual audience who might wander past’ (McInnes 2009 n.p.). The historian
criticising these panels some time later may not have realised that they were only
intended to form one part of a larger package. When interpretation has been con-
ditioned by an archaeology permit, however, there has been more than one instance
where on-site signage was designed and installed without further discussion or
approval by the state agency.
The Quadrant is not the only major site where archaeological fieldwork under-
taken by consultants for private developers has not produced a final report. This is
true for several large and complex urban archaeological sites. Many developers see
value in paying for visible fieldwork which removes archaeological material which
otherwise might restrict development, but apparently have much less interest in
paying for largely invisible post-excavation analysis and reporting. It is an ironic
situation for a profession which so often proclaims the need for information to be
recovered before it is lost and then fails to deliver the information gained through
the fieldwork process. The field notes and records generally remain the private
property of the consultant archaeologist or firm, and the excavated artefact col-
lections remain the property of the developer (as the land owner at the time they
were excavated). The Heritage Act has little detail regarding curation of the arte-
facts and information yielded by archaeological digs. There are (rarely used) pro-
visions that the Minister (government) may direct the lodgement of particularly
significant ‘relics’, but effectively there is no central place or designated repository
to take them. Consequently, the interim solution has been storage of collections
within new developments or with other interested parties such as local museums.
In more than 35 years, there have been no penalties imposed under the NSW
Heritage Act arising from breaches of the ‘relics’ provisions or permits. The Act is
silent about powers to collect evidence, and the state agency has not included a
permanent compliance officer in its staffing. There have been very few prosecutions
for offences under the Act. Response to the lack of output and reporting from some
archaeologists has been to strengthen archaeology permit conditions and to revise
the Heritage Council Criteria for Excavation Directors. These criteria are used to
150 S. Lavelle
assess the suitability of a nominated excavation director for different types of

archaeological projects. Criteria have existed since 1981, but were most recently
revised in 2011 (Heritage Council of NSW 2011). Criterion No. 4 requires ‘Ability
to demonstrate that work under any approvals previously granted by the Heritage
Council has been completed in accordance with the conditions of that approval and
the final report has been submitted to the Heritage Council’. In 2012, the Heritage
Council also approved a final report amnesty which ran through 2013. This pro-
vided an opportunity for outstanding reports to be submitted ahead of (intended)
future tracking of the permits issued and the submission of final reports for those
permits. The amnesty resulted in the submission of numerous reports, but mostly
these were for small-scale projects. The key reports missing for large and complex
urban excavations in Sydney, such as the Quadrant site, were not forthcoming.
Highlands Marketplace
There are many cases where the private sector has shown great willingness and
flexibility to comply with statutory requirements to record, preserve or interpret
archaeology in NSW. This has produced various outcomes at different scales. In
July 2004, Woolworths Limited (Australia) lodged a development application to
build the Highlands Marketplace Shopping Centre in Mittagong, a town 110 km
south-west of Sydney. The site had formed part of the Fitz Roy Iron Works, the first
iron works in Australia, which operated from 1848 to the 1890s. The expectation
was that remains on site would be limited and would be removed (subject to
recording) ahead of the new development. A large enterprise, the Iron Works was
commemorated by a substantial historic monument at a separate location on
Ironmines Oval. Permits were issued for a series of archaeological investigations,
and with the discovery of substantial remains, an Interim Heritage Order was placed
on the site in December 2004. This required Heritage Council approvals to be
sought for future works. Additional archaeological work, in situ conservation
treatments, project delays and redesign were estimated to cost an additional $2.5
million. Sixty car spaces were also ‘lost’ to the extensive area of in situ conser-
vation, although there remained over 700 spaces.
Woolworths worked conscientiously with the Heritage Council and its staff and
the Highlands Marketplace opened in March 2007 with the Fitz Roy Iron Works
restoration a key feature. See Fig. 8.4. The exposed remains of the protected site are
located in the undercroft car park of the shopping centre. These remains have been
conserved, maintained and displayed with permanent public access provided as part
of the interpretation, communication and celebration of the history of the place.
There are also Maintenance and Conservation Plans in operation, and Woolworths
have advised that the centre is proud of this asset, the public are amazed by it,
visitation is high and responses are generally very positive (Fitz Roy Iron Works
2007–2014; Ray Christison, High Ground Consulting, personal communication, 4
November 2010).
Fig. 8.4 Fitz Roy Iron Works archaeology in the undercroft car park of Highlands Marketplace,
Mittagong (Photograph S. Lavelle)
Parramatta
Successful collaboration has also occurred between State and local government to
identify areas of early settlement where high concentrations of archaeological
remains are likely to exist. In 1991, the Parramatta City Council, in conjunction
with the NSW Heritage Council, commissioned the first Archaeological Zoning
Plan for Parramatta to identify the most significant archaeological sites within that
CBD (Higginbotham and Johnson 1991). In 2001, that work was extended by the
Parramatta Historical Archaeological Landscape Management Study (PHALMS)
completed by several project partners, including local and state government, with
Godden Mackay Logan as the principal consultant (NSW Heritage Office, Godden
Mackay Logan 2001; Parramatta City Council 2005). The Parramatta Historical
Archaeological Landscape Management Study (PHALMS) uses a geographic
information system (GIS) platform and a connected relational database to manage
the data for an entire historic city and its subsurface historical archaeological fea-
tures. It provides a citywide predictive model indicating locations where archaeo-
logical features have been removed and where archaeological sites may yet be
discovered. The significance of known or predicted archaeological sites is graded
from ‘exceptional’ to ‘low’. An electronic database divides the city area into dif-
ferent ‘Archaeological Management Units’ (AMUs), which include a summary
history, a predictive statement about values/significance, basic references to historic
maps and other resources, and a clear indication of conservation policy and
152 S. Lavelle
statutory requirements for each AMU (Logan and Mackay 2013). Requirements are
standardised and for units of high significance may include ‘test trenching’, ‘con-
servation in situ’ or ‘large-scale excavation’. All PHALMS AMUs can be found
with the NSW State Heritage Inventory, which is available online. An actual
approach to an AMU will be established through completion of a more detailed and
property specific, Archaeological Assessment and Research Design at such time as
an impact is proposed and a permit needs to be obtained.
Parramatta was occupied by the Burramattagal clan of the Darug Aboriginal
people prior to the arrival of the British in 1788. The name means ‘place of eels’,
and Parramatta River was important for camping and fishing for over 10,000 years.
Rose Hill (now Parramatta) was settled from Sydney in November 1788 as addi-
tional farming land was needed after crop failure. By 1791, there were 100 convict
huts and 1628 people at Parramatta, over half the colonial population at that time.
Old Government House, dating from 1799, is the oldest public building in
Australia, and it is also part of the Australian Convict Sites UNESCO World
Heritage property.
Over the last decade, interpretation of several archaeological ‘digs’ in Parramatta
has occurred as a direct outcome of archaeology permits, and it is now possible to
walk around the Parramatta central business district and view a range of different
information about sites along key streets from the early town within recently con-
structed new buildings. Information includes wall panels with historic text, maps and
illustrations, artefact display cases in building foyers, public artwork (archaeology
themed) and small areas of conserved archaeological remains. These have been
delivered by government and by private developers (Heritage Council of NSW 2010).
An important site in Parramatta is that of the former Parramatta Hospital, histori-
cally significant at a national level as the oldest continuously occupied site for public
health in Australia. The first hospital in Parramatta, and the third in the colony, was
established by 1790. The hospital site was identified as PHALMS Archaeological
Management Unit 2868, and the site is also listed on the State Heritage Register, SHR
number 0828 (NSW Office of Environment and Heritage 2015d).
As a government owned site, there was important pro-active action over a long
time period to ensure that significant archaeology was appropriately considered in
future site planning. Hospital services were gradually withdrawn from the site
following the construction of a new major hospital campus two kilometres away at
Westmead in 1978. Archaeological testing was undertaken in 1994, 2000, 2001 and
2003. In 2003, a Conservation Management Plan (CMP), prepared by the
Government Architect’s Office Heritage Design Services, recommended that if the
Parramatta Hospital site was to be redeveloped that ideally future open space areas
should coincide with the archaeology (Government Architects Office 2003).
In 2004, a further Masterplan was prepared which sited future building envel-
opes away from known areas of major archaeological remains and created an open
area which anticipated in situ retention of the likely archaeological resource as an
‘archaeology courtyard’ between the new buildings (NSW Department of
Commerce 2004). The CMP and Masterplan were both approved by the Heritage
Council.
In 2004, the Parramatta Justice Precinct was announced as the new use of the
site. This was a $280 million development to be delivered by 2008 that occupies a
whole city block. Built by the Multiplex Group, the Precinct includes six Children’s
Courts in a three-storey building, nine Trial Courts in a seven-storey building, a
Justice Administration Offices building of 10 storeys; refurbished $16 million
health facilities (Jeffery House), underground car parking and public open space.
‘Brislington’, a separately listed colonial building on the site dating from 1821, was
also retained (SHR number 059).
The major archaeological work for the new Precinct was completed by Casey
and Lowe Pty Ltd and directed by Dr Mary Casey over 2004 and 2005 (Casey and
Lowe Pty Ltd 2005). Not all archaeology was excavated. Where not affected by the
proposed development (including services and basements) State-significant
archaeology was retained in situ for future investigation.
The new Heritage Courtyard includes interpretation in the form of plaques,
photographic images, signage, artefact displays, paved building footprints on the
ground plane and other devices, not least the architectonic representations of the
former buildings in the form of new lightweight pavilion structures. See Figs. 8.5
and 8.6. These buildings, designed by Bates Smart Pty Ltd, won the Australian
Institute of Architects Award for Heritage Architecture (NSW) in 2008 (Australian
Institute of Architects 2008).
Fig. 8.5 Heritage Courtyard, Parramatta Justice Precinct where ground-level markings and new
pavilion structures interpret former buildings and display archaeological remains. (Photograph S.
Lavelle)
154 S. Lavelle
Fig. 8.6 Parramatta Justice Precinct, 1818 Colonial Hospital archaeological remains in new
pavilion (Photograph S. Lavelle)
The Wheatsheaf Hotel
A future site in Parramatta that will be displayed and interpreted to the public has
also featured a long gestation period. Now known as the ‘V by Crown’ develop-
ment, the site occupies half a city block with three street frontages. The site was
identified in PHALMS as Archaeological Management Unit, AMU 3190, as the site
of several ‘convict huts’ c.1790s–1800s. In November 2003, development consent
was granted by Parramatta City Council for a nine-storey building with central
courtyard and two and a half levels of basement car parking. The $20 million dollar
development anticipated costs of $800,000 for archaeology and interpretation (as-
suming removal of all remains). A permit was also issued for a large-scale open
area excavation. Undertaken in 2005 by Dr Edward Higginbotham, the excavations
revealed evidence of a convict hut c.1800 with a brick-paved floor and other
additions including a wheelwright’s workshop, c1823. Also found was a substantial
early stone cellar with an intact timber floor from ‘The Wheatsheaf’ Inn (1801–
1809) later the ‘Shepherd and Flock’ Inn (1825–1870) (Higginbotham & Associates
2005, 2007).
An Interim Heritage Order was made over the site in March 2006 (IHO number
101). Also made was a (rarely used) Section 129 Curtailment Order. That order
suspended the height limits and floor space ratios of the local planning instrument to
allow the submission of a non-complying development, provided that the devel-
opment conserved the archaeology.
Over the next five years, a succession of developers submitted various designs,
each seeking greater development concessions for retaining and displaying the
archaeology. The ‘V by Crown’ development was approved in 2011, and con-
struction is in progress for six levels of basement car park with
commercial/residential towers up to 22 storeys. A public plaza at ground level will
provide public open space and archaeological display areas with ‘viewing win-
dows’ surrounded by café/retail space. Part of the underground basement space is
dedicated for archaeological interpretation and viewing of remains in situ, with
additional separate Maintenance and Archaeology storage areas.
Apart from Parramatta, other key early settlement centres in pre-1850 NSW also
have archaeological management plans which can be used by the Heritage Council
and Local Councils or other consent authorities to assist in the day-to-day man-
agement of development proposals which might affect significant historical
archaeological sites or ‘relics’. In 2009, the Heritage Council endorsed new
Guidelines for Archaeological Management Plans outlining an appropriate scope of
works, timeframe and the support requirements needed for a useful and viable
AMP. The aim is to ensure that AMPs provide the information required to assist in
determining the identification, significance and appropriate management of sites
and items included in their study areas. They also provide a model brief to guide the
preparation of such plans (Heritage Council of NSW 2009b).
Limited dollar for (matching) dollar grant funding is also available within the
NSW Heritage Grants Program to prepare such plans.
Port Macquarie
Beyond Sydney there have also been mixed stories of lost opportunities, learning
and subsequent better outcomes. Port Macquarie is a town situated on the
mid-North Coast of NSW about 390 km north of Sydney. The town is significant
for its two stages of convict settlement that are rare in NSW: firstly from 1821 to
1832 as one of only two penal settlements in NSW established for the secondary
punishment of convicts, and secondly, from 1833 to 1847, as one of only two penal
establishments in NSW for convict ‘specials’ (invalids, the insane and educated
gentlemen convicts). When Port Macquarie was opened up to free settlement in
1830, the town was re-surveyed on its regular, present-day alignment which
destroyed many of the pre-1831 buildings. About 26 archaeological sites of these
prior buildings, usually sited at 45° to the present alignment, are anticipated to
survive beneath the current street layout. Other early fabric (such as drains and
roads) also survives.
156 S. Lavelle
An Archaeological Management Plan (AMP) prepared by consultants in 1994

mapped the archaeological resource of Port Macquarie, identifying around 300 sites
(Higginbotham and Johnson 1994). It also provided mapping which indicated areas
where there would be no need to undertake archaeological work. The AMP pro-
vided recommendations for future management, such as consideration of archae-
ological conservation areas; in situ conservation of State or Nationally significant
sites; interpretation and display; promotion through cultural tourism; incorporation
of archaeological remains in new developments; and the implicit assumption that
archaeological investigations would be undertaken as required by the Heritage Act.
Since the AMP was prepared, over 40 excavation permits have been issued in the
Port Macquarie central business district, affecting around 10% of the archaeological
resource. The majority of permits were for full excavation and removed all ar-
chaeology. Two key cases resulted in some in situ conservation outcomes which are
described below.
In 2001, there was a major archaeological excavation which exposed the foot-
ings of the four-room 1821 Government House with two rear wings and service
areas added in 1826, and a cellar. There were ancillary elements such as drains,
privies, paving. The discovery of highly intact remains led to requests to ‘save’ the
site by the local and wider community, and the formation of the group Friends of
Port Macquarie’s Archaeological Heritage (Jennings 2002). The archaeological site
was subsequently listed on the State Heritage Register (SHR No. 1517).
The Heritage Council worked with the site owners, local government, the
community and State government to investigate options for the site. Options con-
sidered included purchase of the site by government and the construction of a
museum. Finally, a compromise option was agreed which put underground parking
below the adjacent street and allowed the capping of the archaeological site in a
manner that retained the ruins in situ for potential future conservation and display,
with a new development over the top, the ‘Focus’ Apartments. No archaeological
remains are directly visible as they are sealed beneath a solid concrete slab that
supports the new building. The 18-storey ‘Focus’ development features an inter-
pretative foyer where displays and information give visitors an understanding of
what exists at the site (Lavelle 2007).
In 2005, the Heritage Council, the local Council and several local businesses
also contributed funding towards archaeological heritage signage in the central
business district. There is an accompanying brochure which explains the important
role played by Port Macquarie as a place of secondary punishment when more than
1500 convicts were there at the height of the settlement (Port Macquarie Hastings
Council 2003).
For many years, the local Council in Port Macquarie had also been planning a
new Arts and Cultural Centre on an existing Civic Centre site. By 2005, the $25
million project included a 620-seat theatre, art gallery, conference venue, restau-
rants and associated facilities. An excavation permit was granted in 2006 to allow
archaeological investigations, with the completion of the new development antic-
ipated by early 2008. The project managers, private consultants, demonstrated little
recognition of the nature of archaeology; rather, it was seen as something to be
‘managed out’ of the site. Excavations by Dr Edward Higginbotham revealed State

significant archaeological remains related to the early penal settlement (1821–
1830), the administration of convicts (1831–1846) and the town development after
1831 (Higginbotham & Associates 2008).
Project delays and significant cost overruns resulted in the dismissal of the local
Council by the state government and the appointment of an Administrator in
February 2008. At that time, the total costs were above $41 million with the
archaeology and redesign costs estimated to be in the vicinity of $2 million. The
new centre, now named the ‘GlassHouse’, opened in 2009. It includes in situ ar-
chaeology displays in the basement; floor and pavement treatments indicating the
location of former structures both inside and outside of the new building; inter-
pretative panels and artefact displays. The archaeology of the site was listed on the
State Heritage Register in 2010 (SHR number 1813).
Conclusion
In 2012 Tracy Ireland, a former NSW government archaeologist now an academic,

examined 19 sites where archaeology is conserved and displayed in situ, noting that
‘over the last decade the conservation of urban archaeological remains has been more
strongly enforced through legislation and policy, has become more technically
achievable, and has come to be seen as a more acceptable and feasible option to
groups such as property developers, regulators and communities’ (Ireland 2012, p. 7).
Preserved sites and displays certainly demonstrate public interest and engage-
ment with historical archaeology when it is retained as part of the layering of urban
fabric. Nevertheless, this value is not necessarily self-evident. It has taken decades
of effort by the NSW Heritage Council and its staff to promote the need for public
outcomes as part of the archaeology process. It requires engagement with intangible
values and a shift from a focus on purely archaeological research outcomes or
archaeology for its own sake on the part of archaeologists whether acting as con-
tractors or as government public servants (North 2007).
Political will and interest in heritage and specifically archaeology versus the
costs of conservation, public outcomes and forgone development have also changed
over time. In over 35 years of the operation of the Heritage Act, agencies have been
restructured and renamed usually due to government-of-the-day interests in effi-
ciency dividends or other agendas. The definition of a ‘relic’ has been amended
each decade, both to expand and to contract the type of material that might be
captured. From 1996 to 2007, there was a small specialist stand-alone NSW
Heritage Office, but more commonly heritage has been incorporated as a small
branch within a much larger agency. A risk in this scenario is that heritage might be
seen as a peripheral sideline to overall agency functions.
Another potential risk is the current worldwide interest in the reduction in ‘red
tape’. The Australian Government has a current plan to cut $1 billion in unnec-
essary and costly legislation and regulation every year, and this approach has
158 S. Lavelle
cascaded to lower jurisdictions (Australian Government 2014). This evidences a

change in long-held political philosophy that accepted government’s responsibility
to act as a benevolent caretaker of the public interest and address any market
failures.
Whilst intangible values will always be difficult to capture within a purely
market-based valuation, it does not follow that simply keeping some footings or
archaeological artefacts from the past at selected sites should be seen as an end in
itself. It is important that if and when this occurs it is done in a meaningful way.
Whilst many of the current archaeology displays might be critiqued for a tendency
to accept a version of colonial history largely based on received narratives of
settlement, indigenous displacement, change and progress, there is also an oppor-
tunity for these retained places to construct their own updated narratives through the
lens of the future. It will be more difficult for the technical reports and analyses of
the result of archaeological work as it has been written up to be revisited in such a
way. Reports and conserved sites can both make a contribution to knowledge and
understanding of how Australia as a nation has evolved from its beginnings.
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environment.nsw.gov.au/heritage/aboutheritage/histarchpolicy.htm
World Heritage Convention. (2015). UNESCO. Retrieved from http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/
Chapter 9
From Alliance to Dissonance: Two
Centuries of Local Archaeology
and Conservation in Indian Cities.
The Case of Lucknow, India
Ashima Krishna
Introduction
The Indian subcontinent has a long and ancient history that has been meticulously
developed through several centuries of concerted archaeological and conservation
efforts, and methodically documented for nearly two centuries (Chakrabarti 2003).
The evolution of the fields of archaeology and conservation into a formal and
bureaucratic enterprise was first through the Asiatic Society, and then the
Government of India under the East India Company (1757–1857), and the British
Crown (1857–1947). This pre-Independence archaeology and conservation most
often involved alliances and cooperation between central, provincial‚ and local
governments. Post-Independence, as the country began to focus on development
and progress, the older administrative systems gradually led to disassociated
approaches to archaeology and conservation at the central and state levels, with
little to no involvement by local agencies. The repercussions of this disconnection
are seen increasingly across Indian cities today, most commonly through the
damage to, and destruction of archaeological and historical resources during con-
struction and development activity. Using the city of Lucknow as an example, this
chapter traces how these adverse impacts on archaeological and historical resources
are rooted in the evolution of particular bureaucratic and administrative processes
spanning nearly two centuries, and therefore need to be re-examined in the con-
temporary context.
A. Krishna (&)
Department of Urban and Regional Planning, University at Buffalo, The State University
of New York, 335 Hayes Hall, Buffalo, NY 14214, USA

162 A. Krishna
From Central to Regional to Local: Evolution

of Archaeological Interest and Conservation
The fields of archaeology and antiquities in India preceded conservation by several

decades. Archaeology formally began in the middle of the eighteenth century,
through the antiquarian and archaeological explorations of several French, Danish‚
and British scholars (Chakrabarti 1999; Goswamy 2013; Guha 2003; Keay 2011;
Pant 2012). The establishment of the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1784 by Sir
William Jones, a leading Orientalist of his time, brought these explorations and
excavations within an institutional framework, leading to the development of formal
scholarship and research on archaeology and anthropology (Allchin 1978;
Chakrabarti 1999; Keay 2011; Pant 2012; Sen 2010; Sengupta 2013). With such
august beginnings, eighteenth-century archaeology and conservation eventually
came under the aegis of the Government of India (under the British East India
Company), with several initiatives to document archaeological and historical
resources through descriptions, measurements‚ and drawings (Pant 2012, p. 9).
These early origins are also important because they brought archaeology and
conservation within the same administrative framework, a practice that has con-
tinued in India for over one hundred and fifty years.
Throughout the early eighteenth century, successive Governor Generals of India
serving the British East India Company began to authorize and fund excavations
and explorations, and in some cases, repairs to sites of archaeological and anti-
quarian interest throughout the country (Pant 2012, p. 10). In the early part of the
nineteenth century, several repairs were carried out at monumental sites such as
Agra Fort and Sikandra in Agra, the walled city of Shahjahanabad in Delhi, the
palace in Padmanabhapuram‚ and Sultan Khusrau’s tomb in Oudh; these, however,
were carried out without much archaeological supervision or expertise (Pant 2012,
p. 10). In the early part of the nineteenth century, native rulers also sanctioned
preservation works. The then Nawab of Oudh, Saadat Ali Khan, for example,
approved funds for improvements and repairs to the Fort of Fatehgarh (Pant 2012,
p. 10). These earliest conservation attempts were, however, highly dependent on the
whims and fancies of those in power, and were therefore rather infrequent.
Archaeological explorations and discoveries continued to be sporadic into the
1830s: Francis Buchanan surveyed Mysore, and the Bengal Presidency, and Colin
Mackenzie examined south Indian antiquities (Chakrabarti 1999, p. 6). Excavations
were also carried out elsewhere in India: military officers worked on major Buddhist
stupas (hemispherical sacred structures containing relics) and Grecian remains and
idols in the north, and megaliths in the south of India (Chakrabarti 1999, p. 7).
The Government of India Act of 1858 brought about significant administrative
changes when power was transferred from British East India Company to the
British Crown. Alexander Cunningham, who had by then distinguished himself as
an archaeological and classical scholar with the Asiatic Society, campaigned for a
nationwide survey of archaeological and antiquarian resources. His persistent
efforts bore fruit, and the Archaeological Survey of India was created in 1861 to
9 From Alliance to Dissonance: Two Centuries of Local Archaeology … 163
excavate, list, document‚ and repair archaeological and architectural sites

(Chakrabarti 1999, p. 8; Government of India 2011; Keay 2011; Pant 2012).
Development of Archaeology and Conservation

in and Around Lucknow
Unlike the rest of the country, heritage-related conservation and archaeology ini-
tiatives in Lucknow gained momentum only towards the end of the nineteenth
century, even though there were significant efforts elsewhere in the region. There
are several probable reasons why archaeology and conservation came so late to the
city. First, the city of Lucknow had been a provincial capital throughout much of its
Nawabi1 phase (ca. 1731–1856). During this time, the city saw significant changes
and construction activity, especially with every new Nawab’s ascension to power
(Das 2008; Krishna 2014b; Llewellyn-Jones 2006; Praveen 1989, 2008). This was a
time for assertion of political power through prolific construction activity, much
like the British would do throughout Lucknow and the rest of the country for the
later part of nineteenth century (Oldenburg 1984; Sen 2010, p. 207). Given the
extensive construction activity during this period, it is not surprising that conser-
vation and archaeological excavations were not dominant in Lucknow until much
later. In the aftermath of the 1857 War of Independence (also referred to as The
Mutiny, or The Revolt of 1857 by scholars), Lucknow was one among many cities
that suffered extensive damage, especially to its significant historic buildings.
Post-1857, British engineers began a rebuilding and ‘modernizing’ campaign that
included laying down militarily advantageous wide avenues by destroying older
neighbourhoods, and constructing railways, bridges, and telegraph lines (Keay
2011, p. 48; Singh and Jafri 2011, p. 147). The Residency, the complex housing the
British Resident, suffered significant damage during the war. It was also the only
major site of extensive, deliberate‚ and politically motivated conservation efforts in
Lucknow immediately after the War (Llewellyn-Jones 1995, p. 56). Conservation
of vernacular built heritage and archaeological excavations were therefore not of
paramount importance during this period in Lucknow’s history.
Another reason why archaeological and conservation activity came to Lucknow
much later deals with Lucknow’s location among other, visibly monumental and
historical settlements. During much of the late nineteenth century, officers and scholars
from the Archaeological Survey of India had been focusing their archaeological
excavations and repairs on the Buddhist sites to the north and east of Lucknow, the
1
A Nawab was a native governor during the Mughal Empire, usually a Muslim nobleman of high
status.
164 A. Krishna
Mughal era (ca. sixteenth–seventeenth century) sites of Agra2 to the west, and other
historic settlements such as Mathura, Ayodhya‚ and Gorakhpur, among others (Beglar
and Carlleyle 1874; Carlleyle 1883, 1885; Cole 1873; Cunningham 1871a, b, 1873,
1875, 1880; Mukherji 1899). Mentions of conservation in Lucknow, if present, were
mostly in political contexts, or primarily related to the Residency complex.
Third, Lucknow’s significant historic built environment, when compared to the
monumental Mughal architecture of Delhi and Agra, fell short of the British aes-
thetic sensibilities, with one account terming them ‘the worst specimens in all India’
(Caine 1890, p. 276). As early as 1808, Lord Minto, the then Governor General of
India, appointed a Taj Committee to execute unprecedented and extensive repairs to
protect the Taj Mahal in Agra (Pant 2012, p. 12). In 1815, the Marquess of Hastings
directed conservation and repair activities at Fatehpur Sikri, Sikandra‚ and other
significant sites in Agra (Cole 1882, p. 4). The relative disregard for Lucknow’s
built heritage by the British was also evident between the 1860s and 1880s, when
two of the city’s most iconic and recognizable historic sites, the Asafi Imambara
(Fig. 9.1), and the adjacent Asafi Masjid (Fig. 9.2), part of the larger Fort Macchi
Bhawan area, were being used to store military equipment by British troops
(Government of North-Western Provinces and Oudh 1886a). The early neglect of
Lucknow’s historic resources was also a way for the Colonial regime to assert its
power: focusing on Mughal heritage elsewhere allowed the British Crown to por-
tray its rule as an extension of the mighty Mughals (Sengupta 2013). Mookherji in
1883, in fact, berated the British criticism of Lucknow’s architecture as
‘narrow-mindedness’ (Mookherji 1883, p. 211).
By the 1870s, provincial and city agencies began carrying out archaeology and
preservation-related works, but not in Lucknow. Between 1872 and 1876, most of the
preservation work focused on Agra Fort and Taj Mahal in Agra, and was carried out
by the Executive Engineer of Agra (Government of North-Western Provinces and
Oudh 1886a). In 1876, a special Archaeological Division of the Provincial Branch of
the Public Works Department was created and headquartered in Agra, a significant
local archaeology framework. Over the next two years, nearly ten lakh (one million)
rupees were spent on seven major archaeological and architectural sites in the region
including Agra Fort, Taj Mahal, Fatehpur-Sikri, Etmad-ud-daula’s Tomb‚ and Akbar’s
Tomb in Agra, monuments in Jaunpur, and Gobind Dewa’s Temple in Brindaban. In
1885, the Lieutenant-Governor of North-Western Provinces and Oudh removed the
special officer in the provincial Archaeological Division; instead, occasional repairs
2
Sites in Agra include the World Heritage Sites of Taj Mahal, Agra Fort‚ and Fatehpur Sikri. In
addition to these, other sites such as Sikandra, Itmad-ud-daula’s Tomb‚ and Rambagh Gardens are
among dozens that comprise Agra’s rich architectural and historical fabric dating to the Mughal
period. In fact, by the late nineteenth century, Agra’s sites had received significant attention from
the Government of the North-Western Provinces and Oudh and Government of India (Smith 1896,
1901). By 1889, a ‘Historical Monuments Committee’ was already in place to take care of not only
all the historical gardens in the area, but all the ‘monuments’ as well (Government of
North-Western Provinces and Oudh 1891).
Fig. 9.1 The Asafi Imambara, located in the historic precinct of Husainabad, is one of the most
iconic historic sites in the city of Lucknow. The main mausoleum (above, in 2013) is part of a
larger complex that includes a forecourt, the Asafi Masjid (mosque), an inner gateway, an outer
forecourt, outer gateway‚ and a stepwell. Image courtesy Michael Tomlan
Fig. 9.2 The Asafi Masjid (mosque, seen above in 2013) is part of the Asafi Imambara complex.
The mosque is located in the inner court, flanked by the inner three-arched gateway seen in the
background to the left of the image. The image, taken from the terrace of the main mausoleum
(Asafi Imambara) structure, encapsulates the monumentality of the complex. Image courtesy
Michael Tomlan
were undertaken by an officer working under the Executive Engineer of the Agra
Division Provincial Works, effectively ending the presence of an agency and an officer
wholly dedicated to archaeology and conservation in the region (Government of
166 A. Krishna
North-Western Provinces and Oudh 1886a). This lack of a dedicated officer is also
reflected in the contemporary city departments in Lucknow.
The next decade brought somewhat better alliances between the central,
provincial‚ and local governments. The Government of India appointed Major
Henry Hardy Cole as the first Curator of Ancient Monuments from January 1881 to
April 1884, during which time he produced three detailed reports on the preser-
vation of national monuments in India dated 1882, 1883‚ and 1885. The Curator’s
task was to ensure that each provincial government would prepare detailed
inventories of the archaeological and antiquarian resources within their province,
classified according to condition and ownership (Krishna 2014a, p. 367). The
provincial government also determined the agency that created the inventory, often
comprising district3 officials or officers of the Archaeological Division of the
Provincial Branch of the Public Works Department.
The purpose of these lists was for provincial governments to judiciously pre-
serve sites of archaeological and antiquarian importance within districts and pro-
vinces. Given the ‘local’ nature of this endeavour, the cost and administration of
these sites administered by the provincial government were borne by the local
Public Works Departments, even though the lists were commissioned by the
central-level Home Department (Archaeology). These lists were also meant to
encourage buildings under private ownership to be responsibly preserved, and
‘native’ sites from Lucknow were finally recognized as heritage for the first time
(Government of North-Western Provinces and Oudh 1886a; Krishna 2014a). These
lists, created by the provincial government, likely spurred on a period of significant
archaeological and preservation activity in the city. The Deputy Commissioner of
Lucknow, Lieutenant-Colonel HW Hastings, for example, supervised several
preservation and repair works of residential, institutional‚ and civic buildings
funded by the Lucknow city nazul4 fund for special projects (Government of
North-Western Provinces and Oudh 1886b).
The expiration of Cole’s term as Curator of Ancient Monuments in 1884 was
close to Cunningham’s retirement from the ASI in 1885, leaving an administrative
void at the central level. During his tenure, Cunningham pioneered extensive work
on topographical archaeology in the country (Chakrabarti 1999, p. 9). Upon
retirement, he recommended that the ASI be decentralized to allow provincial
governments to employ regional surveyors such as James Burgess and James
Fergusson (Chakrabarti 1999, p. 9). This led to administrative changes in the ASI in
1885, bringing central, provincial‚ and local governments closer when working on
preserving archaeological and historic sites. Surveyors of the ASI were made to
report to a provincial government rather than a department or a European officer
3
In India, districts are subdivisions within a state and can often comprise cities, towns‚ and
villages. Districts also have headquarters, often the largest town or city within their boundary. The
district of Lucknow, for example, is headquartered in the city of Lucknow.
4
The Nazul Land department was set up in the pre-independence era for controlling of revenue
land and collecting taxes from city residents who were given plots on lease.
elsewhere. That year, the Government of India, through its Home Department
(Archaeology), appointed Major J.B. Keith as Surveyor, Dr. Führer as Assistant
Surveyor‚ and Babu Purno Chander Mukherji as Draftsman to the North-Western
Provinces and Oudh Circle of the ASI, with the Public Works Department as their
local liaison. The Public Works Department was tasked with providing the officers
with a list of detailed descriptions and drawings of the architecturally and archaeo-
logically significant sites in the province (Government of North-Western Provinces
and Oudh 1886a). This was a significant step in creating an alliance between central,
provincial‚ and local governments for the purposes of archaeology and conservation.
In a letter to the Home Secretary of the Government of India, dated 14 October 1885,
Major Keith was appreciative of this move, expressing his belief that:
Each Surveyor ought to feel that he is working for the credit of a particular Province, of a
particular Local Government and not for the benefit of a particular department or a few
European Orientalists. He ought, above all things, to try and awaken a Native sympathy for
the work, an aim that has hitherto escaped notice. In a large country like India where there
are such divergences of style and so many peculiarities, it would be impossible to adopt one
uniform system of work. (Government of North-Western Provinces and Oudh 1886a)
Meanwhile, Lucknow’s continued role as a political and military centre meant

that the Lucknow cantonment was reorganized and redeveloped throughout 1860s
and 1870s, this time in a militarily strategic location near Dilkusha gardens
(Oldenburg 1984, p. 50). After the War of 1857, one of the oldest fort precincts in
the city, Fort Macchi Bhawan (construction date not known; demolished ca. 1890s),
and surrounding buildings such as palaces, residences‚ and religious buildings had
been confiscated and converted into military outposts and armed camps by the
British forces (Oldenburg 1984, p. 49). With the development of the new Lucknow
cantonment near Dilkusha, one of the largest in the Indian Empire, military oper-
ations housed within Fort Macchi Bhawan (Fig. 9.3) were evacuated by the
Military Department between 1883 and 1888. Buildings in the newly vacated Fort
Macchi Bhawan complex were subsequently divided: some were transferred to the
Nazul Department, the Asafi Imambara and Asafi Masjid to the Husainabad Trust,
and the rest to the Public Works Department. Unfortunately, within a five-year
period, all buildings except those under the Husainabad Trust were demolished for
development projects by the City Commissioner (Government of North-Western
Provinces and Oudh 1888). The demolition of Fort Macchi Bhawan, the city’s first
fortified precinct, was a significant loss to the city’s historic fabric, and set the
precedent for loss of archaeological and historical resources in the course of
development projects executed by the local government.
Between 1888 and 1890, the Colonial government continued listing archaeo-
logically and historically significant resources—albeit those with a British prove-
nance. Thirty-five tombs and cemeteries within the district of Lucknow were
included in the ‘List of Christian Tombs of Historical and other interest in the
North-Western Provinces and Oudh’. These were in addition to the eighty-nine
‘Historical British Monuments and Memorials worthy of preservation on account of
their public interest’ previously listed from Lucknow (Cole 1885). Consequently,
168 A. Krishna
Fig. 9.3 Felice Beato, Macchi Bhawan, print, albumen silver, w29.5 h24.3 cm, Lucknow,
1858. Digital Image Courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program. Partial Gift from the Wilson
Centre for Photography
by the turn of the nineteenth century, the number of British monuments and
memorials in Lucknow listed by the provincial government far exceeded those
considered of ‘native’ interest.
In June 1901, provincial governments in the country approved a memorandum that
allowed Surveyors of the Archaeological Survey of India to work closely as consul-
tants to the provinces within their jurisdiction, another significant ‘local’ alliance. That
same year, another list of buildings worthy of preservation was prepared for each
district in the North-Western Provinces and Oudh, and included sites from Lucknow
(Government of North-Western Provinces and Oudh 1901).
In 1906, the ASI was given a more permanent status by the Government of India
(Chakrabarti 1999, p. 14), creating the administrative framework that is still followed
today, comprising regional ‘Circles’, headed by a director-general at the Delhi
headquarters. Archaeology in India was also influenced first by Sir John Marshall
between 1902 and 1929, and then by Sir Robert Eric Mortimer Wheeler between 1944
and 1948 through their respective directorship of the Archaeological Survey of India
(Chadha 2002; Chakrabarti 1999, p. 14; Guha 2003; Wheeler 1966). John Marshall’s
Conservation Manual: A handbook for the use of Archaeological Officers and others
entrusted with the care of ancient monuments, published in 1923, has also been the
guiding policy document in the country for close to a century (Marshall 1923;
Sengupta 2013). This manual was only updated in 2014 to comply with contemporary
standards and guidelines (Archaeological Survey of India 2014). While Marshall
shaped conservation policy, Sir Mortimer Wheeler’s contributions were more in
archaeology. His extensive archaeological excavations, particularly in the Indus
Valley, lay the foundation for twentieth-century archaeology in India, especially
through his emphasis on archaeology as a scholarly endeavour and an academic craft
(Chakrabarti 1999, p. 16).
Provincially, meanwhile, in 1934, the Public Works Department of United
Provinces (formerly North-Western Provinces and Oudh) created a list of ‘monu-
ments’ that were not considered to be of national importance by the Government of
India. The list identified twenty-four sites from Lucknow out of a total of 185 from
elsewhere in the state (Government of United Provinces 1934). By this time, Lucknow
had a Municipal Board as well as a Lucknow Improvement Trust (which later became
Lucknow Development Authority) catering to civic, infrastructural‚ and development
initiatives in the city. Pursuant to the Government of India Act of 1935, however, all
the archaeological and preservation duties of the provincial government came under
the aegis of the Archaeological Survey of India, and effectively ended the decades of
alliances between central, provincial‚ and local systems for archaeology and conser-
vation (Government of India 2011).
Significant administrative and physical changes took place in the wake of the
Indian Independence in August 1947, and central, provincial‚ and municipal gov-
ernments were further reorganized in the subsequent decades. During this time, the
Archaeological Survey of India was also transitioning, but epigraphical, archaeo-
logical‚ and preservation work continued under successive directors-general, as
there was significant support from the government to expand archaeological re-
search in the country. Post-1947, the agency saw a significant increase in budgetary
allocations, staff‚ and regional branches (Chakrabarti 1999, p. 18). Several educa-
tional programmes in archaeology were also instituted in the period immediately
after Independence, to add to the excavations and explorations being done by the
ASI (Chakrabarti 2003; Ray and Sinopoli 2004). The decades between the 1930s
and 1960s, however, lay the foundation for separation of archaeological, preser-
vation‚ and planning efforts at central, state‚ and local levels, leading to the different
kinds of dissonance seen in contemporary Indian cities like Lucknow.
Dissonance in Local Urban Archaeology and Conservation:

Lucknow
As of 2015, the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) is the primary custodian of

roughly 3650 archaeological and cultural heritage sites designated as ‘national mon-
uments’, and conducts major archaeological excavations across the country—a
170 A. Krishna
deliberate, post-Independence centralization exercise (Chakrabarti 2003, p. 3). Since

the ASI’s inception in 1861, several legislative5 efforts have been implemented to
regulate and encourage archaeological and preservation activities in the country. The
Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act (AMASR Act) of
1958 and its 2010 Amendment are the most recent, prominent‚ and robust central
ordinance in existence. The National Monuments Authority (NMA), headquartered in
Delhi, was created as a consequence of the amendment, and oversees the regulation of
‘prohibited’ (up to 100 m) and ‘regulated’ areas (up to 200 m) around nationally
protected monuments and archaeological areas. The presence of major agencies for
heritage oversight, however, can often not be enough of a deterrent to adverse impacts
on historical resources brought on by ‘local’ actions. In May 2015, for example, part
of a 113-year-old historic structure in an old neighbourhood in Delhi, designated as
Heritage Grade B by the Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage
(INTACH), collapsed as a result of tunnel excavations for a new line of the Delhi
Metro (Verma 2015). This damage to a listed heritage structure occurred despite the
existence of a ‘Heritage Conservation Committee’ for Delhi.
Provincially, various state government agencies are tasked with archaeological
explorations, excavations, maintaining state museums‚ and the conservation of ‘state
monuments’. The role of state agencies in conducting archaeological and conservation
work varies widely, and was contested as far back as 1948, when the first Indian
director-general of the ASI, Niranjan Prasad Chakravarti, took office. While Chakravarti
welcomed the interest shown by state governments in ‘starting their own archaeological
departments’, he opposed any efforts at decentralizing archaeological excavations
(Chakrabarti 2003, p. 4). Fortunately, by 1951, there was clearer articulation in the
responsibilities of state governments and the regional ‘Circles’ of the ASI to allow for
local archaeological projects to be dealt with more efficiently (Chakrabarti 2003, p. 6).
More recently, however, this articulation has been lost, with very little overlap between
the ASI Circles and the state government agencies dealing with archaeology and her-
itage. At the local level, municipal agencies are often completely dependent on the ASI
or the state archaeology departments for conservation and archaeology-related activities.
In the state of Uttar Pradesh, for example, the Directorate of Archaeology6 is the
principal statewide agency responsible for excavations, epigraphy, conservation‚ and
protection of sites and ‘monuments’ designated at the state level under the provisions
5
Legislation related to the protection and designation of cultural heritage in India began with The
Treasure Trove Act of 1878. It was followed by the Ancient Monuments Preservation Act, passed
in 1904 under the then Government of India (under the British Crown) and applied also to those
historic sites that were privately owned. Post-Independence, the Government of India passed The
Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains Act (AMASR) in 1958, which is still
in effect. The rules pertaining to this Act were published in 1959. The Amendment to this Act was
finalized and passed in 2010.
6
The Directorate of Archaeology is one of the four directorates that are administered by the
Government of Uttar Pradesh’s Department of Culture. The others are Directorate of Museums,
Directorate of Culture and Bhatkhande Sangeet Sansthan. The state currently has only about one
hundred sites listed and protected under the 1956 Act.
of the U.P. Ancient and Historical Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains
Preservation Act of 1956. This is the strongest legislation within the state for the
excavation, designation‚ and protection of archaeological and historical sites and
resources. It is also, however, woefully inadequate and out of date. Between 1967 and
1995, the state agency designated only nine historic and archaeological sites within the
district of Lucknow (Directorate of Archaeology 2008b). Their principal focus and
staff expertise lie in archaeology, and the agency has successfully carried out several
archaeological excavations over the years (Directorate of Archaeology 2008a, c;
Subramanian 2015; Tiwari 2011). Hardly any of these excavations, however, have
been in Lucknow (Directorate of Archaeology 2008a, c; Tiwari 2011). The
Directorate’s last excavations in the district of Lucknow were between 1979 and 1987,
in the village of Hulas Khera, located about 25 km south of the city. This was a
significant find, with the excavations unearthing a site dating back to 1000 B.C.
(Directorate of Archaeology 2008a). More recently the Directorate’s work within
Lucknow has been limited to maintenance and conservation of ‘state monuments’
(Tiwari 2011). Similar to the ASI, the Directorate has very little say at the local level
of governance unless local actions pose a direct threat to their designated sites, or
unless municipal agencies expressly seek their assistance.
On the other end of the spectrum, local development and planning agencies in
Lucknow lack staff with expertise in dealing with historical and archaeological
resources and sites, and do not require an environmental impact survey, or a cultural
resources survey to issue building permits. This is of concern because the dearth of
local staff expertise and lack of legal frameworks requiring environmental assess-
ment pose a direct risk to the excavation, preservation‚ and management of
archaeological and historical resources during any construction project in a historic
area. It also results in very little clarity in how to treat archaeological resources
found during construction in sites outside of state or central jurisdiction. Such
resources are often either ignored, or worse, destroyed—sometimes inadvertently.
The city of Lucknow faced such problems during the urban conservation of
Hazratganj, a significant historic precinct in the city.
Hazratganj has historically been one of Lucknow’s most iconic, upscale‚ and
centrally located precincts, whose origins date back to 1810 (Krishna 2012;
Llewellyn-Jones and Kidwai 2011; Praveen 2008, 2010). In recent years, the area has
seen incredible construction activity to respond to growing commercial and other
functional needs, putting the precinct’s historic fabric and any buried archaeological
resources at risk. Concerns for the market street among private and public stakeholders
led to its revitalization in 2010 (Krishna 2012, 2014b). The project received funding
from the government of Uttar Pradesh for major infrastructural upgrades. Other parts
of the project, such as façade restoration, renovations‚ and signage control, were all
privately funded by members of the Hazratganj Traders Association (Krishna 2012,
2014b). Given the absence of specific local policies and ordinances that address the
treatment of cultural and historical resources, however, building permits for these
infrastructural upgrades and restoration works did not require any kind of preservation
oversight, and did not mandate studies or surveys to ensure that archaeological or
historical resources were not harmed during construction.
172 A. Krishna
It was therefore not surprising that the project in Hazratganj ran into
heritage-related problems. The area, established in 1810, was initially part of the
larger Hazratbagh, and evolved to include Chini Bazaar, Captain Bazaar, kothis
(vernacular bungalows)‚ and colonnaded buildings inspired by European archi-
tectural styles (Llewellyn-Jones and Kidwai 2011; Praveen 2008; Town and
Country Planning Department 1971). By 1824, Hazratganj was the ‘main street’ of
the city (Hay 1939, p. 124). For most of the nineteenth century, Lucknow was a
significant political centre under Colonial rule—it was also an important site in the
War of 1857 (Caine 1890, p. 275). While most Mutiny-related accounts focus on
the Residency complex, several officers’ accounts from the period describe the
movement of troops, and the gunfire exchanged between the British troops and the
‘mutineers’, especially in and around iconic structures such as Tara Kothi,
Khursheed Manzil, Begum Kothi, Moti Mahal and Shah Najaf Mosque, all located
in and around Hazratganj (Gordon-Alexander 1898; Innes 1895). In fact,
‘Huzrutgunge’ is mentioned as an important street strategically connecting the
British troops from Banks House to the Residency, clear from the 1938 map shown
in Fig. 9.4 (Innes 1895, p. 278). Lieutenant-Colonel William Gordon-Alexander of
Fig. 9.4 Hazratganj (2) has been a major commercial street connecting the Residency complex
(3) to the Government House (1), formerly known as Bank’s House. Image: Murray (1938)
Fig. 9.5 A memorial, seen above in 2013, was constructed in one of the newly designed plazas to
place and commemorate the cannon ball. The artefact, however, has little maintenance and is not
protected from the elements. Additionally, the words on the plaque are riddled with
inconsistencies: ‘The 68 Pounder Cannon Ball that played havoc in Ganj In March 1868 raising
to the ground every monument which had a claim to beauty and Grandeur of our Ganj’. Historical
accounts suggest that the date here should be March 1858. The reference to the ball razing ‘every
monument’ is rather inaccurate, as there is no evidence of such an event. The interpretation of the
cannon ball and its role in Hazratganj (Ganj) can be re-evaluated for a more accurate narrative.
Photograph by A. Krishna
the 93rd Highlanders also recounted the firing of ‘shot and shell’ into Hazratganj on
10 March 1858 (Gordon-Alexander 1898, p. 241).
In December 2010, construction workers were digging a trench to lay the foun-
dation for a new electricity transformer when they discovered a cannon ball at a depth
of about 1.2 m, shown on display in Fig. 9.5 (HT Correspondent 2010, 2011; Times
News Network 2010a, b). The location of the find was in very close proximity to the
Sibtainabad Imambara, another site that played a role in the events of 1857–58.
Finding artefacts in this area, therefore, was not surprising, and should have been
anticipated. During the same period, construction workers also found bricks inscribed
with ‘1882’, leading to speculation on the existence of a tunnel, a drain, or a
brick-paved road in the excavated area (Times News Network 2010a). Historians
believe the cannon ball was probably from the attack on the Imambara on 14 March
1858, which allowed the British troops to advance towards Kaiserbagh (Little 2010;
Times News Network 2011). Various officers’ accounts from the nineteenth century
also suggest the same (Gordon-Alexander 1898; Innes 1895).
Given the level of historical activity in the area, it is likely that significantly more
archaeological resources exist below the surface in areas that were not disturbed by
174 A. Krishna
recent construction activity. Owing to the lack of clarity in dealing with the dis-
covery of such archaeological resources, however, the items were removed from
site, and construction carried on with no further archaeological or historical surveys
to determine whether other such resources could be affected by construction in the
area. The fate of the unearthed artefacts was also uncertain for some time. At first,
both the cannon ball and the bricks from 1882 were to be taken to the Residency
Museum, which already houses several artefacts from the 1857–58 period.
Eventually, however, they were kept in a store room of the Lucknow Development
Authority, the principal city agency carrying out work in Hazratganj. The cannon
ball was examined by a member of the Lucknow Circle of the ASI, and it was also
suggested by them that if found to be from the 1857–58 era, the cannon ball could
be ‘preserved by state archaeology, museum or even by ASI’ (HT Correspondent
2010). Later that year, in November 2011, construction workers digging a pit in
Dayanidhan Park in Lalbagh (a few minutes’ walk from Hazratganj, shown in
Fig. 9.6) came upon a small 110-cm-long cannon, similar to what had already been
found at the same site in 2001 (TNN 2011). Similar to the Hazratganj case, there
was very little clarity in which agencies would be involved in examining the
cannon, and there was no mechanism to halt construction and carry out cultural
surveys at the site to investigate the possibility of more artefacts.
Fig. 9.6 This plan shows the central and historically important location of the Hazratganj market
street along Mahatma Gandhi Marg. The locations of the discovery of a cannon ball (B) and two
cannons in ten years (A) suggest that there may be a lot more archaeological resources yet
undiscovered, and many more from the past that may not have been made public
Given the important role of archaeology, preservation‚ and planning in cities

today, this kind of ambiguity does not bode well for future artefacts unearthed in
urban areas, and points to a systemic problem. While the respective central and state
legislations of 2010 and 1958 provide legal frameworks for sites protected by the
concerned agencies, there is no clarity on safeguarding and protecting sites and
artefacts that fall out of their ‘protected’ areas. According to the Indian Treasure
Trove Act of 1878,7 the responsibility for such artefacts falls on the local admin-
istration, often headed by a District Collector (DC), a District Magistrate (DM), a
Commissioner, or a Deputy Commissioner, as the case may be (Government of
India 1878). While the Act assigns the relevant local authority with the responsi-
bility to decide the future of the artefacts found, the role of the finder‚ and the owner
of the site of discovery, it lacks provisions for any further explorations to be done to
ensure that construction activity does not harm any other buried archaeological or
surface historical resources.
The various archaeological finds in the process of routine construction and urban
infrastructural upgrades highlight the dissonance between local, state‚ and central
agencies in administering archaeological and historical resources. There are cur-
rently no legal provisions at the state or local level to halt construction for further
investigation, especially in case of unexpected archaeological finds as found in and
around Hazratganj. In addition, the regional ASI Circle often do not get involved in
local projects unless they fall within the prescribed perimeter of a national monu-
ment. They need the cooperation of local authorities to get involved in archaeo-
logical finds outside their jurisdiction. In Bangalore, Karnataka, for example,
construction workers unearthed an 11-ft cannon in May 2015 while digging to lay
the foundation for a building in the Bangalore Medical College and Research
Institute campus (Reddy 2015; TNN 2015). The cannon was discovered outside,
but close to Tipu Sultan’s Palace, and is widely believed to belong to his eigh-
teenth–century arsenal. The Superintending Archaeologist of the Bangalore ASI
Circle, however, needed the City Commissioner’s permission before getting
involved (Reddy 2015; Staff Reporter 2015b). In November 2012, similar cannons
and balls were discovered in the K.R. Market area of Bangalore while excavating
for the Bangalore Metro tunnels, and they eventually found their way into the hands
of the State Department of Archaeology (Reddy 2015; Staff Reporter 2015a, b).
While the cannons found in 2012 in Bangalore were put in the backyard of the
Venkatappa Art Gallery and Government Museum (state), the artefacts found in
Hazratganj, Lucknow, in 2011, did not meet a similar fate (Staff Reporter 2015b).
In early 2011, the cannon ball was put on display (Fig. 9.5) in front of Capoors
Hotel as a reminder of the events that occurred in Hazratganj during the War of
1858. It is unclear though, why this particular location was chosen instead of the
area in front of the Sibtainabad Imambara gateway (B in Fig. 9.6), where the
7
The Indian Treasure Trove Act of 1878 defines the competent authority as: ‘Collector’ means
(1) any revenue officer in independent charge of a district, and (2) any officer appointed by the
[Provincial Government] to perform the functions of a Collector under this Act.
176 A. Krishna
cannon ball was originally found, and where its interpretation would have been
more appropriate. Incidences like this, especially in historically important cities like
Lucknow, highlight the dissonance and ambiguity in administering archaeological
and historical resources that are unearthed in the process of various kinds of con-
struction activity.
Needed: Local Archaeology and Preservation Programmes

in Lucknow
Cities like Lucknow lack archaeological, architectural‚ and preservation-related

expertise within their municipal framework, much to their detriment. Existing
expertise comes from either private practitioners, or state or central agencies whose
guidance can be either curbed by their jurisdiction, or by the reluctance of local
agencies to involve them for bureaucratic reasons. The discovery of artefacts during
construction at Hazratganj, though relatively minor, highlighted the dissonance in
administering archaeology and conservation through central, state‚ and local agencies,
and point to the need for significant changes. The century-old alliances between
central, state‚ and local agencies could be revived to resolve issues related to cultural
heritage. First, as representatives of the principal agency in the country, officers of the
regional Circles of the ASI would need to play a more significant role in situations
where archaeological artefacts are unearthed. This would not only include examining
and documenting the objects, but storing, researching‚ and interpreting them as well.
Agencies like the Lucknow Development Authority or the Lucknow Municipal
Corporation do not have trained staff to handle artefacts, nor do they have special
facilities for storing them. An expanded ASI role would also mean that other urban
conservation projects in the city could be more collaborative, rather than avoiding the
complications of various levels of bureaucracy.
Second, the State Directorate of Archaeology would also need to play a bigger and
more vocal role not only in archaeological excavations in prehistoric sites of the state,
but also in conservation, preservation‚ and heritage management within urban centres
like Lucknow. Its participation in the Hazratganj conservation project was conspicu-
ous by its absence. An expanded role, however, would also mean an expansion in
personnel to cater to more interdisciplinary projects within urban areas.
Third, even with better participation from the central and state agencies, the city
government in Lucknow needs a department cell that employs trained staff who can
liaise in such projects, especially in historic areas like Hazratganj where chances of
finding archaeological artefacts are high. This cell, created with systems and
mechanisms particular to Lucknow, could be very useful in ensuring compliance
with all heritage laws, ensure that local agencies carry out their projects responsibly,
and facilitate the documentation and listing of local heritage and archaeological
resources. Agra Municipal Corporation (Agra Nagar Nigam) for example, created a
‘Heritage Cell’ in 2006 in collaboration with an NGO, with funding from the
Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM). They employed

trained professionals to document historic resources in the city not listed by the
central and state agencies, and created heritage walks to promote sustainable her-
itage tourism (Center for Urban and Regional Excellence 2006, p. 40; Shrestha
et al. 2014, p. 200). More recently, the Agra Development Authority (ADA) created
a ‘Heritage Cell’ in June 2014, along the lines of a Landmarks Preservation
Commission, comprising representatives of the ADA, the district administration,
the ASI and civil society members from various NGOs including the INTACH.
This local committee aims to create a plan of action for documenting and preserving
historic resources in the city (Dev 2014).
While this Heritage Cell is a much-needed local effort in a very historic city, it is
still lacking ways for local agencies to have accountability in archaeologically
sensitive areas. A local Heritage Cell for Lucknow could build upon the Agra
model, and in addition to documentation and preservation, help facilitate and
mitigate urban situations concerning cultural heritage. This could also ensure that
city agencies such as Lucknow Development Authority and Lucknow Municipal
Corporation can carry out their routine projects without adversely impacting his-
toric or archaeological resources. In cases like the discovery of the cannon and
cannon ball in Hazratganj, a Heritage Cell could ensure that further investigation is
carried out to see whether other artefacts exist in the area. They could also ensure
that the artefacts are stored, conserved‚ and interpreted appropriately. Such a system
would enable staff of the Heritage Cell to be local enforcement agents, and liaise
with the ASI to intervene in historic and archaeological sites, mitigating
encroachments and damage to them. Cities have to take responsibility for their own
archaeological and historical resources before they are lost to the pressures of
development, and learning from Lucknow’s own history, cooperative alliances
between central, state‚ and local agencies would be a step in the right direction.
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Part II
The Challenges and Accomplishments
of Local Government Archaeology
Programs in the United States
Chapter 10
Toward a Theory of Municipal
Archaeology: Why Local Government
Should Become Public Archaeology’s New
Best Friend
Douglas R. Appler
Introduction
For most archaeologists working in the field of cultural resource management

(CRM) in the USA, government involvement in archaeology usually involves
responding to federal laws, including Section 106 of the National Historic
Preservation Act of 1966 (NHPA), the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA),
or Section 4f of the Department of Transportation Act. In this context, government
archaeology is driven by actions that trigger the federal permitting process, or by
the expenditure of federal funds. If those actions have the potential to negatively
impact properties listed or eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic
Places, archaeologists may be called into evaluate and possibly mitigate that
damage through excavation and recording of the site. The cost of conducting this
archaeology is generally borne by the agency initiating the federal undertaking, by
the state agency using federal funds to initiate an undertaking, or by the private
party seeking a required federal permit.
NHPA and the associated environmental protection legislation that created the
modern federal preservation framework were major accomplishments at the time of
their enactment and have resulted in the identification of over 90,000 historic and
archaeological sites across the country (NPS 2016). Over time, however, the gaps in
this system have become both more apparent, and more clearly in need of attention
on the part of the archaeological community. Arguably the most significant gap is
that archaeological resources on private property are offered minimal protection
through federal preservation legislation. The review procedures specified in NHPA
only apply to federal undertakings, not to purely private actions, and the more
powerful protection offered by Section 4f only applies to resources threatened by
D.R. Appler (&)

Department of Historic Preservation, University of Kentucky, 117 Pence Hall,
Lexington, KY 40506, USA

184 D.R. Appler
federally funded transportation projects. At both the federal and the state levels,
archaeological sites located on public land are much more likely to be afforded legal
protection than are archaeological sites on private land, though state regulations do
typically offer some protection for burial sites, and individual states have protected
special categories of archaeological sites.1 The result is that most privately owned
archaeological sites, even those listed on the National Register of Historic Places,
can be freely disturbed by their owners. As such, there is a need for a new,
supplemental, system that can protect archaeological sites from destruction by
private action.
A second major gap in the federal preservation framework is simply the scale at
which it was designed to operate. It is federal legislation designed to address threats
created by federal undertakings and is largely administered by the state historic
preservation offices for each state (which were created by federal legislation—
NHPA). It was never designed to address the problems or opportunities created by
local actions, conditions, or circumstances. The decisions made by the state historic
preservation office when carrying out the review process are often guided by local
input, and that input is typically a major part of the SHPO’s decision-making
process (Potts 2012). However, by virtue of the scale of Section 106 projects,
members of the public in this context are stakeholders, not decision makers. The
work is done under the conditions specified, and to the degree required, by federal
law, and the SHPO is generally responsible for determining when the demands of
those laws have been met. The importance of the local perspective is necessarily
diminished by virtue of being one of many perspectives that must be considered
before a federal undertaking affecting a listed historic resource can proceed. Along
with the need for administrative efficiency and the public’s lack of familiarity with
federal preservation legislation (Klima 2012), this may represent one of the possible
reasons why SHPOs increasingly struggle to engage with the public on Section 106
projects. The “project by project” nature of federal CRM archaeology may be
another reason. The local population’s exposure to archaeology may last only as
long as the project is under construction.
If archaeologists want to encourage the protection of archaeological resources from
private actions, on private property, while encouraging a stronger connection between
the public and the past, they would be wise to explore the experiences of cities and
counties that have developed their own relationship with archaeology. As several
chapters in this volume make clear, a number of municipalities within the USA
approach the management of archaeological resources from a local perspective. Some
of these communities have been refining their relationship with archaeology for
decades, while in others that relationship is relatively new. Some have emphasized
regulation and process, while others have sought to make public education their
primary goal. While their methods and objectives may vary, these programs provide a
way of addressing both of the flaws identified above: They are developed with the
1
The Kentucky Cave Protection Act, for example, makes disturbing archaeological sites within
caves a misdemeanor (Kentucky Revised Statutes 433. 871–885).
10 Toward a Theory of Municipal Archaeology 185
needs of local residents in mind, and they offer a measure of protection for archae-
ological sites located on private property. This chapter explores the ways in which
local archaeology programs address these two issues. The first section recognizes
characteristics or traits often found in different municipal archaeology programs that
can be used to cultivate an archaeologically savvy citizenry and that can engender a
sense of guardianship for archaeological resources and information. It explores how
the production and use of this knowledge allows a reconceptualization of the role of
archaeology in public life. While the idiosyncratic nature of these programs makes it
difficult to make blanket statements that can be applied to all archaeology carried out
through local government, there are several traits that many of these programs seem to
have recognized and used to their advantage. Different governments may capitalize on
each to different degrees, but all communities seeking to engage with archaeology
should be aware of their existence.
The second half of the chapter explores how a variety of local governments have
approached the idea of archaeological regulation. Because each community is,
generally, trying to achieve a similar goal and is operating within the boundaries of
US law, it is not surprising that there are similarities in the regulations as written.
These similarities may serve as “starting points” or “best practices” for other
communities as they begin to develop their own archaeology regulations. There are,
of course, also many differences between the regulations found in different com-
munities. These differences may be a result of local political constraints, the types
and sensitivity of the archaeological resources present, or other factors. The end
result, however, is that archaeological resources are offered a measure of protection
through the application of local land-use regulations that make archaeological
review a mandatory part of the development review process.
Characteristics of Successful Municipal Archaeology

Programs that Can Encourage Community Ownership,
Understanding of, and Use of Archaeological Information
Seeing the Entire City as an Archaeological Site
The first of these recurring characteristics relates to the way archaeologists working in
local government are guided by modern political boundaries. Because land develop-
ment can take place virtually anywhere in a city, municipal archaeologists must
understand how all lands within the community have been used, shaped, and changed
by different historical forces over time. Rather than becoming an expert in one period
of history, or in one field of human activity, these archaeologists must apply the same
level of expertise to all archaeologically visible activities that have taken place within
the limits of the modern city. From the earliest Native American or Colonial sites to
those associated with the recent past, municipal archaeologists must be able to com-
municate the significance of any artifact recovered anywhere in the city.
186 D.R. Appler
Being sensitive to modern boundaries does not mean that archaeologists can be
unaware of how their city fits into broader regional, national, or global narratives.
That is part of what allows archaeologists to discuss the significance of the infor-
mation they recover. It does, however, create opportunities for understanding the
development of one community from many different intersecting perspectives,
drawing together multiple eras of history, and different social forces, to be under-
stood not at the relatively abstract scale of the region, but at the much more personal
scale of the city. This approach can only be used to its full extent, however, if the
archaeologists have built a research program around questions that are capable of
contextualizing and linking the information being recovered from all corners of the
city, and all eras of its past. One community that has in many ways set the standard
for the using the “city as site” concept and building a successful research program
to accompany it is Alexandria, Virginia.
The “city as site” perspective is a very pluralistic framework on which to build a
research program, particularly when historical land-use patterns are used to inform
discourses surrounding ethnicity and socioeconomic status, as they have been in
Alexandria for much of that program’s existence (Cressey 1979; Bromberg et al.,
this volume). Understanding how cities change over time requires understanding
the contributions of all the city’s diverse populations, and how they shaped the city
as a specific geographic place. If a city’s archaeologists are given the freedom to
develop a research program that is based on the city as a whole, rather than on just a
handful of already identified historic sites, the contributions of ethnic or social
groups that are less visible in the historical record may be allowed to come to the
forefront. This can have very real consequences in terms of how the city’s history is
portrayed and understood, and it can directly influence who may develop an interest
in the city’s past.
Alexandria’s decades-long effort to raise the historical profile of the city’s
African American population provides one way of exploring this process. When the
city hired its first professional archaeologist, Pamela Cressey, in 1977, the city’s
Colonial-era and Civil War histories were the primary beneficiaries of local resi-
dents’ archaeological interests (Appler 2015). By adopting a “city as site”-based
approach to research, it became clear that the role of African Americans in shaping
the city had not been sufficiently developed. As a result of this determination, for
nearly four decades, the city has actively sought to recover information that relates
to the African American experience in all parts of the city, tied to a broad range of
historical themes. The archaeology program has helped to tell the story of slaves
held by what was once one of the largest slave-trading firms in the USA; it has told
the story of many free black communities in different parts of the city; by
researching and memorializing the city’s Freedmen’s Cemetery it has told the story
of slaves escaping to the city and to freedom during the Civil War; it has explored
the process of post-Civil War land purchase and development by African American
families at Fort Ward; it has documented African American churches, businesses,
schools, social organizations, and many other aspects of African American life.
The archaeological sites that have helped to tell this story are located throughout
the city, many in areas not previously thought of as being historic or recognized for
their pasts. The emphasis on valuing information from all corners of the city, not
just in its historic districts, has helped Alexandria to communicate the multifaceted
nature of its history. It has also helped to build a citizenry that is unusually well
versed in, and comfortable using, its history (Appler 2015).
Archaeologists operating from this “city as site” perspective must also under-
stand the importance of the city’s modern population as a product of the same
forces that have shaped the community over time. If the research design values the
process of urban change, and the modern population is a product of that urban
change, the local population, its geographic distribution, its history, beliefs, values,
and priorities are of fundamental importance to the ability of the archaeologist to
understand the relevance of information recovered from the past. By emphasizing
that the process of urban growth and change links historical forces to the population
living in the modern city, archaeologists have to see the current population as
archaeologically relevant. The process of reinterpreting Alexandria’s Fort Ward
Park, discussed by Francine Bromberg later in this book, helps to illustrate how
modern residents with personal and familial ties to a historic site can be of fun-
damental importance to shaping the local need for, and use of, archaeological
information.
Local Government Means Local Priorities
Archaeology programs developed through local government have a tremendous

opportunity to be shaped, guided, and respond to the values and priorities of local
citizens. The federal government has very different needs, and has access to very
different resources, than any local government in the USA. As a result, federal
preservation regulations that were developed to meet those needs should not nec-
essarily be understood as the ideal model for protecting or recovering information
in the very different political and cultural environment found at the local level.
Local governments are more likely to be aware of local conditions and needs, they
can identify and collaborate with the appropriate stakeholder groups, they can form
different types of working relationships with those stakeholders, and they can be
much more nimble in their response to archaeological issues and opportunities as
they arise.
As is discussed in his chapter describing the development of the archaeology
program in Phoenix, Arizona, the former city archaeologist, Todd Bostwick,
worked closely with the Salt River Pima–Maricopa Indian Community, the Gila
River Indian Community, the Fort McDowell Indian Community, and the Arizona
State Museum to establish city policy that would provide for the respectful treat-
ment of Native American burial sites when they are inadvertently discovered in city
projects. In such an event, a media blackout ensues. The site is blocked from public
view, it is not photographed, its location is not publicized, and both tribal
188 D.R. Appler
representatives and the Arizona State Museum are notified (Bostwick 2006, p. 17). In
addition, any cloth placed on the grave sites must be made of muslin. This not only
helps to prevent vandalism of the site, but it also helps to make sure that the remains
and the affiliated descendant communities are treated with dignity and respect. This is
a textbook example of archaeology at the local government level being shaped
according to local values and priorities. While all local governments in the state are
obligated to notify the Arizona State Museum when Native American burials are
inadvertently discovered, state law does not require the level of protection or privacy
required by the city’s policy, and the inadvertent discovery provisions of the Native
American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) only apply to federal or
tribal lands. The end result is a cooperative arrangement that recognizes the members
of the Native American community as major stakeholders in the decision-making
process that determines how burial sites will be treated. The agreement is a reflection
of the ability of local archaeologists, public officials, the Arizona State Museum, and
the Native American community to work collaboratively to develop regulations and
policies that apply to specific local conditions.
Though they will be discussed in greater detail in the second half of this chapter,
local archaeological protection ordinances are invariably also crafted in response to
local archaeological and political conditions. As such they, perhaps more than any
other metric, demonstrate how local priorities can drive innovation in cultural
resource management practice. It would not make sense, for example, for one city
to adopt another’s archaeological protection legislation whole cloth without sub-
stantial modification to target specific resource areas, or gaps in local archaeological
knowledge, or without having significant conversations between local archaeo-
logical advocates, property owners, developers, and politicians to determine what
level of intervention is appropriate. These components of local regulations and
these steps in their creation must all be determined locally, by members of the
community whose resources are to be subject to the regulations.
Local Residents Are Both Generators and Consumers

of Archaeological Knowledge
A third trait shared by many successful municipal archaeology programs is that

local residents are recognized as both the generators and primary consumers of the
program’s archaeological knowledge. Some of those residents are more actively
mobilized as volunteers in the production of information, while others may
encounter that information as researchers or students, but in these communities,
interaction with archaeological information by local residents is a recognized goal.
These communities typically treat the research process as an opportunity to kindle
the public’s interest, to build camaraderie among archaeology enthusiasts, and as a
way to build a corps of informed local citizens. They recognize that the process of
assisting in archaeological research is, in and of itself, a highly enjoyable type of
interpretation. Volunteers certainly have a more memorable experience and a better

understanding of the meticulous nature of archaeology when they can, for example,
help screen dirt as it comes out of the ground. These programs frame archaeological
research as an opportunity for volunteerism—building community while recovering
archaeological information. They also take advantage of the fact that people
involved in the production of archaeological information will also be likely
advocates for the use of that information. These individuals are less likely to be
satisfied with interpretive media that are out of date or that do not change to reflect
current thought or questions. Similarly, interpretive programming that specifically
targets local residents with thought-provoking interpretation and meaningful pub-
lications, talks, or Web sites as a matter of course, is a fundamentally different “final
product” than an archaeological report filed in a local library or museum. Putting
local residents on equal footing with future researchers as the audience for infor-
mation recovered through archaeology requires additional work, but greatly
improves the likelihood of meaningful interaction with the past.
Anne Arundel County, Maryland; St. Augustine, Florida; and Boston,
Massachusetts provide excellent examples of how local residents can assist in the
research process while also learning about their community’s history. In Anne
Arundel County, the Cultural Resources Division of the Planning and Zoning
Department invites volunteers to “…dig alongside the County’s professional
archaeologist, volunteer in our lab, or research the County’s past at the Maryland
State Archives” (Anne Arundel County 2015). Each of those three activities gen-
erates new knowledge and provides a learning experience for the volunteer. In St.
Augustine, the city’s archaeologist, Carl Halbirt, depends entirely upon the avail-
ability of a core group of volunteers to provide a labor force for the city’s mandated
excavations (Halbirt and Miller, this volume). As in Anne Arundel County, the
practice of volunteering both fills a need for the local government and creates an
interpretive opportunity. Similarly, in Boston, volunteers are essential for the labor
they provide on archaeological excavations, for their help in processing artifacts as
they come in from the field, and for developing content for the broader public
through the archaeology program’s Facebook page (Bagley, this volume). Each of
those steps is an opportunity not only for learning about the city’s past, but for
developing the history that becomes available to others.
The Longevity of City Archaeology Programs
Archaeologists working in local government enjoy another characteristic that dis-

tinguishes their work from that of their colleagues laboring under other circum-
stances. Municipal archaeologists do not have to pack up their trowels and look for
the next job when the current project is finished. They can plan on being present in
the community not only for the duration of a particular excavation or season, but
indefinitely (or at least until the city decides to stop funding their position). To
illustrate this point, the cities of Alexandria, Phoenix, St. Augustine, and Anne
190 D.R. Appler
Arundel County all currently have, or until very recently had, archaeologists on
staff with more than 20 (and in some cases more than 30) years of experience
working in the same city. With that longevity comes the opportunity to develop
relationships with others in the city, to establish side projects, and to tap into deep
community knowledge that allows the program to grow and to partner with the
public in new and unexpected ways. In his chapter discussing the archaeology
regulations in Phoenix, for example, Todd Bostwick makes clear that establishing a
culture of respect for archaeology, even among other City departments, was a
long-term project. In Anne Arundel County, this timeline allowed archaeologist Al
Luckenbach, his colleagues, and volunteers to develop the Lost Towns Project as a
nonprofit organization that could respond to archaeological research opportunities
that the county government could not necessarily pursue through regulation alone
(Furgerson 2014). The Lost Towns Project has recovered information from
numerous Colonial-era and more recent historic sites, as well as the Pig Point site,
which may be one of the most important prehistoric sites in the Chesapeake region
(Luckenbach 2009; Kille and Ware 2012). The gradual development of the
Alexandria Contrabands and Freedmen’s Cemetery Memorial and the newly
re-examined story of the families who lived at Fort Ward following the Civil War
represent projects in which archaeology played a major role, but in which that role
was only possible because of the knowledge accumulated over decades of working
with community members on these and related issues. Both projects will be dis-
cussed in greater detail in the Alexandria chapter.
This long-term view also has very concrete side effects in terms of the ability of
the program to function as a repository for archaeological knowledge. In
Alexandria, the Archaeology Museum houses not only the finished reports of sites
that have been excavated, but also the insurance maps, historical tax records, oral
history transcripts, property records, church directories, aerial photographs, Civil
War records, family photographs, and other documentary evidence that allows the
city’s archaeologists to carry out their long-term research goals. A good research
facility, like relationships with community members, takes time to develop.
Local Government Has Unique Powers and Authorities

that Can Greatly Facilitate Archaeological Protection
The ability of local government to provide a measure of archaeological review prior

to private development projects is one power that will be discussed in greater detail
later in the chapter. But development regulations only comprise one way in which
local government may use its authority for archaeological protection. Another tool
that local government possesses stems from its obligation to develop and operate
community facilities, such as public parks, municipal buildings, greenways, and
transportation enhancements (Fig. 10.1).
Fig. 10.1 The sculpture “Truths that Rise from Roots Remembered” by Jerome Meadows is a
central feature in Alexandria’s African American Heritage Park. The sculpture is inscribed with the
names of organizations and individuals who played a prominent role in the city’s African
American history. The sculpture also identifies historic African American neighborhoods
throughout the city. The park provides one example of a city amenity developed to draw
attention to information recovered through archaeology (photograph by D.R. Appler)
Anne Arundel County’s Historic London Towne and Gardens represents one
example of a community amenity that is owned by local government and that was
created in order to protect historic and archaeological resources. In Phoenix, the city
accepted ownership of the Pueblo Grande platform mound in 1924 and subse-
quently made it the centerpiece of the Pueblo Grande Museum (Wilcox 1993,
p. 89). In Alexandria, Fort Ward Park, the Contrabands and Freedmen’s Cemetery
Memorial, African American Heritage Park, and Alexandria Archaeology Museum
all speak to the ability of local government to protect archaeological sites and
information by creating community amenities. St. Augustine provides probably the
oldest example in the country of a city protecting a public space that doubles as an
archaeological site, though its circumstances are quite unusual. The city’s central
plaza, the Plaza de la Constitucion, has been a public square since 1598 (founded in
1565 by the Spanish, St. Augustine is the oldest continually occupied European city
in the continental USA). While the creation of the square obviously predated its
recognition as an archaeological site, maintaining its status as protected city land for
over four centuries has preserved significant archaeological deposits (Halbirt 1996).
192 D.R. Appler
Those deposits will likely stay in place, and if they do not, they will be profes-
sionally excavated, analyzed, interpreted, and made available to the public.
Mandating Archaeology Through Local Development

Regulations
The second goal of this chapter is to explore the different ways archaeology has
been included in the development review process for several different cities. Not
surprisingly, there are both similarities and significant differences in how local
governments across the country accomplish this goal. The regulation of land use on
private property in the USA generally falls to local government. As inefficient as it
may be, it is up to each of the nearly 39,000 local governments in the USA to
determine what steps a property owner must take before he or she can “turn dirt” for
a new house, a new subdivision, or a new commercial development (U.S. Census
Bureau 2012).
For those who have not had reason to become familiar with local land devel-
opment regulations, a few words of guidance might be helpful. Generally speaking,
cities and counties in the USA exercise their state-granted governing authority by
passing and enforcing ordinances that promote and protect the public health, safety,
and welfare. Those ordinances are communicated to the public either in the form of
a unified city or county code, or in a similar collection of ordinances. Believing that
the orderly and efficient development of the community is in the public interest,
most local governments in the USA have adopted zoning ordinances, subdivision
regulations, building codes, and similar restrictions as part of their city or county
code.
Most communities that have adopted archaeological protection regulations have
done so by inserting language into their zoning ordinances. Arguably the most
important part of that language is the question of how archaeology should be
connected to ground disturbing activities, and most communities have done this by
linking archaeological review to the application for a building permit. This linkage
represents the most frequently encountered similarity in US ordinances. Alexandria,
VA; St. Augustine, FL; Miami-Dade County, FL; Albuquerque, NM; Santa Fe,
NM; San Antonio, TX; Anne Arundel County, MD; New York City; and Albany,
NY, among others have all adopted some type of regulations specifying that there
are conditions under which archaeological review will be required before the per-
mitting process can move forward. For local developers, nothing except project
financing is more important than obtaining a building permit, and this requirement
makes sure that they take their archaeological review seriously.
What follows is a review of the language used in several of these ordinances to
require archaeological review. In St. Augustine, the ordinance is quite clear.
Section 6-6 of the city’s Code of Ordinances outlines the type and size of
disturbances that require an applicant to submit an archaeology review form and

unambiguously declares that “No building, right-of-way, or utility permit will be
issued by the city until the archaeology application has been submitted and the
applicable archaeology fees have been paid.” In Santa Fe, section 14.5-3 of the City
Code requires an “Archaeological Clearance Permit” prior to the issuance of
building permits for projects in its Historic Downtown Archaeological Review
District and before the approval of the final development plan for its other two
archaeological districts. In Miami-Dade County, section 16A-14 of the Code of
Ordinances requires a “Certificate to Dig” for virtually any significant activity
within an archaeological zone, salvage archaeology may be a condition for the
certificate, and no applications to other county agencies that involve ground dis-
turbing activities may be approved if an applicant has not first obtained a certificate
to dig. Borrowing language from its historic preservation districts, section 375-36C
of the Code of the City of Albany requires a certificate of appropriateness for
excavating in previously identified areas of archaeological sensitivity. Other cities,
including Alexandria, tie archaeological review to site plan review without
specifically creating an archaeology permit, but they follow the same basic process
of using the “carrot” of a building permit to lead developers through the various
steps of archaeological review (Bromberg et al., this volume). Similarly, in New
York City, any developer requesting a discretionary permit, meaning proposing a
building larger or taller than allowed by a normal building permit, must undergo an
environmental review, which includes determining whether the site has archaeo-
logical potential, and undertaking archaeological testing if the site is significant
(Baugher, this volume).
A Publicly Available “Archaeological Areas” Map
Another element shared by several successful city archaeology ordinances is the use
of a map that identifies areas of high probability for archaeological sites. An “ar-
chaeological areas” map is important for many reasons, but among the most
important is that the research determining the boundaries of the archaeological
zones helps to establish the nature of the resources present in different parts of the
community. For developers, surprise discoveries are not usually a good thing, and
any pre-excavation research that can give property owners or developers advanced
warning of what their land might contain is generally welcome. The research behind
the map may also help to determine what types of mitigation measures are
appropriate. For example, areas with the highest concentration of archaeological
resources might require mandatory full excavation, while areas of a more scattered
nature might only need testing (Fig. 10.2).
An archaeology map is also useful because while the historical significance of
the resources present in an area may be understood by archaeologists and historians,
it is not likely to be the most important issue for a developer. Most developers
simply want to know whether their project is in an archaeology zone or not, and if
194 D.R. Appler
Fig. 10.2 The City of Santa Fe makes its map of archaeological zones readily available through
the city Web site. The zones are drawn to include most of the city, making it clear that
archaeological resources could be found nearly anywhere (City of Santa Fe 2016)
so, what that means for their project. The availability of a well-drawn map allows a
developer to get his or her bearings before proceeding to the next step in the
development process. Finally, a map of archaeology zones is important because the
production and use of the map becomes an opportunity to share something with the
public about the resources present in the community. Maps are very effective tools
for communicating a great deal of information quickly, and their visual nature
makes them much easier for the public to grasp than the text of a zoning ordinance.
The cities of Alexandria, St. Augustine, and Santa Fe all have easily accessible
maps of their archaeological districts available through their city Web sites
(Alexandria Archaeology 2016; City of St. Augustine Archaeology Program 2016;
City of Santa Fe 2016).
Inclusion of Municipal Ground Disturbing Activities

in Regulations
Another characteristic shared by many communities with successful archaeology

regulations has to do with what the local government does on its own projects.
When cities or counties undertake ground disturbing activities, such as widening

roads, constructing new municipal buildings or facilities, or extending utility lines,
they are just as capable of destroying archaeological resources as are private
developers. As such, several forward thinking communities have created specific
language to make clear their desire to protect the city’s archaeological heritage.
Section 14-3.13B of the Santa Fe City Code, for example, makes clear that city
projects in all three archaeological zones are subject to the same review procedures
as private projects. City projects in Phoenix that are greater than two square feet in
area and two inches in depth are also reviewed by the City Archaeologist (Bostwick
2006 p. 11). In Phoenix, however, the requirements for city projects are written into
the city’s archaeology guidelines, rather than into the city code or land development
ordinance. Todd Bostwick explains the implications of difference in his chapter. In
New York City archaeology is required under the City Environmental Quality
Review Act (CEQRA) (Baugher, this volume).
Differences
The preceding section of this chapter has drawn attention to a several common
practices among cities with archaeology regulations. This section of the paper will
turn the reader’s attention to the considerable variety found in the regulatory
approaches to including archaeology in the development process.
The Presence or Absence of “Archaeological Zones”
One area where many cities differ is over the question of whether to use “archae-
ological zones” as a way of identifying areas of the city likely to contain archae-
ological sites. Archaeological zones in this context are very similar to traditional
historic districts, in that their boundaries are identified based on historical or
archaeological research and that development projects taking place within the
boundaries of those districts are subject to additional scrutiny before approval is
granted. The cities of St. Augustine, Alexandria, Albany, Santa Fe, and Monterey
County, California (Monterey County Code, section 21.66.050) all use archaeo-
logical zones as a way of determining whether a proposed project will be required
to undergo archaeological review. If the project is within an archaeological zone,
the proposal must be subjected to some level of archaeological review. If it is not
within an archaeological zone, it does not generally require review by an
archaeologist.
Among those cities that use archaeological zones, there is an additional level of
variation. In Alexandria, section 11-411 of the city’s Zoning Ordinance requires all
development applications that are in archaeology resource areas, regardless of
which area, to obtain a preliminary archaeology assessment from city archaeology
196 D.R. Appler
staff. Other cities, such as St. Augustine and Santa Fe, require different actions
based on the characteristics of the archaeological zone. For example, in St.
Augustine, section 6-6 of the city’s Code of Ordinances dictates that “major dis-
turbances” taking place within the zone that contains the most significant resources
are required to undergo mandatory salvage excavation. Major disturbances within
the less significant zones are subject to testing, followed by additional salvage work
as deemed necessary by the city archaeologist. As will be discussed below, in Santa
Fe, the archaeology zone determines the size of the project that will trigger
archaeological review.
Anne Arundel County, MD, uses a slightly different approach. Rather than
limiting archaeological review to specific archaeological zones, review of proposed
projects is triggered by the likelihood that the project could affect a previously
known archaeological site. Section 17-6-502 of the Anne Arundel County Code
states that development should avoid disturbing significant archaeological resources
listed on the Maryland Inventory of Archaeological Resources. With that as a guide,
if the Office of Planning and Zoning determines that a listed archaeological site is
on the property or that there is a high potential for archaeological sites to be present
on the property, section 17-6-502 allows it to require a “Phase I” preliminary
survey to determine whether the property should undergo additional archaeological
scrutiny.
One city that stands out from the others in this respect is Albuquerque, NM. The
city does not use archaeological zones or base the need for review on proximity to
known archaeological sites. Instead, section 14-16-3-20 of the city’s Zoning Code
requires preliminary plats or site development plans of over 5 acres in size to be
reviewed for their effect on archaeological resources. While this may create addi-
tional work for the City Archaeologist in terms of reviewing projects that will not
affect archaeological sites, it does obviate the need to periodically update archae-
ological zones based on new information. It also makes it quite clear that virtually
everyone whose project is over a certain size will have to have their project
reviewed for its potential impact on archaeological resources (Schmader, this
volume).
The Nature of the “Trigger” for Archaeological Review
One significant question that any city contemplating an archaeology ordinance must
answer is “What type of project triggers archaeological review?” Answering this
question successfully requires delicately balancing archaeological needs with local
political concerns—because the moment a city starts telling private developers that
they are legally required to conduct archaeological review, that additional cost must
be justified, and archaeology becomes a very modern political issue.
The City of St. Augustine has arguably one of the country’s most sensitive
“triggers” for requiring archaeological review of private development projects.
Section 6-6 of the city’s Code of Ordinances states that within the city’s archae-
ological zones, all projects that require a city building permit, utility permit, or
right-of-way permit and that are greater than 100 square feet in area and deeper than
3 inches in depth, must submit an application for archaeological review. In basing
its “trigger” on the combined area and depth of the hole to be created, St.
Augustine’s policy is similar to that used by the City of Phoenix to trigger review
on city projects.
Most cities do not include a “depth” requirement. Santa Fe, for example, bases
review on the area of the disturbance, and the area that triggers review varies by
zone. Section 14-3.13B of the Santa Fe City Code states that within the city’s
Historic Downtown Archaeological Review District, projects 2500 square feet in
area or greater are required to apply for an archaeological clearance permit. In the
city’s “Rivers and Trails” district, projects over two acres in size are typically
required to apply for a clearance permit, and in the Suburban Archaeological
Review District, projects over 10 acres in size require an archaeology permit.
Alexandria takes a slightly different approach, linking archaeological review not
to the size of the hole that a property owner wants to dig, but to the nature of the
proposed project. Section 11-411B of the city’s zoning ordinance states that within
the city’s archaeology zones, those projects requiring site plans must undergo
archaeological review. Section 11-404A specifies that site plans are not required of
developments that produce fewer than three housing units. Therefore, someone
constructing one or two houses within an archaeological zone would not be subject
to archaeological review, because they are not required to submit a site plan for
review. For subdivisions that create three or more housing units, and for most other
forms of development within archaeological zones, project review by an archae-
ologist is required.
In Albany, the system for determining what activities trigger archaeological
review is essentially the same as the city’s system for reviewing changes to its
historic architecture, in that virtually any change must undergo review by the
planning department. Just as changes to a historic building’s windows or front
porch would require review by the city’s historic preservation planner in order to
obtain a certificate of appropriateness, section 375-36C of the Code of the City of
Albany specifies that changes to the soil in an archaeological zone require review
by the city archaeologist in order to obtain the same certificate of appropriateness.
The language of the ordinance gives the city archaeologist the authority to deter-
mine whether or not the proposed project will be sufficiently likely to impact
archaeological resources. If so, the city may require field work prior to issuing the
certificate.
Who Conducts “Archaeological Review?”
Arguably the most important part of any archaeology ordinance is the question of
what is required when a project has to undertake “archaeological review.” In most
198 D.R. Appler
cities, once a project has been reviewed by the archaeologist or the zoning
administrator and it has been determined that actual fieldwork is needed, the
developer or land owner is required to hire a professional archaeologist who con-
ducts the archaeology to the extent required by the city’s ordinance and prepares a
report for the local government. This is the model used in Alexandria, Albany,
Santa Fe, Anne Arundel County, New York City, Phoenix, and San Antonio, TX.
That report may be given to the city’s historic preservation staff, its development
review staff, the archaeology review board, or the city archaeologist, but typically
the administration of the city’s archaeology regulations and the responsibility for
research, fieldwork, and preparation of the final report are separated. There are
many reasons for this division, but one of the most readily apparent is the size of the
workload required by strong archaeological protection regulations. One noteworthy
exception to this rule is St. Augustine, whose ordinance requires the City
Archaeologist to be the one who conducts the salvage archaeology for all projects in
which fieldwork is required. While this model does provide the city archaeologist
with extraordinary familiarity with that city’s archaeological resources, it also
places a tremendous burden on the individual in that position. Although this system
seems to work well for St. Augustine, larger cities might want to consider the
separation of the administrative and archaeological functions of the ordinance, or
possibly hiring a larger staff of archaeologists.
The Role of the Public in Administering Archaeology

Regulations
One final area of variety in the local archaeology regulations most often encoun-
tered in the USA is the question of how, or whether, there is an avenue for public
participation in the process of archaeological resource protection. As is to be
expected, each city approaches this idea differently. Alexandria is well known for
its exemplary program that pairs the public policy guidance of the citizen-led
Alexandria Archaeological Commission with the skill of the city’s professional
archaeologists. And with training, the city’s avocational archaeologists can par-
ticipate in several ongoing city archaeological projects, as well as with historical
research, interpretation, and public outreach. But the day-to-day administration of
the ordinance falls mostly to the city’s professional archaeologists, while the
fieldwork triggered by the ordinance is largely done by CRM firms. As described
by section 14-2.7D of the Santa Fe City Code, that city’s Archaeological Review
Committee consists of private individuals appointed to the committee by the
Mayor, but three of the five committee members are professional archaeologists,
while the remaining two posts are held by a historian and a member of the
development community. Given the role of the committee in determining the scope
of work to be done before an archaeological clearance permit can be granted, that
professional knowledge plays an important role in the ordinance’s success. In St.

Augustine, in large part because of the way the city’s ordinance was first developed,
the city archaeologist actually uses volunteer labor to help conduct the archaeo-
logical fieldwork and laboratory work required by the city ordinance. Members of
the St. Augustine Archaeological Association played a major role in the creation of
the city ordinance, and their continued interest has helped the city archaeologist to
stay on top of an ever-increasing workload (Appler 2013). In short, there are many
ways in which both the professional and non-professional public can interact to
support the goals of an archaeology ordinance. This is a situation where creativity,
openness to new ideas, and a willingness to develop an ethic of archaeological
stewardship can pay substantial dividends.
Conclusions
Although the number of communities with archaeological protection regulations is

small, it is a larger group than most people realize, and the experiences of these
communities point the way toward a form of archaeology that addresses some of the
most glaring flaws in the federal preservation framework. While they do so with
different tools, techniques, and requirements, they use the legal authority of local
government to protect archaeological resources on private and municipal property.
Residents in these cities also enjoy much more contact with, and control over,
archaeological resources than do most US citizens. While it may be difficult to think
of any level of government as being “nimble,” these communities have proven
themselves to be capable of developing innovative regulations and policies that
address local needs and respond to local conditions.
These cities and counties demonstrate that archaeology can be integrated into the
development processes of small communities and large communities, they can
provide protection for historic and prehistoric sites, and they can be drawn to
respond to commercial, residential, and public land uses. One fundamental concept
that must be understood, however, is that the benefits of developing local archae-
ology regulations will never be fully realized if the non-professional public is not
“built-in” to the archaeology program. Residents must be given a chance to par-
ticipate in, learn from, and develop an appropriate level of ownership over the
information recovered—because a city is not just a collection of archaeological sites
—it is also home to the citizens of that community. If archaeologists and their
supporters do not make themselves and the information they recover available to
the general public, they risk alienating the people who ultimately must be persuaded
that the power of local government can and should be used for the purpose of
protecting archaeological resources.
200 D.R. Appler
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Chapter 11
We Dig Alexandria: A Reflection on More
Than Fifty Years of Community
Archaeology
Francine Bromberg, Pamela Cressey, Garrett Fesler, Paul Nasca

and Ruth Reeder
Introduction
Community archaeology began in Alexandria, Virginia, even before the term

entered the lexicon of professional archaeologists. The year was 1961, and the first
archaeology in the City resulted from citizen efforts to preserve a Civil War fort
from destruction by the encroachment of suburban sprawl. Over the next fifty years,
the hallmark of Alexandria’s successful community archaeology program became
collaboration among professionals and the public, with public advocates often
leading the way, as they did in 1961, for the promotion of archaeology as a
community value and for its use as a preservation strategy.
Founded in 1749, the Town of Alexandria was laid out in a grid pattern around a
small cove of the Potomac River. With the third oldest historic district in the
country, Alexandria has been recognized as a national leader in preservation. The
City takes pride in its historic character and has become a destination for those
seeking charm and authenticity. Situated across the Potomac from the nation’s
capital, the diverse 15 square-mile town, with a population of more than 140,000,
extends from colonial Old Town on the river to the highways, high-rises and
subdivisions of the West End. A World-War I torpedo factory, rehabbed into a
popular art centre on the riverfront, provides a location for the Alexandria
Archaeology Museum, and office space for six staff members, who are employees
of the municipal government.
F. Bromberg (&) P. Cressey G. Fesler P. Nasca R. Reeder

Alexandria Archaeology, 105 N. Union St., #327, Alexandria, VA 22314, USA

204 F. Bromberg et al.
Throughout the years, the key component of the City’s archaeological program
has remained public participation and partnership. As Maureen Malloy points out in
the introduction to the SAA volume Archaeologists and Local Communities:
Partners in Exploring the Past, community archaeology involves going beyond
“participation by the public” to incorporate “partnership with the public”
(Derry and Malloy 2003:ix). The Alexandria Archaeological Commission, a resi-
dents’ board of 14-members appointed by City Council, acts as one of the most
significant catalysts for this public/professional interaction and collaboration.
Established in 1975, likely the oldest city archaeology board in the country, the
Commission advises City Council on policy and direction for archaeological
matters and works in tandem with the professional staff. As a voice for the larger
community of interested residents, the commission serves as the focus of com-
munity input and makes specific recommendations to City Council. The recom-
mendations are strengthened, and residents’ concerns and interests have more
impact when expressed through actions of such a board.
Naturally, public participation must always remain a strong and integral part of
any community program. Each year, about 100–200 volunteers and students have
contributed from 5,000 to 11,000 hours of time. Their tasks are varied: they con-
duct excavations, historical research, and oral history interviews; process artifacts;
teach lessons to school children and help to run other public programs; receive
visitors to the Museum; and provide administrative support. They come for many
reasons—to learn, to contribute to the community, to enjoy the past. Their interests
and curiosity shape the character and products of the program. Other participants in
partnerships include city planners and developers, citizens at planning meetings and
public hearings, visitors to the Museum, teens in summer camp, college students,
bicyclists and walkers along the Alexandria Heritage Trail, children in hands-on
activities, and families at Dig Days. These people are more than receivers of
information; their questions and ideas continue to affect plans for the future. All are
invited to join the Friends of Alexandria Archaeology, a non-profit group formed in
1985, which encourages participation in, knowledge of, and support for archaeol-
ogy. As the program has evolved, a constant dialogue between the public and
professional archaeologists has led to the establishment of a strong “archaeological
community” and the creation of an ever-increasing number of partnerships within
the community at large.
This chapter reflects on more than 50 years of archaeology in Alexandria,
illustrating how the citizens and archaeologists of one American city have
approached the challenge of unearthing the knowledge and recognizing the value of
its buried past and using this knowledge to enrich the community. The chapter is
organized chronologically to provide a glimpse into the evolving priorities of
Alexandria’s archaeological program through the decades. It highlights some of the
knowledge gained over the past fifty years and emphasizes the various strategies,
tools, and partnerships that emerged to accomplish the program goals.
11 We Dig Alexandria: A Reflection on More Than Fifty Years … 205
Rescue and Reconstruction
In keeping with the expanding preservation tenets of the decade of the 1960s, which
saw the passage of the Reservoir Salvage Act and the National Historic
Preservation Act, the first archaeology in Alexandria focused on rescue and
reconstruction. The efforts of a group of activists, led by local resident Dorothy
Starr, moved by their commitment to history and their recognition of the value of
historic places for education and enrichment, led to the City’s purchase of Fort
Ward to create a historical park with a museum dedicated to interpretation of
Alexandria’s Civil War past (Douglas 1964). In order to create a more accurate
reconstruction of the northwest bastion of the fort, the City hired archaeologist
Edward Larrabee in 1961 to excavate the site (Larrabee 1961). This model of
saving a site or historic place and turning it into a park continues to this day as a
part of the archaeological preservation toolkit in Alexandria.
Between 1965 until 1975, local citizens mobilized again to protect the City’s
archaeological resources, this time in the heart of Old Town. During this period, the
City’s ongoing urban renewal program razed several city blocks along King Street,
the commercial centre of the city. As demolition exposed artifact-laden privies, the
community outcry led to demands that the City address and halt the losses to
Alexandria’s heritage. An archaeological technician was hired to conduct excava-
tions, first funded by the Smithsonian between 1965 and 1971, then by local citizen
contributions through 1973, and finally by the City in the fall of 1973 (Watkins
1965b; Ozefovich 1971, 1974) (Fig. 11.1).
The constant sight of this salvage work in the middle of Old Town and the array
of artifacts recovered bolstered the public’s appreciation of archaeology. With the
support of architectural historians and other preservationists, residents successfully
lobbied City Council, resulting in the 1975 passage of a resolution that created the
Alexandria Archaeological Commission (Alexandria City Council 1975). The
resolution articulated three general goals for archaeology within the City: To
Search, To Study, and To Share. Through formulation of this last goal,
Alexandrians incorporated the lessons learned from the salvage projects of the
preceding years and expressed that the City’s archaeological heritage belonged to
the public.
Research, Context, and Discovery
The hiring of professional staff beginning in 1977 sparked a shift from a rescue
strategy to a research strategy for archaeology in Alexandria. As the last King Street
urban renewal block was investigated with a virtual out-pouring of help from
hundreds of volunteers contributing thousands of hours, the new City team began to
picture this one block as a part of a larger city-site (Cressey 1979; Cressey and
Stephens 1982; Shephard 1988). Envisioning that this broader research framework
Fig. 11.1 Richard Muzzrole, the archaeological technician first sent to Alexandria by the
Smithsonian Institution in 1965. Photo courtesy of Alexandria Archaeology
could bring more power to the findings, the City archaeologists recognized the need
to develop contexts to allow for the accurate identification, evaluation, and inter-
pretation of sites across the City within the framework of the full continuum of
human occupation, which extended back more than 10,000 years.
To aid in the development of a context for Native American occupation, the
Commonwealth of Virginia allotted funds in 1979 for a preliminary survey of
stream valleys, which led to the identification of more than 15 sites that had
survived over two centuries of urban and suburban development (Commonwealth

of Virginia, Alexandria Regional Preservation Office 1979). For the historic peri-
ods, the development of context began with the collection of historical maps, aerial
photographs, and other key locational information to allow for the plotting of
potential site locations. Themes of study and periods of significance were
established.
Looking back on Alexandria Archaeology’s projects from the late 1970s through
the 1980s, it becomes apparent that research often centred on a number of signif-
icant themes. Waterfront studies focused on locating potential resources buried in
the Potomac River and mapping the physical changes along the river as the bluffs
along the cove were “banked out” to fill the silty mud flats and allow for the
construction of wharves and piers to extend into the deeper river channel, thereby
ensuring the port’s viability (Shomette 1985; Watts 1986; Shephard 2006).
A cemetery survey was completed to gather information about locations of these
particularly sensitive resources (Commonwealth of Virginia, Virginia Department
of Historic Resources 1989). Excavations and analyses provided insight into early
commerce and industry in Alexandria. Investigations at Arell’s, McKnight’s and
Gadsby’s taverns revealed that they catered to different clientele, with tankards for
beer and ale for the rowdier crowd found at Arrell’s, teapots and cups for the
businessmen and politicians at McKnight’s, and fine wares confirming the
impressive reputation as a tavern that entertained presidents at Gadsby’s (Foss
1974; Beane et al. 1994). Stoneware recovered from the Wilkes Street Pottery had
distinctive forms and blue cobalt designs that characterized the wares of the three
successive potters, John Swann (1813–1825), Hugh Smith (1825–1841), and
Milburn (1841–1877) (Myers 1983; Cressey and Magid 1993, p. 14–17). Work at
the Moore-McLean Sugar Refinery led to increased knowledge about Alexandria’s
role as a sugar producer and exporter and to a greater understanding of the process
of sugar production in the early nineteenth century (Barr 1989; Barr et al. 1994).
Among the artifacts recovered were thousands of red earthenware sherds in two
basic forms: cone-shaped moulds where the sugar crystalized and jars with glazed
interiors where impurities were collected.
Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of hours of archival research into tax and census
records led to the preparation of maps that fostered an understanding of changing
land use patterns and the evolution of neighbourhoods in the City from 1780 to
1910. Results of this work indicated that elite households and businesses were
initially situated along the riverfront, but later moved inland to the Washington and
King Street corridors. A 1981 grant from the National Endowment for the
Humanities allowed for archaeological testing of households of varying socioeco-
nomic status. In addition, oral history interviews were conducted to establish a
living connection with activities and life in Alexandria’s past.
A focus on Alexandria’s African American community as an important research
theme emerged as archival work documented locations of, and changes in, African
American neighbourhoods through time. African American sites of Free Blacks and
sites of enslavement were investigated. At the Harriet Williams site, home of an
enslaved Alexandrian, the recovery of large serving pieces but no kitchen wares
suggests that she cooked food in her owner’s house, two doors away, and carried it
to her home (Cressey 1985; Cressey and Magid 1993). In Hayti, one of
Alexandria’s first free African American neighbourhoods, excavations unearthed
thousands of artifacts of everyday life, including mismatched table wares and large
numbers of buttons, presumably bearing witness to the women’s roles as laun-
dresses (Cressey 1985; Cressey and Magid 1993).
None of these discoveries would have been realized without a strong cadre of
volunteers, who learned from and interacted with the professional staff. As new
neighbourhoods were explored and new sites investigated, there were impromptu
and scheduled site tours as well as lectures given at neighbourhood associations and
churches. Through expansion into new neighbourhoods, new connections were
formed between archaeologists and residents, including leaders in the African
American community, thus broadening the base of the “archaeological
community.”
Before the passage of the Archaeological Protection Code in 1989, there were no
legal requirements for archaeology prior to development, and all archaeology
conducted on private sites was the result of negotiation and good will between the
City Archaeologists and the property owner or developer. In one early example
from the late 1970s and early 1980s, when plans for new construction along the
north waterfront became imminent, the Commission recognized an opportunity for
Fig. 11.2 As part of the TransPotomac Canal Center development, the Alexandria Canal Tide
Lock was excavated, reconstructed, and preserved as an Alexandria cultural heritage site. Photo
courtesy of Alexandria Archaeology
the creation of another historic park, this time as part of a private development
project that was located on the site of a tide lock of the Alexandria Canal. The
developers, Savage Fogarty, Inc., were convinced that creating this amenity to
enrich and enhance the community would add interest and value to their project,
and as a result, financed both the excavation and the subsequent creation of the park
(Hahn 1992) (Fig. 11.2).
The canal was excavated, recorded and preserved in place; a reconstruction
above the original fabric was completed and interpretive signage erected (Hahn and
Kemp 1992; Shephard 1994). New development is currently planned for this site,
and the canal reconstruction will be retained and incorporated into a new mixed-use
complex.
Museum and Collections
With the collection of so many artifacts and so much information about the City’s
past, the pressing need arose in the early 1980s for a facility where exhibits and
interpretation could convey information to the public and bring the Commission’s
Fig. 11.3 The Alexandria Torpedo Factory Art Center. Though its location within the facility has
changed, Alexandria Archaeology has been headquartered in the Torpedo Factory since 1984.
Photo courtesy of Alexandria Archaeology
goal, “To Share,” into focus. The Alexandria Archaeology Museum opened in 1984
in the newly renovated, City owned, Torpedo Factory Art Center (Fig. 11.3).
The guiding principle behind the development of the Torpedo Factory Art
Center was to showcase artists at work and allow the public the opportunity to
witness the creative process, ask questions, and learn about the many different art
forms as 150 artists practiced their crafts in full public view. This same principle
applied to the Alexandria Archaeology Museum, where the theme morphed into
“Archaeologists-At-Work.” The museum thus became more than just a series of
interpretive displays. It is designed to function as an open, working laboratory
where the public can witness professionals and volunteers engaged in the pro-
cessing of artifacts, see and touch authentic finds, and freely ask questions as
material from sites across the City is washed and catalogued. In addition, the
museum design incorporates flexibility, with lab tables on wheels so that they can
be quickly moved to create space for lectures and other activities. The Alexandria
Archaeology Museum is funded by the City of Alexandria, and its archaeologists
are City employees. The activities of the Museum also benefit from a very
enthusiastic corps of archaeology supporters. Between July 2013 and July 2014, the
activities of the Alexandria Archaeology Museum were supported by just over
11,000 hours of volunteer support (Friends of Alexandria Archaeology 2015: 15).
Responsibility for the high volume of artifacts collected also brought about the
pressing need for proper collections management and curation. The original storage
space did not meet newly developed federal curation standards; thus, in 1989 grants
from the National Science Foundation and the Institute of Museum Services
allowed the City to develop a new off-site collections facility. In 1991, the entire
collection was re-boxed and placed into this temperature and humidity controlled
environment. Today, the City continues to own and operate the facility, which is
just over a mile from the museum. It now contains more that 2 million artifacts and
ecofacts from almost every site excavated in the City, providing a research resource
that is extremely rare for any locality in the country.
Archaeology Code and Master Planning
By the late 1980s, rapid development raised concerns for threatened sites across the
City. The Archaeological Commission concluded that a local protection ordinance
was needed to identify and preserve threatened resources. The Commission sought
input from the business community—developers and their lawyers—thereby
bringing new players into partnership with archaeology. As a direct result of the
Commission’s vision and commitment, City Council adopted the Alexandria
Archaeology Protection Code in November 1989, one of the first local ordinances
in America (Lait 1989). It set out a process whereby the private sector would pay to
preserve resources through excavation and analysis before construction, or hope-
fully, through protection of some sites in situ (Alexandria Archaeology 1990). The
Code makes archaeological review part of the permitting process, meaning that a
developer cannot receive a building permit until the project has been reviewed by
the City’s archaeology staff.
The Code, which formally became part of The Zoning Ordinance of the City of
Alexandria in 1992, stipulates that Alexandria Archaeology review all city site
plans that involve ground disturbance and make a determination of the potential
impact on archaeological resources (City of Alexandria 1992). The City archae-
ologists determine the level of work to be done by private developers who are
required to hire archaeological consultants to conduct investigations and produce
both technical and public reports on their findings.
The City review process necessitated the compilation of as much data as possible
regarding the locations of potential sites in order to make appropriate determina-
tions of the work levels. Using the maps obtained and surveys completed through
previous research efforts, City archaeologists wrote a preservation chapter in 1990
for the City’s Master Plan that included over 4,000 potential site locations, as well
as historic districts and standing structures. This mapped information, now in digital
form using Geographic Information System (GIS) software, facilitates the review
process (City of Alexandria 1992).
The passage of the Code more than 25 years ago changed some aspects of the
program. Code implementation meant that research became more
development-oriented with a focus on sites that were threatened by construction.
Consultants from cultural resource management firms began to conduct the bulk of
the fieldwork required by the Code, and City staff adopted an oversight role for
these projects. In addition to completing reviews of development projects, the staff
became responsible for overseeing the archaeological preservation process to
ensure quality, writing scopes of work, consulting during the processes of exca-
vation and analysis, and reviewing technical and public reports.
Code implementation begins with a Preliminary Archaeological Assessment.
Using GIS, historic maps, tax maps, settlement pattern data, and other primary
documents, City archaeologists put the project area through an assessment process
of due diligence. Guiding the staff through this assessment are six criteria, similar to
those of the National Register of Historic Places: research value, rarity, public
value, site integrity, presence of materials, and impact of the development on
resources. At this point, the assessment focuses on the potential the property may
hold for archaeological sites, and the significance of these potential buried
resources. Questions asked include: Do any historic maps show sites on the
property? What are the time periods and functions of these map features? Is the
landform conducive for prehistoric settlement? What is the current condition of the
property? Depending upon what turns up during the assessment process, City
archaeologists generally issue one of four directives:
1. No archaeological action.
2. Call Alexandria Archaeology if prehistoric or historic finds are uncovered.
3. Arrange for Alexandria Archaeology to monitor the project.
4. Hire an archaeological consultant to conduct historical and archaeological
studies of the project area as requested by Alexandria Archaeology.
If it is determined that the project area has good potential for archaeological
sites, then the property owner is required to hire a professional archaeological
consultant and move through the process of background research, surveying,
evaluating, and if necessary, excavating any significant resources. It is worth noting
that, although not officially under the Code, Alexandria Archaeology also reviews
building permits and other activities that do not require formal site plans—things
like additions to homes, the replacement of pipes, moving a fence, and so forth. In
these cases, if something of significance is on a property, the City does not burden
the owners with the cost of archaeology, but the City archaeology staff asks per-
mission to conduct some sort of emergency recovery project or monitor the ground
disturbing activity. The cost of this archaeology is borne by the City.
Studies mandated by the Archaeological Protection Code have added immeasurably
to the understanding of Alexandria’s past as demonstrated by looking back and eval-
uating what the Code has accomplished. Between 1989 and 2015, the City’s archae-
ological staff has conducted more than 11,000 reviews. If not for the vision of the
Archaeological Commission and the foresight and action of the City Council to
implement a protection code, much of the information would have been lost.
An understanding of Native American life, commercial and industrial activities,
African American enslavement, death and dying, waterfront activities, rural life and
the Civil War are among the themes elucidated by the implementation of the Code.
For instance, CRM excavations at the Jones Point Site led to the discovery of
Alexandria’s first known house, a structure that measured about 12 feet in diameter,
that was built by Native Americans about 1000 years ago and made of bent sap-
lings, probably covered with woven mats (Barse et al. 2006). It was identified by
the presence of a rough circle of 25 small postholes–dark, organic soil stains,
remnants of the saplings that had decayed in the ground. At Keith’s Wharf/Fords
Landing, CRM archaeologists unearthed the remains of an eighteenth-century
wharf, the hulls of eight sunken derelict vessels, and the Alexandria Marine railway
where a four-mast schooner weighing 1500 tons was constructed and launched in
1883 (Artemel et al. 1988). Excavations at the Bruin Slave Jail, a slave-trading
establishment in operation from 1844 to 1861, uncovered a cistern that was part of
the slave jail laundry, a pit containing hundreds of animal bone fragments–scraps
from stews that were made to feed the slaves, and evidence of a connection to
African customs with the discovery of a full chicken skeleton minus the head in
another pit on the site (Kraus et al. 2010). Analysis of artifacts recovered from the
Quaker Burial Ground suggests that Alexandria’s Quakers abided by the tenets of
simplicity that characterized their faith (Bromberg and Shephard 2006).
Investigations have provided insight into Alexandria’s industries with the discov-
eries of a 50-foot long beer cellar that maintained the cold temperatures needed for
lager fermentation at the Shuter’s Hill Brewery Site (Walker et al. 1996) and the
furnaces and flues that reveal the mechanics of creating the high temperatures
needed for manufacturing bottles at the Virginia Glass Company (Pfansteihl et al.
1999). Work at two Civil War encampment sites revealed brick fireboxes and flues
covered with metal, features known as Crimean ovens, that were designed to
provide heat for hospital tents during winter encampments (Balicki et al. 2005;
Jirikowic et al. 2004).
Education, Recreation, Tourism, Promotion
Concurrent with the implementation of the preservation strategies, numerous public

programs for different audiences—school children, families, walkers and bicyclists,
etc.–were developed in the 1980s and 1990s as important educational tools to
promote public awareness of archaeology. The museum remains the hub of the
archaeological education network. Over the past decade, annual visitation to the
museum averaged more than 30,000 individuals. From the information recorded in
the museum’s guestbook, it is clear that Alexandria Archaeology is communicating
its message to a national and international audience. For example, from October to
December 2013, the museum had visitors from 44 different states and the District of
Columbia, and 24 foreign countries, including Canada, Nicaragua, Venezuela,
England, Italy, Ireland, Spain, Romania, Thailand, Turkey, New Guinea China,
Australia, and more.
On a local level, the space in the museum serves as a community venue for
public archaeology lectures, such as the Friends of Alexandria Archaeology’s
Saturday “Java Jolt” lecture series. During these events, the portable work tables
that fill the centre of the museum’s workspace are rolled away and chairs are set-up
to accommodate the attending public.
Similarly, many of archaeology’s hands-on educational programs are conducted
within the museum space, creating an interactive classroom for children and young
adults alike. These programs, called “Adventure Lessons,” link to state-mandated
educational standards. On average, over 1,000 students participate annually in one
of these lessons. Nearly all of the students are part of public, private, and
home-schools groups from the greater Washington DC area; but a group of
high-school students from Toronto, Ontario, Canada, recently visited the museum
specifically to partake in one of our lessons (Fig. 11.4).
Each Adventure Lesson employs real artifacts recovered from a site excavated
within the City. The use of genuine artifacts provides a level of authenticity to the
lesson and creates a link between past generations and the present. For instance, the
Sugar Lesson is based on the excavation at the early nineteenth-century Alfred
Street Sugar House site. This lesson focuses on the refinement of sugar in
Alexandria and uses sherds from the site to help students interpret the functions of
two different types of ceramic redware vessels—one with a glaze to collect the
syrup and the other unglazed where the sugar cones crystallized. The lesson also
addresses the broader themes of Alexandria’s commercial ties to the Atlantic world
and the issue of slavery, as seven enslaved African Americans worked at the sugar
house. The Hayti Lesson is based on excavations in one of Alexandria’s early
nineteenth-century free black neighbourhoods. In this lesson, high-school aged
Fig. 11.4 Students participating in an “Alexandria Archaeology Adventure Lesson” in the

museum. Photo courtesy of Alexandria Archaeology
students work with a variety of artifacts and census records to interpret what life
was like in this African American community (Landes and Moyar 1996).
Other educational programs and activities draw visitors and tourists out of the
museum and into the community. “Family Dig-Days” have been a part of
Alexandria Archaeology’s public-outreach toolkit since 1991. Currently held at the
Shuter’s Hill site on the grounds of the George Washington Masonic National
Memorial, the program allows members of the public to tour the site and put the soil
through a screen to collect the artifacts dug by volunteers. The Shuter’s Hill site is
an ongoing, City-sponsored excavation that is not driven by development pressure
(Fig. 11.5).
A second program, the week-long archaeology summer camp, caters to teens
interested in history. This year’s excavation took place at the City-owned Fort Ward
Park. The 23-mile Alexandria Heritage Trail, which opened in 2002 after more than
15 years of public effort, brings historical and archaeological knowledge of 100
sites dating back 9000 years to cyclists and walkers. An explanation of the sites and
their histories can be found in the short book Walk and Bike the Alexandria
Heritage Trail (Cressey 2002). City Council has approved a template for heritage
signs as part of the way-finding sign project, and interpretive markers are constantly
being added to the system.
Fig. 11.5 Family Dig Day at the Shuter’s Hill site. Photo courtesy of Alexandria Archaeology
In addition to the museum and public events, the media and the internet also help to
spread word about the City’s archaeology program, and about the information it has
recovered. Press releases and media tours continue to generate newspaper, radio, and
television coverage so that more people are included in the discoveries and hear about
good stewardship. The City’s website, along with the City’s eNews network,
Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, provides information to an even broader community
base, with updates that provide in-depth knowledge of archaeological investigations,
and that afford an opportunity for instant messaging about current finds, excavations
and events. A recent series of YouTube videos documented the day-to-day excavation
of a well that was discovered in the basement of one of Old Town’s historic structures.
Historical research indicated that the well, which may have collapsed during con-
struction, was meant to be used in an early nineteenth-century bath house. These
videos, along with videos of the archaeology summer camp and other Alexandria
Archaeology activities, can be found on the Alexandria Archaeology YouTube feed:
https://www.youtube.com/user/ArchaeologyAlex/feed.
Community Projects
So where is Alexandria’s program now, after more than 50 years of archaeology?

The implementation of the Code continues to build upon the historical and
archaeological knowledge of past decades. Pure research goes on in the form of
excavations at Shuter’s Hill, where volunteers and students excavate the laundry of
a plantation site that promises to provide significant information about the lives of
enslaved African Americans. However, most research now is often community-
driven and revolves around large, long-term projects that require archaeological
expertise.
Contrabands and Freedmen Cemetery Memorial
Threads leading to one current project, the creation of the Contrabands and
Freedmen Cemetery Memorial, weave a compelling tale of the value and benefits of
the public/professional partnerships that have developed as part of Alexandria’s
archaeology program. As with the creation of Fort Ward Park fifty years ago, it is
the story of the dedication and commitment of inspiring women and a small group
of residents. Freedmen’s Cemetery was established in 1864 by the military gov-
ernor of Alexandria, head of the occupied town during the Civil War. According to
a document, known as the Gladwin Record, discovered buried in the archives of the
Library of Virginia in Richmond, it is the resting place for at least 1,711 African
Americans, mostly refugees who fled to Alexandria to escape from bondage in the
war-torn areas south and west of the town (Pippenger 1995). In the mid-twentieth
century, a gas station and office building were constructed on the property, and
memory of the cemetery faded. When a 1997 series of newspaper articles published
information about the existence of this historical and sacred ground, the subsequent
desecration, and the possible impact of a federal bridge construction project, resi-
dents (and two women—Lillie Finklea and Louise Massoud, in particular) sprang
into action to attempt to save the site and create a memorial commemorating the
hardships and contributions of these African Americans refugees (Cressey 1997a, b,
c) (Fig. 11.6).
The Friends of Freedmen’s Cemetery was established to support the preservation
efforts, and City Council resolved to set aside a Day of Remembrance, with an
annual ceremony on the site. Archaeological testing, which included both remote
sensing and excavations, confirmed the presence of extant burials, and lobbying
efforts led the City to purchase the gas station and office properties with plans to
create the Contrabands and Freedmen Cemetery Memorial as part of the federal
bridge project.
After the demolition of the structures, which was monitored by City archaeol-
ogists, a ceremony was held in 2007 to rededicate the site as a sacred place.
Hundreds attended the event, which featured memorial candle illuminations created
by Alexandria school children and residents, one for each of the 1,711 souls buried
on the site whose names come down to us through the Gladwin Record kept by the
military government and the Freedmen’s Bureau. A full-scale archaeological
investigation was deemed necessary to identify grave locations and ensure that
creation of the memorial would not cause further desecration of the burials. By the
end of the excavation, 631 grave locations had been identified (Sipe et al. 2014).
Fig. 11.6 Lillie Finklea and Louise Massoud were central to the effort to create the Alexandria
Contrabands and Freedmen Cemetery Memorial. Photo courtesy of Alexandria Archaeology
During the excavation, the grave shafts were identified, but the human remains were
left undisturbed.
The City sponsored a competition for the design of the memorial. Design
guidelines specified that no burials were to be disturbed and included the archae-
ological site map with grave locations and other potential burial areas delineated.
The City received more than 200 entries, with at least one from each of the 50 states
and from 20 countries. Winners of the competition were chosen by the Freedmen’s
Design Steering Committee, and final plans incorporated elements of the winners’
designs. A second design competition was held to choose a statue for the memorial,
and Mario Chiodo’s The Path of Thorns and Roses now serves as the site’s cen-
trepiece (Fig. 11.7).
Fig. 11.7 The Path of

Thorns and Roses is the
centrepiece of the Alexandria
Contrabands and Freedmen
Cemetery Memorial. Photo
courtesy of L. Barnes for Visit
Alexandria
The final design incorporated features that would not be known without the
historical and archaeological research. The 631 known grave locations are each
marked with a flat stone—never to be forgotten again. The location of the carriage
path that entered the cemetery was identified by the archaeological work and serves
as the entry to the memorial. The Gladwin record, which lists the names, ages, dates
of burial, place of death, and sometimes, cause of death, is reproduced in bronze on
stone walls of remembrance. Char Bah, the City’s genealogist, has found thousands
of descendants who can trace their ancestry back to more than 100 of the names on
the wall.
In September 2014, the City dedicated a memorial park on this one and a
half-acre site. Hundreds of descendants from the local area and all parts of the
country attended the ceremony and led a procession into the memorial, each placing
a rose on the statue of The Path of Thorns and Roses.
Fort Ward Park
Another significant community project centres on the history and archaeology at

Fort Ward Park. It was perhaps fitting that the 50th anniversary of archaeology in
Alexandria brought us back to this site. Where the archaeological work in 1961
coincided with the 100th anniversary of the start of the Civil War, the commem-
oration of the sesquicentennial was just beginning. The forces in play that brought
about a return to Fort Ward remain similar to those that resulted in the creation of
the park fifty years ago, namely resident interest and activism. When the City’s
Department of Recreation released proposed plans for changes in the park, con-
cerned residents banded together to require the City to consider impacts to all
historical and archaeological resources within the park, not just those related to the
Civil War. A previous survey had identified the location of a Native American site,
and archival work and oral history had demonstrated that an African American
community, known as “The Fort”, had grown up on the property after the Civil War
(OHA/Alexandria Archaeology 2009). Some descendants of the original residents
continued to live on the site until it was taken by the City, through both purchase
and condemnation through eminent domain, for the creation of the park. It was clear
that remnants of residences, a school/church, and most importantly cemeteries and
burials, could remain extant in the park. At public meetings in 2009, descendants of
former residents of the park and other current City residents ranked park planning
and management goals, citing protection of the graves and preservation and
interpretation of the full range of the history of Fort Ward as the number one
priority. Acknowledging these values as important, City Council established a
citizen committee, the Fort Ward Stakeholders Advisory Group, to make recom-
mendations relating to planning and management in the park.
With the recognition that knowledge of the locations of graves and resources
was paramount to park planning and management as well as to preservation and
interpretation of The Fort community, City Council also allocated funds for his-
torical research and archaeological investigation. A documentary history was
written of The Fort community, and archaeological investigation has identified a
concentration of Native American activities, scatters of Civil War artifacts,
numerous home sites of The Fort community, and 43 grave locations in four
separate areas of the park (Moon 2014; Bodor 2011; Alexandria Archaeology/OHA
2012). In early 2015, City Council adopted a management plan for the park, which
provides guidance for beginning the interpretation of the Fort Community, stipu-
lates that no graves are to be disturbed by future development, and sets up an
archaeological process to look for graves and other buried resources prior to any
ground disturbance. Council approved both a public management plan implemen-
tation committee and a public interpretive committee to oversee the process as the
project moves forward. To ensure preservation and promote interpretation, City
archaeologists will work with both of these groups, as well as other City depart-
ments and The Ft. Ward and Seminary African American Descendants Society, a
non-profit group formed to report on the project and share the history and contri-
butions of African Americans in the Fort Ward area.
Planning and Preservation
More than ever, archaeology is integrated into the planning process of the City.
With the implementation of the Code over the past twenty-six years, developers,
planners, engineers and landscape architects, both within the City and in private
firms, have become more sensitive to preservation needs and to how the integration
of historical character and archaeological finds can enhance development projects
and benefit the community. In addition to site plan reviews, the archaeological staff
contributes information about history and archaeology to studies of planning dis-
tricts, open space, and land acquisition. One recent example of this process comes
from the City’s recent effort to formulate plans to revitalize the riverfront and
address issues of flood control and increased public access. As a part of this process,
the Alexandria Archaeological Commission produced a waterfront preservation
plan. Highlighting the importance of preservation and knowledge of history in the
planning process for waterfront development, the Commission’s plan includes
recommendations of ways to incorporate aspects of historic character into the
design and was accepted by Council as part of the Waterfront Plan.
The increased interaction with developers, planners and designers has led to
community decisions to preserve sites, create more parks with historic meaning,
and integrate art that reflects historical themes into development projects throughout
the community. Thus, knowledge of the past has made its way out of the museum
and into the fabric of the City. Interpretive markers, erected in parks and as part of
development projects, highlight the history and archaeological significance of
historical places. Coordination between archaeologists and a developer saved a
Civil War battery from destruction, as a decision was made to change proposed
house locations so that the battery remained as open space. Archaeological work for
the African American Heritage Park identified 26 burial locations, and park design
incorporated the gravestones that were discovered and featured a sculpture that
evokes a tree of life and the roots of remembrance. The design for a long linear park
at Potomac Yard drew its inspiration from historical and archaeological maps of the
canal and railyards that once traversed the length of the development area. In a
housing development named for James Bland, an African American musician and
songwriter, planners opted for a musical theme in the design of a park to pay
homage to the project’s namesake. A globe, highlighting the importance of trade
and commerce to Alexandria’s early history, occupies a prominent location in an
area of new development at the south end of the City. At the site of the former
Bruin Slave Jail mentioned earlier in this chapter, the location of the cistern from
the slave jail’s laundry is demarcated in the open space of the new development
project. A statue on the site was inspired by the story of the Edmonson sisters, who
were jailed on the site after a failed attempt to escape to freedom aboard the
schooner Pearl in 1848. Abolitionists, including Harriet Beecher Stowe, raised

money to purchase their freedom, and the novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin incorporates
characters and incidents from Stowe’s knowledge of Bruin’s slave-trading activities
(Kraus et al. 2010).
Conclusion: A Network of Partnerships
The public/professional partnership that began with citizen activism to create Fort
Ward Park continues to enrich the lives of visitors and residents with an
ever-widening circle of partners. The success of the program stems from both
engaging the public and listening to the public. As demonstrated in the review of
the evolution of the Alexandria Archaeology program over the past 50 years, the
sources of collaboration are manifold. Perhaps the most appropriate way to con-
clude a discussion of Alexandria’s community archaeology program is to recognize
the many different groups of people who have been drawn to contribute to the
program over time. One group might be described as those who have come into
fortuitous or occasional contact with the program. This might include individuals
who hear our media coverage, visit our web site, or join our list-serve to hear about
events. Also included in this group are the residents and tourists who visit the
museum, attend a lecture or site tour, or participate in a family dig day, as well as
riders and walkers of the heritage trail, teachers and students who come for lessons.
A second group of individuals has a more intentional and often long-term
interaction—the many students, interns and volunteers who contribute their time
and energy to the process of developing and communicating historical information.
They conduct historical research, excavate sites, process artifacts, help with col-
lections, staff the museum, conduct and transcribe oral history interviews, and
perform administrative duties. This group includes the members of the Friends of
Alexandria Archaeology, whose dues have helped to support the program finan-
cially for thirty years.
Political engagement has been particularly important for the development of
archaeology in Alexandria, and a third group includes individuals whose interest in
history and archaeology led them to support an archaeologically informed civil
society within the city. Members of the Alexandria Archaeological Commission
and officers of the Friends of Alexandria Archaeology fall into this group, but so do
members of more focused committees and organizations, such as the Freedmen’s
Design Steering Committee, Fort Ward Stakeholders Advisory Group, and Friends
of Freedman’s Cemetery who take on advisory and/or collaborative roles on
project-specific bases. This group is essential for creating an active voice for
archaeology within the participatory framework of local government.
A fourth group includes those who come into contact with archaeology through
the development, planning, and design process. This includes the residents who
attend planning meetings where history and archaeology are discussed; as well as
the developers, planners, landscape designers, and artists from both within the City
and in private firms, who have taken on a shared responsibility to preserve, protect
and interpret the past and have begun to incorporate historic character into their site
plan designs. The act of weaving the City’s history into its modern urban fabric can
be tremendously challenging from a design perspective, but when successfully
executed, can be of significant, long lasting, public benefit.
A fifth group includes members of descendant communities, whose connections
to the City’s past continue to inspire awe, and whose oral histories, family pho-
tographs, and knowledge of past activities have contributed so much to our
understanding of what it was like to live in Alexandria in bygone eras. Their stories
provide both historical information and a human perspective on the past that is
unavailable through archaeology alone. Without their help and cooperation, many
of the stories that have come to define the City’s understanding of places such as
Fort Ward Park, would be impossible to tell.
A sixth group includes those who are our professional partners—the many
archaeological consultants who have worked on code projects, conservators who
have worked with our collections, local historians and university scholars who
contribute to our interpretations, and genealogists who discover links to descendant
communities, among others. Having a diverse group of professions bring their skills
to bear on the City’s past helps to make sure that the public has access to a
tremendous amount of historical information, and that that information reflects the
highest professional standards.
A final group is, in many ways, an umbrella for all the others, as it includes those
individuals who have led crusades to protect our past; who have lobbied and
garnered support for the passage of the Code, for the protection and interpretation of
our resources, and for the creation of parks including Fort Ward and the
Contrabands and Freedmen Cemetery Memorial. Their efforts have radically altered
the social and physical landscape of the City of Alexandria. They have made it a
place where local residents have easy access to archaeological and historical
information, and where that information can be put to new uses that result in a
deeper more meaningful interaction with the past.
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info/archaeology/SiteReportPfanstiehlVirginiaGlassCoAX181.pdf
Pippenger, W. E. (1995). Alexandria, virginia death records, 1863–1868, (the Gladwin Record)
and 1869–1896. Westminster, MD: Family Line Publications.
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the impact of canals on the course of American Urban life. Easton, Pennsylvania: Canal
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of extending the alexandria waterfront. The Alexandria Chronicle, Spring, 1–13.
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SiteReportShometteWaterfrontSubmergedResources.pdf
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freedmen cemetery memorial, city of Alexandria, Virginia, Archeological data recovery at Site
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alexandriava.gov/uploadedFiles/historic/info/archaeology/
SiteReportWalkerShutersHillBreweryAX35.pdf
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Between Oronoco and Franklin Streets and Oronoco Bay.
Chapter 12
Reflections on the New York City
Archaeology Program (1980–2016)
Sherene Baugher
Introduction
The excavation of New York City’s shops, taverns, warehouses, slave burial
grounds, almshouses, working-class and middle-class homes, elite residences, and
sunken ships have all captured the public’s attention and imagination. These sites
have also garnered the attention of academics through conference papers, journal
articles, and book chapters. New York City sites are unusual because most of them
were excavated as a result of local municipal laws rather than federal mandates. For
most cities in the USA, urban archaeology is undertaken because of federal gov-
ernment mandates under section 106 of the 1966 National Historic Preservation Act
(NHPA). This requires an archaeological evaluation of a proposed development
whenever the project triggers federal permits and/or uses federal funds.
However, not all urban projects are simply the result of mandated federal laws.
During the past fifty years, New York City and a few other urban centers have
moved beyond federal regulations to create innovative programs to protect the
archaeological resources within their municipalities. With the support of municipal
legislation, municipal budget allocations, and municipally mandated funding
required of developers, innovative urban archaeology projects have taken place in
American cities, such as New York City; Boston, Massachusetts; St. Augustine,
Florida; Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Phoenix, Arizona.
This chapter focuses on the development and transformations in the municipal
archaeology program in New York City, which includes all five boroughs of the
city: the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. The City
Archaeology Program is part of the New York City Landmarks Preservation
Commission. This chapter discusses:
S. Baugher (&)
Cornell University, 440 Kennedy Hall, Ithaca, NY 14853, USA

228 S. Baugher
• the legislation that created a process for evaluating archaeological resources that
might be destroyed by development projects,
• the creation in 1980 of the position of City Archaeologist,
• the creation in 1981 of the City Archaeology Program,
• the City Archaeology Program’s innovative projects in the 1980s,
• the downsizing of the program in the 1990s as a result of the 1987 and 1989
stock market crashes and consequent political changes,
• the impacts of the 2008 stock market crash and the Great Recession, and
• the program as it is in 2016.
During all of these periods, there is a discussion of the challenges to the local
law and examples of major successes. This chapter also examines how the City
Archaeology Program has provided public interpretation and public outreach pro-
grams and has engaged the public in New York City’s archaeological heritage.
Legislative Background
In the 1960s and 1970s, the confluence of the environmental protection and historic
preservation movements led the federal government, and various state and local
governments, to pass regulations mandating archaeological evaluations prior to
major construction projects (Tomlan 2015). These laws impacted how archaeo-
logical work was and is carried out in New York City. For the city, the most
important legislative acts were and remain the New York City Landmarks
Preservation Act of 1965 and the City Environmental Quality Review of 1977
(CEQR).
State Laws
In 1975, the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) required the
consideration of environmental factors, including archaeological evaluations, in
decision making by state and local governments. SEQRA was modeled on the 1969
National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) (Pagano 1984, p. 103). While NEPA
only covered federal projects, SEQRA extended state authority to review state
funded projects or projects requiring state permits. Under this authority to review
projects that require government permits, both the state and local governments such
as New York City must approve any discretionary permits. This dual responsibility
is meant to assure that an important site is protected from two perspectives: the
interests of the state and the interests of a local government (NYS Dept. of
Environmental Conservation 2015). In 1975, SEQRA regulations allowed local
governments to establish their own environmental review procedures as long as
they were as protective as the state procedures. New York City government used
12 Reflections on the New York City Archaeology … 229
this prerogative to pass a law in 1977 establishing the City Environmental Quality
Review (CEQR) (NYC Mayor’s Office of Sustainability 2015).
New York City
Under the 1977 City Environmental Quality Review (CEQR), the City placed
environmental review functions within two “co-lead agencies”––the Department of
City Planning and the Department of Environmental Protection (NYC Mayor’s
Office of Sustainability 2015). New York City established its own environmental
regulations that are triggered when a developer requests a discretionary permit from
a city agency. For example, a discretionary permit could be sought by a developer
to build a taller and/or larger building or complex of buildings than is currently
allowed by law. Another trigger is when a developer requests a zoning change for
his parcel, such as from residential to mixed use, or to build a commercial structure
or complex not originally permitted (“zoned”) for this area. All these permits enable
a developer to construct buildings that will yield much greater revenues from the
sale or rental space within the building or complex.
The New Yorker City Planning Commission issues these permits. Before a
permit is issued, it must be evaluated to determine whether it requires an envi-
ronmental review. The Planning Commission works with relevant city agencies that
have the expertise to evaluate environmental concerns such as transportation. The
New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission evaluates all discretionary
permits regarding a site’s potential for archaeological or historic resources. If a
project’s site indicates potential as an archaeological site, this in turn triggers an
archaeological study. The developer is required to pay for all costs of the envi-
ronmental review. This financial obligation includes paying for all phases of the
archaeological work carried out by one of the Cultural Resource Management
(CRM) firms that the developer is required to hire. The Landmarks Commission
evaluates all phases of the CRM archaeology projects.
Archaeology and the New York City Landmarks Law
The first large-scale archaeological project funded by a developer in New York City
was not triggered by federal or state laws, nor by CEQR, but by the 1965
Landmarks law. This project, named the Stadt Huys (Dutch, meaning “State
House”) excavation on Pearl Street in Lower Manhattan, unearthed remnants of
seventeenth-century Dutch “New Amsterdam” (Rothschild et al. 1987). This
excavation excited the interest not only of local citizens but also of government
officials and led to the creation of the City Archaeology Program.
The background to this exciting archaeological project began in 1965 when,
more than a decade before the establishment of CEQR, Mayor Robert F. Wagner
230 S. Baugher
signed a law that created the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission
(NYC LPC 2015). During the next year, 1966, the Landmarks Commission began
to designate individual landmarks, including what became known as the Stadt Huys
site at 71 Pearl Street. The fate of this site had a rocky start. The building at 71 Pearl
Street had an 1826 façade and various components of the foundation dated to 1641,
1700, and 1826 (NYC LPC 1966, p. 1). In 1968, Lehman Brothers, a brokerage
house, requested permission from the Landmarks Commission to demolish this
1966 designated landmark. In 1970, the Commission gave permission to remove
the façade and put it into storage so that it could be re-erected later at another site,
but the rest of the building was demolished (Baugher and Wall 1997, p. 117). The
development did not take place, the site was turned into a parking lot, and the
façade was never re-erected. Nine years later the new owner, intending to build a
skyscraper for Goldman Sachs, requested a permit to build on the site. The
Landmarks Commission suggested that the developer finances an archaeological
excavation at the site instead of re-erecting the 71 Pearl Street façade (Baugher and
Wall 1997, p. 117). In 1979 and 1980, Nan Rothschild and Diana Wall co-directed
the first major CRM (Cultural Resource Management) excavation in Manhattan
(Cantwell and Wall 2001, pp. 18, 28). Map studies suggested that this area was the
site of the Dutch administrative headquarters known as the “Stadt Huys,” and this
soon became the popular name for the site. The discovery of thousands of artifacts
from Dutch and English colonial New York buried only a few blocks from Wall
Street amazed government officials and captured an enthralled public. The broken
artifacts included plates, cups, wine glasses, and clay smoking pipes. The archae-
ologists found the foundation of an English Colonial 1670 tavern, Lovelace Tavern.
They also unearthed an early eighteenth-century well and a section of Stone Street,
a busy seventeenth-century thoroughfare (Baugher and Wall 1997, pp. 117–118).
The officials at the Landmarks Commission realized that if so many artifacts
were still preserved in the heart of the most developed part of the city, then
archaeological material could be found in all five boroughs. As a result, they
negotiated with the City to create a position for a City Archaeologist. In 1980, the
Landmarks Preservation Commission created a City Archaeologist position and
hired Sherene Baugher (the author) as the first City Archaeologist. A year later, in
1981, the Landmarks Commission created the City Archaeology Program.
After Baugher was hired, one of the first assignments given to her by the
commission’s executive director (Lenore Norman) was to work with the commis-
sion’s legal counsel (Dorothy Miner), the developer’s staff, and the archaeologists
who excavated the site (Nan Rothschild and Diana Wall) to plan a permanent
archaeological exhibit for the plaza. The outdoor exhibit, which opened in 1984,
has the footprints of the Stadt Huys outlined in yellow brick and the Lovelace
Tavern is outlined in gray granite pavers (Baugher and Wall 1997, pp. 118–119)
(Fig. 12.1a). Two corners of the actual Lovelace Tavern foundation are on view
under Plexiglas, and an eighteenth-century well is partially reconstructed near the
Lovelace Tavern footprint, plus there are numerous interpretive signs (Baugher and
Wall 1997, pp. 118–121) (Fig. 12.1b). This was the first permanent New York City
outdoor exhibit focusing on urban archaeology. A section of colonial Stone Street
was removed to allow for the construction of the new building. But the architectural
firm, Skidmore, Owings, and Merrill, ingeniously aligned the lobby of the building
to reflect the original gentle curve of Stone Street (Baugher and Wall 1997,
pp. 120–121). The lobby floor has brown pavers that extend outside the building’s
lobby to connect with the remaining two-block segment of Stone Street. After more
than three decades, the outdoor exhibit is still open to the public. The Stadt Huys
project was important on multiple levels––the value of the archaeological data on
colonial Dutch and English New York; the positive support it created for urban
archaeology among both the public and politicians; the support from the Landmarks
Commission to have large urban projects include a component for public outreach,
such as exhibits; and finally the impetus for the creation of the City Archaeology
Program.
There have only been three full-time New York City Archaeologists: Sherene
Baugher (1980–1990), Daniel Pagano (1991–1997), and Amanda Sutphin (2002–
present). This chapter will cover the development, challenges, successes, and
transformations in the City Archaeology Program. But first, we begin with a brief
discussion of how city-mandated archaeology functions under CEQR.
Legally Required Archaeological Work Under CEQR
The evaluation of archaeological work under CEQR does not end with the initial
flagging of a project as possibly having an archaeological potential. Developers
select the CRM firms and pay for the CRM work. To ensure appropriate archae-
ological work by the private firms, the City Archaeologist evaluates the CRM firms’
scopes for both field and laboratory work, recommends any changes to the pro-
posed field and lab work, and can require revisions to the draft the final site report.
In the early 1980s, the City Archaeologist and staff members of the Landmarks
Commission, incorporating input from the Professional Archaeologists of New
York City (PANYC), established the process for the evaluation of CRM projects
under City jurisdiction. A detailed 2002 document, Landmarks Preservation
Guidelines for Archaeological Work in New York City, explains all the procedures
for the various phases of city-mandated archaeological work (NYC LPC 2002).
This review helps developers, property owners, and CRM firms understand what
triggers archaeological work and what that work may entail.
The phasing of CRM work is similar to the federal project requirements known
as Phases 1A, 1B, 2, and 3, except that the New York City phase entitled “Phase
1A” requires more extensive documentary research. Because of the available
archival data in the city, including maps, documentary research often reveals
extensive site disturbance and thus no field testing is required. The archaeology staff
reviews discretionary permits to determine whether any archaeological evaluation is
needed. The 2002 Landmarks Archaeology Guidelines note in bold print “over 85%
of projects reviewed do not trigger archaeological concerns” (NYC LPC 2002,
p. 6). Examples of projects requiring no further archaeological work are as follows:
232 S. Baugher
Fig. 12.1 a The footprints of the seventeenth-century Stadt Huys in yellow brick pavers
(foreground) and the Lovelace Tavern in gray granite pavers are in the plaza of the 85 Broad Street
building in lower Manhattan. Plexiglas covers the foundation stones of one of the corners of the
Lovelace Tavern (left corner with the brass railing) (Photograph by C. Forster). b The rear wall of
the Lovelace Tavern is visible under Plexiglas. The gray granite pavers that extend from the
Plexiglas outline the rest of the footprint of the Lovelace Tavern. (Photograph by S. Baugher)
a new development of the site of a building with a very deep basement that would
have destroyed any archaeological record; or a site where the previous basement
went down to bedrock; or a site where the new structure is on slab construction on a
site that was previously disturbed by other buildings (NYC LPC 2002, pp. 6–7). For
the 15% of projects that require an archaeological investigation, the developer pays
for all phases of work undertaken by CRM firms. “Phase 1A” involves using the
extensive library and archival resources in New York City to carry out documentary
research and the writing of a report. Then, based on a report of this research, the
CRM consultants may or may not recommend preliminary field testing known as
Phase 1B. For example, during the ten-year period from 1980 to 1990, only 50% of
the documentary studies found that the archaeological sites were still intact,
meaning half of the projects required no field testing (Baugher 2001a, p. 141). If
archaeological testing is required, then the work is done in stages. Preliminary
testing known as Phase 1B determines if the site actually contains archaeological
resources. Then, Phase 2 determines the significance of the resources. Phase 3 is
known as “mitigation” and requires either that the developer’s architects and
construction crews avoid sensitive areas entirely or that a CRM firm conduct a
large-scale excavation because significant resources will be destroyed by the pro-
posed construction (NYC LPC 2002, p. 5 and 9). For example, in the period 1980–
1990 of all the projects requiring some archaeological field investigation, only 10%
of all these projects required a full-scale excavation (Baugher 2001a, p. 141). These
Phase 3 projects were truly outstanding. They included a Dutch trading post just off
Broad Street in Lower Manhattan; colonial Dutch and English homes found
throughout the city; eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century merchant shops; and
even an eighteenth-century cargo ship that had been intentionally sunk to be part of
colonial landfill in the East River in what is now the South Street Seaport. These
excavations provided new insights into life in colonial and early nineteenth-century
New York. These sites have been described and highlighted in the books New York
City Neighborhoods (1990) by Nan Rothschild, Unearthing Gotham (2002) by
Anne-Marie Cantwell and Diana Wall, and Archaeology of American Cities by Nan
Rothschild and Diana Wall (2014).
The City Archaeologist reviews all phases of CRM archaeological work and also
visits the CRM projects to inspect the fieldwork. The City issues construction
permits after the archaeological fieldwork has been completed and has been
approved by the City Archaeologist. One of the problems that have plagued other
cities is getting CRM firms to complete the washing and cataloging artifacts in
laboratory work and writing a detailed project report. This has not been a problem
on City-mandated work in New York because the City withholds the Certificate of
Occupancy for a building until the City Archaeologist has approved the final
archaeological report. This economic leverage by the City also means that the
developer can withhold funds from a CRM firm until they produce an acceptable
final report. In some other cities, artifacts from official archaeological digs can
234 S. Baugher
languish in warehouses. But in New York City, the artifacts from CRM collections
must be sent to a repository such as a museum, historical society, or a university
that is acceptable to the Landmarks Commission and the City Archaeologist. In
addition to CEQR, the New York City Archaeologist also serves as a consultant to
the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) archaeologist on federal or state
projects within the boundaries of New York City.
The City Archaeology Program in the Formative Years

1980–1990
When Baugher became the City Archaeologist in 1980, the New York City
Landmarks Commission was fully committed to preservation and public outreach.
Because Baugher was the first person to hold the position of City Archaeologist,
there were no precedents defining what the City Archaeologist should do. Baugher,
with the support of Commissioner Kent Barwick, was able to extend the scope of
her work beyond her core responsibility to evaluate the CRM projects that were
mandated by law. She gradually initiated archaeological field and laboratory work
on city-owned properties, conducted innovative research, designed and installed
exhibits, gave public lectures, co-wrote and published a brochure on preserving
gravestones, and created public programs at various sites. Baugher recruited a team
of volunteers and was eventually able to pay some of them through grants she
wrote. Given the range of work mentioned in this paragraph, the rest of this section
is divided into two parts: (1) work related to legally mandated archaeological
projects undertaken by CRM firms and (2) innovative projects carried out by the
staff of the City Archaeology Program.
Legally Mandated Archaeology Undertaken by CRM Firms
Urban archaeology, whether it is mandated by federal, state, or municipal laws is

economically tied to the development and construction industry. When the econ-
omy is in good shape and the construction industry is on an upswing, urban
archaeology projects are in abundance. The 1980s was a period of great prosperity
for New York City with extensive new buildings going up and hence numerous
archaeological projects. By 1986, the Landmarks Commission hired a full-time
assistant archaeologist, Daniel Pagano, to help with the heavy load of environ-
mental reviews. Pagano handled all initial reviews while Baugher oversaw all Phase
2 and 3 projects. Pagano also assisted on some of the grant projects (to be discussed
in a later section). The 1980s was also the time when developers were testing the
strength of CEQR, looking for loopholes and challenging whether positive out-
comes emerged from the archaeological digs they were required by law to pay for,
and whether or not the public even cared.
The Excavation of a Ship and Public Outreach
Of the many high-profile CRM excavations that have taken place in New York
City, the one that made a lasting positive impact on the way the public responded
was the discovery a sunken eighteenth-century merchant ship in the South Street
Seaport area of Manhattan (Fig. 12.2a, b). In 1981, the developer, Howard Ronson,
requested a discretionary permit to build a taller building than allowed by law. The
project site was originally flagged because of the potential to contain merchant
shops from the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries––and CRM archae-
ologists uncovered almost 250,000 artifacts (Geismar 1983). Near the end of the
Fig. 12.2 a The excavation of the 175 Water Street site. The Ronson ship was found along the left
side of the block near the location of the flatbed truck (Photograph by C. Forster).
b Archaeologists from the CRM firm Soils Systems excavate the bow of the Ronson ship
(Photograph by C. Forster)
236 S. Baugher
dig, the archaeologists were testing the block, which was on colonial landfill, for
evidence of colonial “retaining” walls or other supports and instead found a sunken
ship. The original CRM documentary research and even a subsequent doctoral
dissertation by Warren Reiss were unable to uncover any record of a ship being
sunk on this parcel (Geismar 1983; Riess 1987). However after thirty years of
additional research, Warren Riess now believes that the name of the ship was
probably the “Princess Carolina” (Riess and Smith 2015, p. 60).
Because the archaeologists found a sunken ship, the developer, Howard Ronson,
the City Archaeologist Sherene Baugher, Landmarks Commissioner Kent Barwick,
and the Landmarks counsel Dorothy Miner, were able to renegotiate the scope of
work and extend the excavation for almost six weeks. The developer fully coop-
erated because he was interested in maritime history and archaeology, especially
because he was British and had seen significant archaeology in London. Ronson
willingly spent extra funds, beyond what was required by law, to bring in a team of
nautical archaeologists from Texas A&M. He also willingly funded $350,000 to
conserve the bow of the ship, which he then donated to the Mariner’s Museum in
Newport News, Virginia (Baugher 2001a, pp. 148–149).
“The Ronson Ship,” as the project was known, was also the first CRM site in
New York City opened to the public. Commissioner Barwick had visited Viking
excavations in York, England, and was intrigued by the way the British archae-
ologists set up temporary exhibits and viewing areas so the public could observe the
excavations. Barwick wanted to have an “open house day” so that the public could
view the excavation of the early eighteenth-century sunken ship in the South Street
Seaport area of Manhattan. With the approval of the developer who agreed to admit
the public to what was legally his property, an “open site day” was held in February
1983. The City Archaeologist, archaeologists working for the CRM firm Soil
Systems, and preservationists from the Landmarks Commission all hosted the
event. The event was a great success and the project received coverage in local and
national newspapers and in local television news, and over 10,000 people took the
site tours (Baugher 2001a, p.148). The public interest and excitement amazed
everyone including the archaeologists. The project created positive (and free)
publicity for the developer and also helped to create future public support for
archaeological projects. It also demonstrated to other developers that archaeology
could be an asset to a project instead of a problem. Because of the amazing level of
cooperation between the developer and the Landmarks Commission, home of the
City Archaeology Program, the project won both city and state preservation awards.
The project demonstrated to the public, the politicians, and the developers that high
archaeological professional standards could be carried out in a legally mandated
project without incurring construction delays. In fact, the building was completed
two months ahead of schedule (Baugher 2001a, p. 150). After the 1982 ship
excavation, most New York City-mandated archaeological projects in the 1980s
went smoothly with the full cooperation of developers.
The 1986 Challenge to CEQR––17 State Street Project
The only major challenge to the City law occurred in 1986. A developer, Melvyn
Kaufman of the William Kaufman Organization, applied to City Planning for a
discretionary permit and was informed that his site, 17 State Street, had archaeo-
logical potential to contain material from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
(NYC LPC 1986a; Dunlap 1990). While the developer was working with the City
Planning Commission to receive his discretionary permit, his staff went to the New
York City Buildings Department to obtain an as-of-right permit as if he was going
to build a smaller building than he intended (NYC LPC 1986a). With the new
permit, a construction team quickly excavated the site for the building’s foundation
and destroyed any trace of the archaeological site (Cantwell and Wall 2001, p. 31).
The City Planning Commission had required an archaeological documentary study,
which was paid for by the developer. The study by Joan Geismar found that the
property had been the home of an early eighteenth-century Jewish merchant,
Abraham Isaacs, from 1728 to 1754 (Geismar 1986, pp. 10, 30–31). The site could
have been the first Jewish colonial site excavated in the northeast; thus, it had
significance to both New York City and the region (Baugher and Wall 1997,
p. 126).
The developer’s circumvention of City law challenged the whole environmental
review process. This became a test case and went before the New York City Board
of Standards and Appeals, the legal body that resolved conflicts between the City
Planning Commission and the applicants. The Landmarks Preservation
Commission requested some form of mitigation because of the purposeful
destruction of an archaeological site. Community groups and professional organi-
zations, including the Professional Archaeologists of New York City (PANYC),
spoke at the hearings in favor of mitigation (Wall 1986). The developer’s battery of
attorneys fought hard to prevent any penalty––but they failed. The Board decided in
favor of mitigation, and the Landmarks Commission was asked to submit a draft
proposal for mitigation (Dunlap 1990). Baugher, Joseph Bresnan (Executive
Director of the Landmarks Commission), and Jeremy Woodoff (Director of
Environmental Review at the Landmarks Commission) proposed a museum exhibit
and a maintenance plan (Woodoff 1986). With some modifications to the plan, the
developer agreed to pay for the design and installation of a mini-museum, New York
Unearthed, located in the plaza of his new building (Dunlap 1990). He also had to
pay for the management, maintenance, and public education programs for five years
(NYC LPC 1986b). To insure that this agreement was fulfilled, the developer could
not obtain a Certificate of Occupancy for his building until all of the conditions of
the agreement had been fulfilled, including the opening of the museum and funding
for its management (Baugher and Wall 1997, p. 126). The developer turned over the
operation of the mini-museum to the South Street Seaport Museum (Fig. 12.3). In
1990, the museum opened to the public with 400 square feet of exhibit space on the
plaza level and 1200 square feet of exhibits and a conservation lab on the floor
below (Baugher and Wall 1997, p. 126). This test case sent a powerful message to
the development community, and the result was a continued compliance with the
238 S. Baugher
Fig. 12.3 The Unearthed New York mini-museum is in the plaza of the 17 State Street building in
Lower Manhattan. The museum operated from 1990 until 2006 (Photograph by S. Baugher)
law. The City also planned to close the loophole used by Kaufman Organization in
the permitting process in which the company applied for and received an as-of-right
permit for a smaller building, destroyed an archaeological site, while in the process
of getting a discretionary permit. In the future, before issuing any as-of-right per-
mits, the City’s Buildings Department staff would check with the Planning
Commission to determine if a project was also undergoing review for a discre-
tionary permit.
Innovative Projects by the Staff of the City Archaeology

Program
Besides the municipal laws pertaining to developers’ projects, there were also
innovative programs that involved cooperation among city agencies between 1980
and 1990. Baugher, with the support of Commissioner Kent Barwick, established
the City Archaeology Program in 1981 that would also undertake work on
city-owned sites. Baugher studied a state-level archaeology program directed by
Paul Huey as one model for working on city property with paid temporary staff.
Huey’s Program was part of the Historic Sites Bureau of New York State Office of
Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation. Baugher also used Pam Cressey’s City
Archaeology Program in Alexandria, Virginia, as a model for how a program
functioned with a large volunteer core (Cressey and Vinton 2007). Baugher wrote
grants to fund archaeology staff and also created a volunteer core to work on both
excavations and on laboratory work. The Archaeology Program archaeologists
included people familiar to scholars in historical archaeology such as Diane Dallal,
Meta Janowitz, Ed Lenik, and Gaynell Stone. Daniel Pagano also assisted on some
of the projects. Pagano started working with the program as an intern 1981, moved
on to become a member of the grants staff, and then became a full-time city
employee as the Assistant City Archaeologist in 1986.
The City Archaeology Program depended on grant money to undertake exca-
vations on city-owned and/or city landmarked properties on projects that had not
triggered discretionary permits but were nevertheless significant. These grants
funded temporary archaeological staff. Baugher wrote and received state and private
foundation grants, and other city agencies also provided grants. The Landmarks
Preservation Foundation, the nonprofit arm of the Landmarks Commission, man-
aged all grants. Some of the grants also funded projects involving: (1) evaluations
of the historic cemeteries in all five boroughs, (2) creation of predictive models of
properties with high archaeological potential within Manhattan, and (3) design and
installation of archaeological museum exhibits (Baugher et al. 1982; NYC LPC
1984). Baugher and the archaeology staff undertook documentary research,
archaeological excavations, laboratory work, and preparation of reports on sites on
city-owned land and on the property of city-owned historic house museums. These
projects included the excavation of the colonial Voorlezer House located in Staten
Island’s “Historic Richmondtown,” a 100-acre outdoor museum complex (Baugher
et al. 1985).
The Archaeology Program’s excavations were on city-owned cultural institu-
tions and in city parks that were slated for some ground disturbance such as
installing underground pipelines or the creation of new parking lots. One of these
projects involved diverse excavations at the 80-acre Snug Harbor Cultural Center
on Staten Island. Snug Harbor had originally been built as a stately, columned series
of buildings to house retired seamen and thus had originally been named “Sailors’
Snug Harbor”––the word “snug” meaning a safe anchorage (Baugher and Baragli
1987; Baugher 2007, 2010). Other city-funded projects involved an assessment and
report regarding the archaeological potential of a cultural institution’s property such
as the Bronx Botanical Garden. These studies highlighted significant archaeological
sites so that they could be protected from future construction projects (e.g., Baugher
et al. 1989).
These excavation projects usually involved some form of public outreach
whether it was site tours, public lectures, or museum exhibits. The public pro-
gramming and exhibits were also funded by grants. One example was a year-long
archaeology exhibit called “Staten Island Trade Networks: Studying Community
History Through Archaeology.” The New York Council for the Humanities funded
this exhibit at the Staten Island Museum.
The community engagement goals of New York City Archaeology Program
were similar to the City Archaeology Program in Alexandria, Virginia, which has a
public component that enables people to volunteer on excavations and in the
240 S. Baugher
archaeology laboratory. Over the years, New York City teachers, city employees,
nurses and doctors in private practice, and preservationists from the Landmarks
Commission became New York City archaeological volunteers. This type of public
involvement also increases grassroots support for archaeology and preservation.
Perhaps the most high profile of these City Archaeology Program projects was
the six-week excavation in 1989 of the colonial almshouse in City Hall Park
(Fig. 12.4). This was a joint excavation by Baugher and the staff of the City
Archaeology Program working together with Professors Frederick Winter and
Arthur Bankoff and their students from Brooklyn College (Baugher and Lenik
1997). The almshouse kitchen was located behind current City Hall. The archae-
ologists unearthed thousands of eighteenth-century artifacts. After the excavation
was completed, all the washing, cataloging, and report preparation were undertaken
solely by the City Archaeology Program staff (Baugher et al. 1990). The conditions
in this almshouse, while not ideal, were certainly better than the nineteenth-century
English workhouses depicted by Charles Dickens or in the crowded conditions in
twentieth-century homeless shelters (Baugher 2001b, p. 199). The dishes, glasses,
clay smoking pipes, buttons, buckles, eye glasses, toys, marbles, coins, and faunal
remains revealed the positive treatment for what colonial New York considered the
“deserving poor”––widows, children, elderly without families, and injured soldiers.
The almshouse site was opened to the public and created lots of interest. The
archaeologists had daily visitors to the site. These visitors included people who
worked in nearby offices as well as tourists. Staff and students handed out a
one-page description of the project and happily answered questions about the
excavation. Many visitors returned to observe the progress of the excavation. The
project received local newspaper and television coverage as well as national tele-
vision coverage by Maria Shriver and Al Roker on NBC’s program Sunday Today.
Despite all the media coverage, there was never any attempt at looting. New
Yorkers were intrigued and interested in learning about the history of their city, as
we had already seen with the thousands of people who came to see the Ronson ship
in 1982.
Summarizing the years from 1980 to 1990, the City Archaeologist did more than
just oversee and regulate archaeology on developers’ properties. Baugher devel-
oped a robust program creating joint voluntary projects with other city agencies to
undertake archaeology on city-owned properties. She encouraged public partici-
pation in field and laboratory work, gave site tours, and public lectures. She even
gave tours in city cemeteries to encourage communities to help protect their local
cemeteries. To encourage the public’s respect for and protection of cemeteries, she
co-authored an extensively illustrated cemetery brochure (Baugher et al. 1984). Her
archaeological efforts also involved her work with descendant communities,
including collaboration with members of the city’s American Indian Community
House to jointly excavate a potential Native American site in lower Manhattan
(Baugher 2009). The year 1990 marked the conclusion of the City Archaeology
Program’s innovative, successful, and challenging first decade.
Fig. 12.4 Tourists and New York City residents view the excavation of an eighteenth-century
almshouse near City Hall in Lower Manhattan. In the background, an archaeologist near the fence
discusses the latest discoveries with the public (Photograph by C. Forster)
Transformations in the City Archaeology Program

1991–1994
Nothing remains static and change is inevitable. In December 1990, Baugher left
the Landmarks Commission to become an assistant professor at Cornell University
in Ithaca, New York. For the next six months, she volunteered her time to work
with the remaining grants staff members, Judith Guston and Ed Lenik, to oversee
242 S. Baugher
the completion of all of the grants. Baugher’s work included editing reports, writing
parts of some chapters, and making sure all the artifacts were cataloged in order to
leave the next City Archaeologist with a clean slate (Baugher et al. 1991a, b, c;
Baugher and Lenik 1991). In 1991, Daniel Pagano became the Acting Director of
the City Archaeology Program. Formerly, the assistant archaeologist, Pagano, had
to take on Baugher’s responsibilities as the City Archaeologist as well as his own
because the agency only had funds for one archaeologist.
In 1987 and 1989, there were stock market crashes that still had profound
impacts on the economy in the early 1990s (Carlson 2007). Unfortunately, by 1991
a recession brought a major slowdown to construction in New York City. The
economy suffered and New York City government’s reaction under Mayor David
Dinkins (1990–1994) was to downsize all city government agencies no matter how
efficient an agency was. When staff left to take other jobs or to retire, their positions
were not filled. The Landmarks Preservation Commission cut back its work to only
legally mandated services. For the City Archaeology Program, this meant their
innovative grants and programs were cut and never restored. Funding for exhibits
and public programs ceased. Nonmandated archaeological work on city-owned
properties ended. Public participation in excavations on city-owned property was
terminated. Public tours of excavations stopped. Innovation was no longer
encouraged. The work of the City Archaeologist shifted to the task of evaluating
environmental reviews. The job was now similar to the role of the archaeological
evaluators of CRM work at state and federal-level agencies, the once-innovative
position ceased to be.
In 1991, there were also major changes to CEQR. The previous system of two
lead agencies was discarded. For the City Archaeology Program, this originally
meant dealing directly with City Planning. The 1991 modifications to the 1977 law
created a system “in which each City agency acts as lead agency for projects that it
approves, funds, and/or directly implements” (NYC Mayor’s Office of
Sustainability 2015). This change (still operational in 2016) divested the respon-
sibility of environmental reviews to many diverse agencies and made it more
difficult for the City Archaeologist to be sure that potential projects were flagged.
There were CEQR archaeology projects during the 1990s recession and recov-
ery. But the two highest profile archaeology projects of the period, the Five Points
project and the African Burial Ground, were triggered by federal funds, not by city
discretionary permits. The biggest projects of the decade would have been missed
had the city been solely reliant on its own regulations. The General Services
Administration (GSA) funded both projects. The project at Five Points, New York’s
infamous nineteenth-century slum, was triggered by the proposed construction of a
new federal courthouse at Foley Square in Lower Manhattan. Because of the federal
funds, the archaeologist at the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) in Albany
served as the lead reviewer, with the City Archaeologist only serving as a con-
sultant. Although the CRM archaeologists excavated only one block within the
entire multi-block neighborhood of Five Points, their efforts uncovered over a
million artifacts associated with the Irish, German, and Italian people who lived
there (Yamin 2001).
During the period 1990–1994, the project that overshadowed all the others was
the controversial excavation of the colonial African Burial Ground in New York
City. In the beginning of the project, the City Archaeologist’s involvement was
again only as a consultant to the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO)
archaeologist since this was a federally funded project but that changed. In
December 1991, the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) for the project was
amended to make the Landmarks Commission (and thus the City Archaeologist)
directly involved in the project (Howard University and John Milner Associates
1993, p. 5). Throughout the remainder of the project both the Landmarks
Commission and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation commented on all
phases of the work (Advisory Council on Historic Preservation 2003). Due to the
increase in workload brought on by the Landmarks Commission’s direct involve-
ment with the oversight of the African Burial Ground project, the Commission
hired Jean Howson as a half-time assistant archaeologist to work with Daniel
Pagano. Howson primarily worked on the African Burial Ground designation
report, and she also assisted with site visits to the burial ground.
Much has been written about the African Burial Ground because it is the most
well-known study of a segregated, Northern colonial cemetery for enslaved and free
people of color. The cemetery dates from at least 1703 and Africans continued to
use the burial ground until 1795 (Howson et al. 2009, pp. 35–36, 43, 53–55).
The CRM team recovered 419 burials and provided an unprecedented opportunity
to study this urban population’s cultural and geographic origins, investigate the
physical quality of life for these people who were primarily enslaved, and learn
about “the biocultural transformations of these people from African to African
American identities” (Mack and Blakey 2004, p. 10). However, the story of the
African Burial Ground is not simply about what the bones and artifacts revealed.
Equally important is the story of the politics, ethics, and community activism that
arose to protect the burial ground.
In the summer of 1991, CRM archaeologists discovered human remains on the
former burial ground, but the US General Services Administration (GSA) kept the
discovery a secret until October 1991 (Harrington 1993, p. 21). Religious leaders
and lay people from New York’s African American community were angered that
they were not informed about the excavation, and the anger increased when several
burials were destroyed by a backhoe (Harrington 1993, p. 33). Unlike Native
American burials protected by Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation
Act (NAGPRA), unmarked African American burials can be excavated without a
legal requirement to inform the descendants or stakeholders. A two-year battle
ensued between the GSA and the African American community over the fate of the
burial ground (Statistical Research 2009, p. 278). The Landmarks Commission held
public hearings in November 1992 regarding the potential designation of the site as
a city landmark. Assistant archaeologist Jean Howson was a co-author of the
designation report (Harris et al. 1993). In 1993, the site was designated as “the
African Burial Ground and the Commons Historic District” by the Landmarks
Commission and is still the only archaeological site that is a New York City
designated landmark. The entire area that historically contained the burial ground
244 S. Baugher
Fig. 12.5 a The African Burial Ground Memorial, designed by Rodney Leon, is in lower
Manhattan. The controversial GSA office tower is the gray building in the background
(Photograph by S. Baugher). b The grassy mounds in the foreground mark the location of the
reburial site of the 419 bodies that were excavated at the African Burial Ground in Manhattan. The
memorial is in the background (Photograph by S. Baugher)
was also declared a National Historic Landmark in 1993. In 2006, the site was
proclaimed the African Burial Ground National Monument and became part of the
National Park System (Statistical Research Inc. 2009, p. 20, 34).
In 1993, Howard University was hired by the GSA to undertake post-excavation
research on the human remains, coffins, and artifacts that had been removed from
the African Burial Ground (Howson et al. 2009, p. 5). The archaeologists and
biological anthropologists involved in this post-excavation research characterized
themselves as activist scholars. They were committed to working closely with the
descendant community, and later, they also ensured the repatriation and reburial of
the human remains and artifacts (La Roche and Blakey 1997; Perry et al. 2009).
The role of an engaged and politically active public and descendant community also
shaped how the African Burial Ground was protected and was/is interpreted to the
public (Fig. 12.5a, b). In 2003, all 419 bodies that were excavated and scientifically
studied were reinterred at the site (National Park Service 2011). In 2007, after a
major national competition, an outdoor memorial designed by Rodney Léon was
installed and unveiled (Rothstein 2010). In 2010, the National Park Service opened
a museum/visitor center on Broadway near the burial ground memorial (Rothstein
2010). The African Burial Ground provides a model for scholars and government
officials working with descendant communities and indeed highlights the impor-
tance of community collaborations in shaping the interpretation of such sites.
After Daniel Pagano’s direct involvement with the African Burial Ground
excavation was completed, he took an eighteen-month leave of absence to work for
the Advisory Council on Historical Preservation in Washington, D.C. Jean Howson
continued as a half-time archaeologist until 1994. While Pagano was on leave, the
Commission hired two temporary half-time archaeologists, Susan Dublin and
Marjorie Ingle, to handle all the archaeological environmental reviews. All three
archaeologists worked for Gina Santucci, the Director of Environmental Review at
the Landmarks Commission. Pagano returned to the Commission in 1994 as the
Director of the City Archaeology Program and Susan Dublin and Marjorie Ingle left
the Commission shortly after his return.
Changes Under Mayor Giuliani 1994–2001
The administration of Republican Mayor Rudolph “Rudy” Giuliani brought a

pro-development approach to New York City government. Even though the city
was successfully rebounding from a recession, there was no attempt bring back any
of the innovative archaeology programs of the 1980s. Giuliani’s minimalist
approach of only focusing on legally mandated work has been continued by sub-
sequent mayors of New York.
246 S. Baugher
Mayor Giuliani appointed Jennifer Raab as the new Chair of the Landmarks
Preservation Commission. Commissioner Raab (1994–2001) made internal changes
to the Archaeology Program, including creating two new positions. In 1994,
Landmarks Commission hired Amanda Sutphin as a part-time archaeologist to
assist the City Archaeologist. Between 1997 and 2002 was a period of change in the
management of the Archaeology Program. In 1997, the Landmarks Commission
hired Professor Arthur Bankoff from Brooklyn College as a part-time staff member
with the title Archaeology Advisor. As of 2016, Professor Bankoff still serves a few
hours a week as a part-time staff member. From 1997 until 2002, Bankoff directed
the Archaeology Program. Pagano’s job transformed and he became responsible for
the initial CEQR reviews for archaeology. In 1998, Sutphin became a full-time
archaeologist as the Deputy Advisor to the Chair, and her responsibilities evolved
over time. In 2002, Sutphin was promoted and became the City Archaeologist as
well as the Director of the Archaeology Department.
With the growing importance of the Internet, Commissioner Raab pushed the
archaeology staff to create archaeological content for the Landmarks Commission’s
Web site, which provides information to the public on all of the Commission’s
diverse work. The archaeology staff provided the official written detailed guidelines
and steps for archaeology under the CEQR requirements, and these guidelines were
placed on the Web in 2002.
The Department of Archaeology, 2002–2016
In 2002, the former Archaeology Program was renamed the Archaeology

Department with Amanda Sutphin as the director. During the terms of Mayor
Michael Bloomberg (2002–2013), New York experienced prosperity, but then
suffered the Stock Market crash of 2008, followed by the Great Recession. The city
is still rebuilding from that economic crisis under its current mayor, Bill de Blasio.
During these turbulent times, the City Archaeologist continued to review CRM
archaeological projects triggered by discretionary permits and to evaluate the field
proposals and final site reports of CRM firms.
In an effort to provide more Web-based information for archaeologists,
researchers, and the public regarding CRM projects, the Landmarks Commission
scanned all the 1980s and 1990s CRM Phase 1, 2, and 3 reports. These scanned
reports were uploaded to the archaeology section of the Landmark Commission’s
Web site in 2009. All new CRM reports are required to be submitted in digital form
so that they can be placed on the Web.
Daniel Pagano continued undertaking the initial evaluation CEQR proposals. In
2007, Daniel Pagano and Gina Santucci, Director of Environment Review at the
Landmarks Commission, wrote grants and then designed and implemented the
Environmental Review GIS database program (ERGIS). Starting in 2007 and
continuing in 2016, Pagano utilizes ERGIS for research purposes to produce GIS
maps and predictive models of potentially archaeological sensitive areas in com-
munities throughout the city. Pagano has also digitized over 2500 historic maps for
use with ERGIS. These materials and the ERGIS database provide valuable
information for initial environmental review assessments. In particular, they have
been helpful to improve predictive modeling for the identification of Native
American sites in the borough of Brooklyn (Pagano 2013) as well as throughout the
other four boroughs.
Impacts of the Great Recession on CRM Archaeology

in New York
The 2008 stock market crash impacted all sectors of the US economy including the
construction industry and CRM firms. In New York City, some CRM firms have
seen projects that initially would have been totally privately financed by developers
and triggered CEQR now included components involving federal funds. This meant
that these projects fell under federal and state review, and thus, in these cases, the
City Archaeologist is no longer the primary evaluator. That role now resides with
the archaeologists at the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO). In an advisory
role, the City Archaeologist still advocates strongly for archaeological projects.
There are, however, still CEQR projects that are solely under the review by the City
Archaeologist.
The city archaeology projects that have received the most press coverage in the
last 15 years were federal not New York City-mandated projects, similar to the
pattern seen in the 1990s. In 2004, the significant South Ferry Terminal project at
the southern tip of Manhattan was undertaken using federal funds to replace and
enlarge the South Ferry subway stop (Dallal et al. 2011). During the monitoring
phase of this large construction project, CRM archaeologists uncovered four
colonial-era stone foundation walls from New York’s military fortifications.
A positive public outreach result of this project was that the Metropolitan
Transportation Authority, the project’s sponsor, had a section of Wall 3, which
dates to 1755–1756, reconstructed on a wall in the new South Ferry subway ter-
minal (Dallal et al. 2011, p. 8, pp. 16–18).
The other major project was the 2010 discovery of another colonial sunken ship
one block south of the site of the World Trade Center, on property that was also
impacted by the destruction of the Twin Towers on September 11, 2001. The block
was part of the larger redevelopment of the World Trade Center. Since this was a
project involving city, state, and federal investment, it triggered federal laws and
thus was reviewed by the archaeologist at the State Historic Preservation Office
(SHPO) with the City Archaeologist acting as a consultant (AKRF 2013. p. 1.2).
From 2009 to 2011, the CRM firm known simply as “AKRF” (originally “Allee
King Rosen and Fleming”) monitored the construction at the site. In July 2010, at a
248 S. Baugher
level between 20 and 30 feet below street grade they found an eighteenth-century
ship intentionally sunk as landfill (AKRF 2013, p. S-1). The ship was in a class
known as a Hudson River Sloop that was designed to transport cargo and pas-
sengers in the shallow waters of the Hudson River or along the coast (AKRF 2013,
p. S.2). The ship received lots of media coverage including television, newspapers,
and magazines, thus bringing this discovery to a wider audience.
In New York City, the community activism of the 1990s African Burial Ground
project is still being felt in contemporary projects. In Harlem, the 126th Street Bus
Depot is on the location of an African American burial ground and the cemetery
extended to the edge of another CRM project, the Willis Avenue Bridge (Historical
Perspectives 2004, 2011). The CRM firm Historical Perspectives conducted the
initial work to locate the boundaries of this cemetery and worked with the
descendant community. The cemetery was not disturbed by either project plus
signage commemorating the burial ground was erected near the Manhattan side of
the Willis Avenue Bridge (C. Saunders, personal communication, June 9, 2016).
Then, in 2015, 140 disarticulated bones were unearthed just outside the known
boundaries of the cemetery by the CRM firm AKRF. The CRM archaeologists
worked with the descendant community, and the burial ground was re-consecrated
by the Reverend Dr. Patricia Singletary, pastor of the Elmendorf Reformed Church
(Dunlop 2016). The concern and commemoration for burial grounds is not limited
to African American cemeteries. For example, Historical Perspectives excavated the
burial ground of Irish and German men, women, and children who died in a Staten
Island mid-nineteenth-century quarantine station hospital (Mascia 2011). Due to
community activism, the 83 excavated bodies were reburied on the grassy lawn in
front of a new courthouse and a sign and gravestone mark the burial grounds
(Ishayik 2014) (Fig. 12.6).
The Challenges and Successes
The CRM Collections
In addition to her environmental review work, Amanda Sutphin had to handle the
increasing challenge of determining where to put the collections from all the CRM
excavations, as well as how to deal with challenges to the archaeological section of
CEQR. In the 1980s, the collections from the CRM excavations in Lower
Manhattan primarily went to the South Street Seaport Museum near the Manhattan
side of the Brooklyn Bridge. Other New York City collections from the other four
boroughs and other sections of Manhattan were housed in other facilities including
Brooklyn College, Columbia University, New York University, and Queens
College, as well as in historical societies and house museums. The South Street
Seaport Museum gladly accepted high-profile CRM collections from Manhattan
excavations and also managed the archaeology museum, New York Unearthed
Fig. 12.6 Signage and a gravestone in the grassy plaza in front of a courthouse commemorates
the nineteenth-century Quarantine Hospital Cemetery on Staten Island. The gravestone marks the
reburial site of 83 bodies excavated by archaeologists prior to the construction of the courthouse
(Photograph by E. Hudson)
(created as mitigation for the 1986 destruction of the archaeological site at 17 State
Street). TIAA/CREF, the owners of Kaufmann’s 17 State Street Building, contin-
ued to voluntarily fund the staffing of the New York Unearthed museum until they
sold the building in 1999 (Schiffman 2005). The new owner, RFR Realty, was
willing to provide the space rent-free but was not willing to pay the Seaport to staff
the museum (Schiffman 2005). In 2005, New York Unearthed closed and the
artifacts were removed (Nazaryan 2011).
In 2004, the South Street Seaport Museum cited financial difficulties and fired
seven employees including the archaeological curator (Walker 2004). The Museum
also threatened to get rid of its archaeological collections (Sutphin 2016, p. 4).
Amanda Sutphin tried unsuccessfully to find a suitable storage facility in New York
City. When no affordable space was available in the city, the New York State
Museum in Albany came to the rescue and agreed to take the collections in 2005
(Rose 2005). The State Museum houses archaeological collections from all over the
state and has the staff to make these collections available to researchers, so this
indeed is a proper home for the CRM collections from the South Street Seaport
Museum.
250 S. Baugher
Challenge to CEQR—15 Williams Street
In 2004, a developer submitted a proposal to City Planning for a discretionary

permit for property at 15 Williams Street in Lower Manhattan. The land was part of
seventeenth-century Nieuw Amsterdam (Dutch New York). The site was flagged
for archaeology because it might contain a seventeenth-century brewery, a resi-
dence, and orchard. The property’s minimal development increased likelihood of
finding seventeenth-century resources, especially the brewery (Sutphin, personal
communication, January 26, 2016). However, the developer’s staff decided to go to
the Buildings Department to receive an as-of-right building permit and to begin
excavation on the site. This is the exact procedure that was used in 1986 by
Kaufman’s staff for the infamous 17 State Street project. Apparently the loophole
between the Buildings Department and City Planning was never formally closed
with a written agreement and existed only as an understanding between staff. Sadly,
when staff members leave or retire, the institutional memory of an informal
agreement is lost. After Sutphin discovered what had happened, she alerted Mark
Silberman, the General Council for the Landmarks Preservation Commission, who
then notified David Karnovsky, the General Council for the Department of City
Planning. Staff at the Landmarks Commission and at City Planning, worked
together and drawing upon the legal precedent of 17 State Street, they were ulti-
mately able to reach agreement with the developer. The developer agreed to pay 1.1
million dollars to the Department of City Planning, which was then deposited in the
Fund for the City of New York (a nonprofit organization) in order to create an
archaeological repository (Sutphin 2016, p. 4). The search for an archaeological
storage facility ended happily with a very generous offer from the private sector.
The Durst Organization, one of the city’s largest real estate development firms,
offered for free a 1500-square feet, fully climate-controlled space in Midtown
Manhattan for a period of 10 years (Sutphin 2016, p. 15). The developer’s fine was
used to furnish the facility, to move the collections, to support the repository, and
most importantly to create an accessible collection.
The City has artifacts from forty-one sites still stored at various locations in
about 1800 banker boxes in various states of preservation (Sutphin 2016, pp. 4–6).
Staff members from the Museum of the City of New York worked with Sutphin to
create a digital database of these collections. The museum staff also repacked fifteen
of the forty-one collections in a uniform way, preserving the artifacts in archival
storage boxes. This will make it easier for future researchers to access them.
Unfortunately, additional funds will need to be raised to complete the work on the
other twenty-six collections.
Since 2014, Sutphin has been overseeing the shipment of the archived artifacts
to the new City Archaeology storage facility. From 2014 to 2016, access for
researchers was by appointment only. In August 2016, the Landmarks Commission
hired a part-time archaeologist, Dr. Jessica Striebel Maclean, and one of her roles
will be to be at the repository one day a week. In addition, the Landmarks
Commission hired a firm, Keepthinking, to design the archaeological database and
to create a Web site. The Web site will provide data from the collections and
photographs of some of the artifacts. Hopefully, this Web site will be useful to
researchers, students, and the general public. When the Web site is completed, it
will have a link to the Landmark Preservation Commission’s Web site.
Conclusions
Much has changed between 1980 and 2016. Like other global cities, New York
City has seen its share of both prosperity and economic retrenchment. The pros-
perity of the 1980s created a growth in both city development and city-mandated
archaeological projects. In the plaza of 85 Broad Street in Lower Manhattan, you
can still see the 1984 granite footprints outlining two colonial buildings and the
restored colonial well, reminders of the 1979 archaeological excavation on the Stadt
Huys site. A wall in the South Ferry subway terminal contains a reconstructed
segment of a stone wall from colonial fortifications. The memorial and burial
mounds at the African Burial Ground and the museum/visitor center are also places
the public can visit. These three sites provide lasting visual images of the city’s
urban archaeology.
In spite of all the budget cuts, New York City municipal laws regarding ar-
chaeology on projects requiring discretionary permits are still intact. In New York
City, CRM firms are still constantly unearthing artifacts and foundations from the
past. Taxpayer dollars are spent on some of these excavations. On others, devel-
opers receive special discretionary permits to build larger and more profitable
buildings. But what does the public receive from these public archaeology projects?
Since the 1990s, public involvement and outreach in archaeology have not been a
priority of the Mayors of New York. Unfortunately, many of the CRM archaeo-
logical discoveries receive no publicity and the public rarely learns about these
sites. CRM companies produce technical reports for the review agency archaeol-
ogists, but almost nothing is provided for the public. In the past, the public has
clearly shown an interest in the city’s archaeology through tours of sites like the
Ronson sunken ship and the daily visitors to the almshouse excavation.
Unfortunately, the community outreach and engagement of the public in New York
City’s archaeology that took place in the 1980s has been replaced by an avoidance
of public participation. The reason is usually given as “insurance concerns” and
“liability issues.” But these concerns also existed in the 1980s, when ten thousand
New Yorkers visited the Ronson ship. Because New York citizens have clearly
shown enthusiasm and interest in their archaeological heritage, they deserve to see
how their tax dollars are being spent. In addition, engagement with the public helps
to generate grassroots support for the protection and preservation of the city’s
archaeological heritage.
With the new archaeological storage facility provided by the Durst Corporation,
the City is moving forward to a goal of making these collections accessible to
researchers. But how will the staff of the City Archaeology Department at the
252 S. Baugher
Landmarks Commission reach out to the general public? How will they present
archaeology to the public? Will the archaeology staff be allowed to become
involved in more than simply doing environmental reviews? Will they be allowed
to bring back some of the innovative projects of the 1980s such as public lectures
and exhibits? Will some of the artifacts in the storage facility be used to create
traveling exhibits for public schools, senior citizen centers, or public libraries?
Perhaps the opening of this new archaeological storage facility will provide an
opportunity for the City. It is time to put the public back into public archaeology.
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Historical Archaeology 35(3).
Chapter 13
Digging the Hub: The Evolution
of the Boston City Archaeology Program
Joe Bagley
Introduction
The City Archaeology Program emerged in 1983 from the mire of the
now-infamous Central Artery/Tunnel project or, as it is more widely known, the
Big Dig, a 20-year transportation project to re-route the elevated highway that cut
through Boston into a 3.5-mile tunnel. Throughout the three decades of its exis-
tence, the program has experienced the typical highs and lows of municipal entities
but has survived predominantly due to its flexibility and, in many ways, its lack of
formal jurisdiction. This flexibility has allowed the four City Archaeologists who
have run the program to pursue a variety of personal and professional priorities that
have changed with each City Archaeologist, as well as with the growth and
development of Boston. This has also resulted in prolonged vacancies within the
program as there is no formal legislation requiring the existence of a City
Archaeologist in Boston. This chapter will review the history of the City
Archaeology Program, and the work of the four archaeologists who have held the
title of “City Archaeologist,” with a focus on the recent work of the program.
History of Enabling Legislation
In 1975, the City of Boston created the Boston Landmarks Commission (BLC) in
an effort to identify and preserve historic properties, review development and
demolition projects, and provide review for several Historic District Commissions.
Today, the BLC regulates over 8000 individual properties and landscapes in nine
historic districts and individually designated Boston Landmarks (City of Boston
J. Bagley (&)
City Archaeologist, 217 Manchester St, Boston, MA 02126, USA

258 J. Bagley
2016). The BLC also reviews demolition permits for any property over 50 years old
to determine potential landmark status (City of Boston 1995).
In Massachusetts, federal Section 106 review and compliance is expanded with
Massachusetts General Laws in Chap. 9, Section. 26–27C, which extend
Section 106-style review to state permitted, funded, or licensed projects. These regu-
lations and laws created the position of State Archaeologist and the State Archaeological
Permit (SAP), which is required for any archaeological work on public land.
In 1982, the Massachusetts Historical Commission (MHC), the State Historic
Preservation Office (SHPO), published a document that reviewed the known and
potential historical and archaeological resources of the Boston area, with specific
recommendations for preserving and documenting archaeological resources in and
around Boston (Bradley et al. 1982). One of these recommendations was that the
City of Boston hire an historical archaeologist, as four neighborhoods within the
city (Charlestown, Dorchester, Downtown Boston, and Roxbury) had
well-documented seventeenth-century settlements with known and potential early
historical archaeological sites within their historic cores.
The City followed the recommendations and hired its first City Archaeologist in
1983. Neither the original 1975 enabling legislation nor the 1988 bylaws (written
five years after the position of City Archaeologist was created) include any mention
of archaeological resources, mandate the existence of the position of City
Archaeologist, or define its role. It is this lack of legal definition and enabling
legislation that has been both a blessing and a curse of the program and the role of
City Archaeologist. The City Archaeologist has no legally defined role and is not
required by law to review projects of any kind. While it was an original role of the
position, the City Archaeologist is not currently required to review archaeological
permits for projects in Boston, and while he may comment on SHPO-reviewed
projects, he is not required to participate in SHPO review. The City Archaeology
Program does not formally exist in any legal or legislative format. The City
Archaeologist’s role can best be defined as “whatever the City Archaeologist can
convince people to do through the Landmarks Commission and through overall
cooperation with other agencies and individuals,” and the City Archaeology
Program can be best defined as “whatever the current City Archaeologist wants it to
be.”
Though not mandated, the placement of the City Archaeologist position as staff
within the BLC was the most logical location as the BLC is the primary definer,
protector, and overseer of Boston’s historic resources. In this role, the City
Archaeologist functions somewhat like a miniature State Historic Preservation
Officer or State Archaeologist, but only for those landmark-designated properties
that include landscapes as part of their review criteria. Of the 8000
landmark-designated properties, all but approximately one hundred lie within nine
historic districts. Each district has an individually compiled set of Standards and
Criteria against which BLC staff review proposed work. None of the districts
include belowground archaeological resources as part of their review, meaning the
City Archaeologist cannot request archaeological mitigation on these properties
through Landmark review.
13 Digging the Hub: The Evolution of the Boston City … 259
The Standards and Criteria for each of the 91 individually designated landmarks,
which represent the most significant historic properties and landscapes in Boston,
all require new development to be evaluated for potential impacts to historic
landscape features, which the Landmarks’ staff has interpreted as including
archaeological resources. As staff of the BLC reviewing projects that arise on
landmark properties, these 91 properties represent the de facto “jurisdiction” of the
City Archaeologist, though legally this has never been defined. While these prop-
erties are relatively few in number, they are by definition significant to the history of
the region, and projects associated with them often both have archaeological
impacts and lie outside of the jurisdiction of federal and state archaeology laws.
Despite this, only one landmark, the City Square Historical and Archaeological
Site, was specifically designated due to archaeological data. Archaeological her-
itage of most landmark properties is thus an incidental accident.
With the creation of the City Archaeologist position in 1983 came the creation of
the City Archaeology Laboratory. The laboratory became the City’s repository of
archaeological materials including collections excavated during the Big Dig and
other projects. State law mandates that all archaeological work on public land
requires a State Archaeology Permit (SAP) issued by the State Archaeologist
(MHC/SHPO). In Massachusetts, SAPs stipulate that all objects excavated under a
SAP (regardless of whether it is public or private land) become state property and
must be curated in accordance with the Secretary of Interior’s Standards and
Guidelines for Historic Preservation. Under the state’s rules, nearly all of the col-
lections from private and public property held by the City Archaeology Laboratory
are state-owned. Because the MHC/SHPO does not have its own curation facility
capable of storing all of the Commonwealth’s collections, it has designated various
repositories at laboratories, universities, and museums as state-approved curation
facilities, though this designation does not come with financial support from the
Commonwealth for the curation or management of these collections.
The State Archaeologist designates custodians for collections at individual facilities.
It is the policy of the State Archaeologist to issue them in the name of the director or
head of individual departments or agencies, so the official state-sanctioned custodian of
the City Archaeology Program is the Director of the Landmarks Commission, the City
Archaeologist’s boss, who is typically a historic preservationist, not an archaeologist. In
summary, the laboratory is a state-approved repository of Boston’s archaeological
collections, the majority of which are State property, which is managed by the City
Archaeologist under the guise of a State Archaeologist custodial permit issued to the
Director of the Boston Landmarks Commission. This system allows the State
Archaeologist the legal means to confiscate the majority of the archaeological materials
in the state if they deem them to be stored in unsuitable conditions and issue a new
custodian and transfer permit to a suitable storage facility. These state laws, regulations,
permits, and mandates coupled with the relatively undefined role of the City
Archaeologist in city government form the foundations of Boston’s City Archaeology
Program. Since its founding, four individuals have held the title of City Archaeologist.
Each brought with them individual priorities for the position, resulting in a wide variety
of accomplishments.
260 J. Bagley
Stephen Mrozowski (1983–1985)
By 1983, the Big Dig archaeological surveys were well underway. The Public
Archaeology Laboratory (PAL), Inc., a private cultural resource management
(CRM) firm, had been awarded the data recovery (Phase 3) federal contract for
Section 106 compliance archaeology at the City Square Archaeological District in
the Charlestown neighborhood. PAL leased the basement of the City-owned Tunnel
Administration Building at 152 North Street in Boston’s North End neighborhood
as laboratory space to process the Charlestown assemblage (Fig. 13.1).
Stephen Mrozowski, who at the time was pursuing a Ph.D. in Anthropology at
Brown University, was hired in 1983 as the first City Archaeologist, though the
position was a temporary contract with no benefits. Mrozowski piggybacked off of
PAL to run the City Archaeology Program. At the time, the program was focused
almost exclusively on public outreach, though the State Archaeologist required that
SAPs be reviewed by the City Archaeologist on projects within Boston prior to
their issue. The program was run out of a small room within PAL’s temporary
laboratory, though Mrozowski also had a shared desk at City Hall if needed.
In 1985, Mrozowski released Boston’s Archaeological Legacy: The City’s
Planning and Policy Document through the BLC. This seminal work summarized
the known archaeological resources of Boston and established priorities for future
research and survey in Boston. While the report requires updating today, it still
Fig. 13.1 Data Recovery (Phase 3) excavations by the Public Archaeology Laboratory, Inc., at
the City Square Archaeological District in the Charlestown neighborhood of Boston, 1985. Image
courtesy of the Massachusetts Historical Commission
stands as the document from which the City of Boston establishes archaeological
priorities and background including the most-recent open space planning document.
In 1987, PAL left the laboratory, which was taken over by the City Archaeology
Program creating the City Archaeology Laboratory (the lab). As a city-owned
building housing a city program, the laboratory was able to exist rent-free. The
entirety of the City Square assemblage, now processed and cataloged, remained at
the laboratory and formed the core of the city’s curated collections.
Steven Pendery (1985–1993)
In 1985, Mrozowski left the City Archaeology Program to pursue employment with
the National Park Service and was replaced by Steven Pendery, a Harvard Ph.D.
candidate in anthropology and an active principal investigator of numerous ongoing
archaeological projects within the Central Artery/Tunnel archaeological digs in
Charlestown. Pendery was the City Archaeologist between 1985 and 1993. During
Pendery’s early tenure, the position of City Archaeologist was funded with state
and federal funds from the Big Dig project and he served primarily in a consulting
position focused on providing archaeological review and enforcing archaeological
compliance for numerous large and small investigations related to both the Central
Artery/Tunnel project and other projects throughout the city.
Pendery’s tenure was marked by the considerable number of field projects he
conducted throughout the city. These projects include both CRM-style and re-
search-oriented excavations, primarily on city park land. Through his role in the
Landmarks Commission, in 1986, Pendery required and executed an archaeological
survey of Boston Common, a landmark-designated property, ahead of a proposed
lighting project, which otherwise would not have required state or federal archae-
ological review due to lack of funding and permitting triggers. Over 100 new light
fixtures as well as a network of electrical wires and junction boxes were planned
throughout the Common. Pendery’s CRM-style excavations documented the
presence of numerous significant archaeological deposits in the Common including
a Revolutionary War-era British encampment, two intact Native American shell
middens, an early colonial camp site, the early eighteenth-century town powder
house, and thousands of artifacts from the Common’s long history as Boston’s
“back yard” (Pendery 1988). A significant aspect of the project was the inclusion of
local community community volunteers who actively participated in all aspects of
field excavation and laboratory processing and cataloging, a model that would
persist throughout the program’s history. Pendery was able to receive temporary
funding from the Parks Department to hire two professional archaeologists as
project supervisors to manage and direct the volunteers during the excavations.
Toward the end of Pendery’s tenure, he joined Harvard professor Robert Preucel
for an archaeological field school on the Brook Farm site, a designated Boston
Landmark, National Historic Landmark, and National Register-listed property.
Brook Farm has been a state-owned park since 1988, but is known historically as an
262 J. Bagley
experimental mid-nineteenth-century Transcendentalist utopian community with a

prolonged history that included two 3000- to 5000-year-old Native American camp
sites, a colonial farm, almshouse, a Civil War camp, and two orphanages. The field
school was in operation during the summers of 1991–1994 producing large
quantities of archaeological materials from the entire occupation of the site (Preucel
and Pendery 2006). The materials were brought back to the City Archaeology
Laboratory where some of the collection received washing and cataloging, other
unwashed artifacts were stored in cardboard trays. Soon after completing the
excavations, Pendery left the City Archaeologist position to pursue work with the
National Park Service. To date, no final report has been completed. Recently, a
small grant has funded the still-ongoing cleaning, sorting, and cataloging of the
Brook Farm assemblage.
If Mrozowski’s legacy as City Archaeologist was marked by the formative
groundwork of the early City Archaeology Program, Pendery’s legacy lies within
the massive quantity of archaeological assemblages he produced in city parks.
Between the portions of the Charlestown Big Dig, Pendery excavated when he was
previously employed at Harvard’s Institute of Contemporary Archaeology (ICA),
the excavations on Boston Common, Brook Farm, the Dorchester Pottery Works,
and other smaller projects, over two-thirds of the City’s 1800 boxes of archaeo-
logical materials in the Laboratories’ repository are direct results of Pendery’s
archaeological work.
A significant contribution of Pendery’s work was his cultivation of a partnership
between the BLC and the city’s Parks department. As part of the BLC, Pendery did
not have direct jurisdiction over all city property, only the landmark-designated
portions. Pendery’s work on non-landmark parks not only successfully demon-
strated the archaeological integrity and significance of parks without formal land-
mark designation, but also created a positive partnership between two City agencies
that would prove beneficial in future work.
Though Pendery was employed by the City, he was not technically staff. Until the
early 1990s, his position was paid by funds set aside as part of the archaeological
mitigation of the Central Artery/Tunnel project and through state Survey and
Planning grants from the MHC. It was only during his final years as City
Archaeologist that the significance of the work and impact of the City Archaeologist
was realized and the City transformed the position into a full-time, benefited,
staff-level job within the BLC. In 1993, Pendery left the position for a role in the
National Park Service’s Northeast Region Archeology Program creating the first of
two prolonged vacancies in the program’s history.
Ellen Berkland (1996–2010)
Ellen Berkland, whose first interactions with the City Archaeology Program were as
a volunteer excavator at Pendery’s Boston Common dig in 1986, was hired as City
Archaeologist in 1996 after a nearly three-year vacancy in the position. Berkland
had participated in numerous professional field surveys in Boston including the

majority of the sites in the Big Dig. At the time, Berkland was pursuing a M.A. in
archaeology at Boston University.
Several significant changes occurred during the three-year hiatus. First, the
requirement for the City Archaeologist to approve archaeological permits in Boston
was eliminated due to the prolonged vacancy in the position. Second, the position
lost its full-time status though kept the title of “City Archaeologist” and remained
within the Boston Landmarks Commission. Berkland’s early years in the position
were funded by ongoing Big Dig transportation funding for the City of Boston, but
her position was part-time, being limited to 25 h per week (Fig. 13.2).
With the approval of the Boston City Council, the City Archaeologist position
was made full time and opened to applicants in 1998. Ellen Berkland, who already
had the position for two years, had to re-apply for the position alongside stiff
competition, but was eventually selected, again, as the full-time staff archaeologist
of the Landmarks Commission. Unlike Pendery’s tenure, Berkland’s time as City
Archaeologist was not dominated by excavations, but instead focused on collec-
tions management, public education, and outreach. The City Archaeology
Laboratory was transformed into a part-curation center and part-classroom. The
centralized location of the laboratory in Boston’s North End made it especially
accessible to Bostonians. Thousands of volunteers participated in stabilizing and
processing archaeological collections, and thousands of students visited the labo-
ratory over Berkland’s 14 years as City Archaeologist.
Toni Pollock, the Commissioner of the Environment Department and of the
Parks Department, added a new role to the City Archaeologist position. When the
City Archaeologist was again made a permanent staff position, Pollock added the
role of “Manager of Rainsford Island” to the tasks of the City Archaeologist. This
vacant and undeveloped island had once been the home of the City’s quarantine
hospital, almshouse, boys and girls reformatory, and even a resort. Fire, misuse, and
demolition have cleared any aboveground structures from the island, but under
Berkland’s direction, the first archaeological management plan was drafted that
documented over a dozen historic terrestrial and submerged archaeological sites
including hospital structures and a cemetery whose headstones had been removed
(Claesson 2002).
A significant milestone in the program’s history was the Intermodal Surface
Transportation Enhancement Act (ISTEA) grant awarded to the Massachusetts
Historical Commission in 2006 for the purpose of cataloging and improving the
curation standards of the State’s transportation-related collections, including more
than half of the collections stored in the City Archaeology Laboratory. This grant,
for the first time, allowed for the hiring of full-time contractors in the position of
laboratory assistants. These funds paid for the creation of the Massachusetts Artifact
Tracking System (MATS), the in-house Microsoft Access-based digital artifact
catalog system used by the State of Massachusetts and City of Boston. Funding did
not allow for the moving of the laboratory from the now-dilapidated Tunnel
Administration Building basement home, but it provided for the purchase of
archival boxes, an archival artifact tag printer, computers for digital cataloging, and
264 J. Bagley
Fig. 13.2 Ellen Berkland excavating at the cross-street backlot as part of archaeological
mitigation ahead of Boston’s Big Dig in 1992. Image courtesy of the Massachusetts Historical
Commission
archival plastic bags. With these supplies and staff, portions of the Charlestown Big
Dig collection were digitally cataloged.
Berkland’s outreach into the community was immense and resulted in a much
more widely known City Archaeology Program, especially among school children
and historical groups. Her research focused a great deal on the Boston Harbor
Islands, where the National Park Service had established a formal recreation area
comprised of an amalgamation of various city, state, and privately owned islands
and lands in Boston Harbor. Beyond her outreach with members of the community,
Berkland’s greatest contribution to the program was her ability to maintain and
increase the interactions within and among various governmental, educational, and
private groups.
In 2010, Thomas Malhstedt, the long-term senior archaeologist of the State’s
Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), retired. Berkland applied and
was chosen to replace Malhstedt. Due to the economic upheaval of the previous
years, then-mayor Thomas Menino had issued a hiring freeze on non-essential city
employees just prior to Berkland’s departure, and due to the fact that the position of
City Archaeologist is not mandated in any legislation, there were no legal justifi-
cations for filling the position during the hiring freeze. Ironically, the Great
Recession that caused the prolonged vacancy eventually led to the position being
filled.
Joseph Bagley (2011-Present)
In December 2011, two months after starting graduate school at UMass Boston, the
author was selected to be the next City Archaeologist, continuing the trend of the
position going to active graduate students. Prior to this, in the summer of 2011, the
City of Boston decided to sell some of its excess property, which included the
Tunnel Administration Building, whose basement housed the City Archaeology
Program. Ellen Lipsey, then the Executive Director of the Boston Landmarks
Commission, had been trying to convince the City to allow the position of City
Archaeologist to be filled so that ongoing Landmark review projects would have an
archaeologist on-staff to conduct their review. During this time,
landmark-designated properties with projects impacting known or potential
archaeological sites received no archaeological review or mitigation. With the
upcoming sale of the building housing the laboratory, the laboratory had to be
moved. The City chose to move the laboratory to the City Archive Building located
across town, and with this decision, Lipsey had the leverage to convince the City
that they needed a qualified archaeologist to not only pack the mothballed labo-
ratory, but also set up the new space and manage the laboratory moving forward.
The position came with two initial orders: pack the laboratory and restart the
City Archaeology Program. The laboratory-packing was completed in early January
of 2012, but the move itself would not occur until April leaving months of time
when the laboratory was closed, no public programming was occurring, and winter
caused a relative paucity of projects to review. This relatively quiet period allowed
for a thorough change to much of the outward-facing online components of the City
Archaeology Program.
On January 18, 2012, the City Archaeology Program’s Facebook page opened.
Posts to social media included interesting artifacts that were found while working
with the collection, something a volunteer found while he or she was processing,
updates from the field, or generally interesting stories related to Boston archaeology
and history seen online. Seven months later, the page had its first 100 “likes” or
266 J. Bagley
followers. This grew steadily to the first 1000 about one year later, doubling to 2000
seven months later, and again to 4000 in July of 2015.
The Facebook page is carefully curated ensuring a consistent tone and appro-
priate quantity of posts to engage without overwhelming the public and other
archaeologists alike. No single aspect of the work done since becoming City
Archaeologist in 2011 has had a more beneficial outcome from the standpoint of
public perception, appreciation, media outreach, engagement, and attention from
other archaeologists than the program’s Facebook page. For example, the 44 posts
made in October to the program’s Facebook page during the 2014 Archaeology
Month (all of which were prescheduled in a single day in September) were viewed
over 138,000 times. With an audience composed of an even mix of men and women
with a majority being between 25 and 44 years old and residents of Boston, the City
Archaeology Program’s online presence, through Facebook alone, is reaching the
people in the community it serves.
Today, the role of City Archaeologist is similar to a combined SHPO, CRM
principal investigator, laboratory supervisor, and corporate spokesperson, though
these roles are not defined in legislation. One way the City Archaeologist differs
significantly from the role of a SHPO is his engagement with the local Native
American community. The Massachusetts’ SHPO is limited in its legal interactions
with Native American communities to those tribes that are recognized by the state
or federal governments. As a municipal government, Boston is not limited to these
groups. The Massachusett people, a vibrant and active tribal community, are the
obvious namesake for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, but they are not a
formally recognized tribe. While this excludes them from legal considerations by
the SHPO, the City does not have such restrictions. Boston has been actively
discussing issues of City recognition and appreciation of the Massachusett com-
munity with tribal elders. The City is also engaged in consultation on various
aspects of the archaeological collections currently stored in the laboratory to ensure
their proper handling and storage as defined by the Massachusett people. One major
issue that has not arisen, but will undoubtedly someday, is the fact that with regard
to human remains, jurisdiction is defined by the State. In Massachusetts, a statewide
unmarked burial law requires that State Police are called if human remains are ever
encountered in an unmarked location. The law’s protocols require that the remains
be defined as either archaeological or a crime scene, depending on whether they are
100 years old or more, as determined by the State Medical Examiner. The remains
become either the jurisdiction of the State Police if less than 100 years old or the
State Archaeologist. Once under the jurisdiction of the State Archaeologist, state
and federal rules automatically eliminate participation by the City Archaeologist
and exclude the Massachusett People from ever having a direct say in the treatment
of their ancestor’s remains, regardless of where they are found.
The lack of these types of clearly defined or legislative roles presents some
interesting issues with the City Archaeologist’s relationship with the SHPO. The
City Archaeologist can ask, but has no ability to legally require that certain aspects
of mitigation be followed such as determining the appropriate test pit interval,
having the collections transferred to the City Archaeology Laboratory upon
completion of the report, or having a public outreach component to an archaeo-

logical dig. However, the City Archaeologist through the BLC can stipulate these
requests be incorporated into the permit proposal, which when issued by the SHPO
creates a legal document mandating the stipulations in the SAP permit proposal be
followed.
The City Archaeologist has required all archaeological work in the City to be
done under a SAP to ensure the high standards of a Massachusetts’ SHPO report
review (the City Archaeologist has no legal means to reject reports) as well as the
maintenance of legal ownership of collections with a public agency (the state)
where the artifacts can be made available to researchers. The SHPO has concurred
with all requests by the City Archaeologist to conduct archaeological mitigation on
landmark-designated areas, but the City Archaeologist has no legal means to require
the SHPO to require archaeological mitigation on projects outside of BLC review
but within the SHPO’s jurisdiction.
A recent example of a project where SHPO and the City Archaeologist differed on
opinion included a proposed development on a large multi-acre parcel in the Roxbury
neighborhood of Boston. This project included a portion of a BLC historic conservation
protection area “donut” buffer zone surrounding the seventeenth-century
landmark-designated burying ground. The entirety of the development project was
within SHPO review jurisdiction due to state and federal funding and permitting, but
only a small portion was within BLC jurisdiction. The entire project area, about half a
city block, was archaeologically sensitive as it abutted the original and only road into
Boston, contained dozens of nineteenth-century properties, and historic maps showed
structures in the project area during the eighteenth century. While the City
Archaeologist preferred that the entire project area be surveyed, only the eastern-most
extreme of the project area lay within the review of the BLC.
A Phase I survey (called an “Intensive (Locational)” survey in Massachusetts)
was required in a relatively small 100 10 foot surface that was the only area
within the protection area not formerly occupied by a structure. The SHPO chose to
not require any archaeology outside the protection area. Unfortunately, the pro-
tected area was not the most sensitive part of the parcel and the survey did not
identify significant deposits within the BLC jurisdiction area. The remainder of the
archaeologically-sensitive property outside of the protection area was developed
without archaeological survey.
Conversely, a similarly-sized parcel directly across the street and entirely within
the protection area was in his jurisdiction. As such, the City Archaeologist pre-
emptively required archaeological mitigation through a formal letter submitted to
the developer and the SHPO, and the SHPO concurred. It was surveyed in its
entirety by a private CRM firm in the winter of 2014/15 producing over 100,000
artifacts (report in progress). Sites found included a buried nineteenth-century
factory housing development relating to early Irish workers and evidence of a
highly stratified seventeenth–nineteenth-century landscape created by massive
filling episodes separating each significant period of occupation.
268 J. Bagley
The lack of a defined jurisdiction is beneficial in some cases; in many of these,

the City Archaeologist serves a role similar to a SHPO requiring archaeological
survey, but also functions much like a CRM firm as individual City Archaeologists
have been responsible for executing the surveys triggered by their review. By not
formally restricting the role of City Archaeologist to properties that lie within the
jurisdiction of the Boston Landmarks Landmarks Commission, this allows for
partnerships with outside agencies, other city departments, and excavations on
private land. As the work is all done pro bono and often as part of formal review by
the Boston Landmarks Commission, payment for services is not possible without
creating a conflict of interest.
In 2013, at the request of the local Charlestown preservation community, the
City Archaeology Program was brought in to survey a small city park that once
contained the training field for the local militia. While no Revolutionary War
deposits or artifacts were found, a buried fountain, evidence of several school
houses, a massive early nineteenth-century refuse deposit, and two intact
Woodland-period Native American sites were encountered on the 0.8 acre parcel
(Bagley 2015) (Fig. 13.3). All City Archaeology programs are open to the public,
encourage public interaction with the volunteers excavating the site, and are
deliberately timed whenever possible to occur when the site is most visited by the
public and tourists.
Partnerships with outside groups are also possible with this non-defined juris-
diction. The Old North Church Foundation planned to construct a brick pathway
through the rear yard of a c. 1715 house owned by the Church. The parcel was
immediately behind the Old North Church, best known for its role as a signal tower
in the Revolutionary War, and made famous by Longfellow’s telling of Paul
Revere’s Ride. Though the property is not a designated City Landmark, it does have
a very broad Preservation Restriction on the buildings and landscape requiring that
modifications to either be reviewed by the SHPO. The Foundation came to the BLC
for consultation on the project prior to submitting it for review by the SHPO. While
the City Archaeologist was not a participant in the initial meetings, the project came
up during a BLC group meeting, and concerns were stated for archaeological
resources in an undeveloped early eighteenth-century backlot. The more than
40,000 artifacts eventually recovered from the ten 1 1 m units excavated in the
impact area from the house’s complete 300-year history demonstrated the impor-
tance and integrity of this tiny rear parcel (Bagley 2015) (Fig. 13.4).
During roughly the last fifteen years, the City Archaeologist’s office has par-
ticipated in several excavations on properties that were not designated landmarks.
The City Archaeologist has instituted an informal policy to provide small archae-
ological surveys, pro bono, when required by the City Archaeologist or SHPO.
These include some of the recent excavations at the Old North Church, the site of
the 1645 Boston Latin School in front of Boston’s Old State House, and the
excavations of the 1859 Industrial School for Girls site. Scale and budget are
important aspects of this pro bono work, all properties owned or leased by a
nonprofit or the City of Boston. Because the program receives no operational
budget, all of the field and laboratory labor, including artifact cataloging, is done by
Fig. 13.3 Volunteers and members of the public during excavations at the Training Field Park
survey in 2013. Photograph by J. Bagley
volunteers. The lack of a budget imposes a limit to the scale of the project that can
be executed by the volunteer crew, and actual costs such as bags, Sharpies, and
boxes must be accounted for through donations, and to avoid conflicts of interest,
the City Archaeologist does not require or request supplies or funds for supplies to
be donated by the owners. Being pro bono as a standard also avoids financial
conflicts, whereby the City Archaeologist requires an archaeological excavation and
then either bids against CRM companies for the project or otherwise accepts or
charges money from the institution or group that is being made to do the
excavations.
This informal policy has greatly benefited the City Archaeology Program. As
projects on landmark-designated properties with both belowground impacts and
required archaeological review are relatively infrequent (1–2 a month), this means
270 J. Bagley
Fig. 13.4 Volunteers excavating at the Clough House site in Boston’s North End in 2012.
Photograph by J. Bagley
there is greater time allowed for outreach, field, and laboratory work. By conducting
the pro bono archaeological surveys, the City Archaeologist creates opportunities
for public education, outreach, and involvement, while also increasing the likeli-
hood of archaeological excavations within project areas both within and outside of
SHPO and City Archaeologist review. This visibility and relevance to the public
has greatly increased the public awareness of the both the City Archaeologist’s
existence, the program as a whole, and the relevance of archaeology in Boston
today. The drawback to these excavations is the increased demand on the City
Archaeologist for laboratory processing and report creation, which are difficult
without a paid staff or operations budget.
Though the position of City Archaeologist is funded by the City, the lack of any
other type of funding has been a major issue for the program as a whole. Funds
provided by the previously discussed ISTEA grant in 2007 purchased a quantity of

archival plastic bags and boxes that had lasted until 2013. After these ran out,
supplies have been purchased only through donations. On average, the City
Archaeology Program has functioned each year since 2011 on approximately $1000
in donations from the public each year. These funds must keep an archaeology
laboratory stocked with supplies for the entire year. A lack of funding has not been
an issue with regard to artifact processing (washing, sorting, labeling, bagging, and
organizing) as dedicated, and enthusiastic volunteers from the local community and
numerous local university archaeology programs (Boston University, UMass
Boston, Harvard, etc.) under the constant supervision of the City Archaeologist
have resulted in high-quality and relatively swift processing of artifacts. Cataloging,
however, has become a major bottleneck and Achilles heel of the program. Not
paying trained individuals with specialized skills for their labor creates a profes-
sional, ethical, and moral dilemma and has resulted in these individuals who come
to volunteer at the laboratory leaving as quickly as possible for paid work
elsewhere.
To accommodate the growing need for review of projects and meetings to plan
upcoming projects and collaborations, the laboratory has been reduced to part-time
hours with the City Archaeologist spending two days a week at City Hall and only
opening the laboratory for the remaining three. The 4000-square-foot City
Archaeology Laboratory is located 10 miles away from downtown and sometimes
struggles to attract its ideal volunteer: archaeology students, who often have to
spend over an hour each way commuting via public transportation. The laboratory
nevertheless averages 200 h of volunteer labor each month. These volunteers, while
critical to the work of the laboratory, require near constant supervision and assis-
tance due to their relative lack of experience in identifying artifacts. As cataloging
requires concentration and the ability to be able to catch artifact identification
mistakes, the City Archaeologist cannot enter items in the digital catalog while at
the laboratory due to constant interruptions and requests for assistance.
One successful method for swift catalog production has been requiring graduate
students who are interested in pursuing thesis projects using assemblages recovered
by the City Archaeologist to first catalog the entirety of the assemblages prior to
commencing their analysis. This has resulted in one 40,000 artifact site being
cataloged in less than three months by volunteers. The pressing need to complete
outstanding reports and the continuing requirement for catalogers has recently
resulted in allowing inexperienced but promising volunteers, especially those in
college programs, to catalog the artifacts using the identifications already written on
each artifact lot bag with the presumption that mistakes have been addressed by the
project supervisor—the City Archaeologist—during the initial artifact sorting and
bagging process.
In the past, Steven Pendery was successful in collaborating with agencies,
specifically the City’s Parks Department, in efforts to fund archaeology on parks
properties. More recently, the Parks Department has insisted that the Environment
Department (where the BLC is located) funds their own projects, as archaeology is
outside of the Parks Department budget requests. Budget cuts within all
272 J. Bagley
departments have not opened new sources of funding for emergency archaeological
digs, and since 2011, funding requests for the City Archaeology Program have been
denied by the Boston City Council. As a result, all parks projects and all other
projects on city-owned land conducted by the City Archaeologist have been con-
ducted without a budget and only with volunteers.
More recently, projects conducted by the City Archaeologist have focused on
sites without landmark designation. These are particularly variable as the work that
is being proposed on these sites does not fall within Landmark review, though there
are extremely sensitive sites on the property (Boston Latin School at Old City Hall
and the Industrial School for Girls are two examples). A successful method for
achieving archaeological mitigation where absolutely no archaeological review is
required has been to offer all City Archaeology Program work pro bono, with the
agreement that the work be done completely within the public realm and with as
much press, public outreach, and direct public involvement as physically possible.
This technique, while by no means solving funding or cataloging problems, has
dramatically increased the visibility and public awareness of the City Archaeology
Program to local and sometimes national audiences. This may, someday, lead to
greater funding opportunities.
Today, the City Archaeology Program is treated as a separate entity from the
review and compliance work done through the BLC. The program is the sum of the
volunteers who give their time, the archaeological collections, efforts to make
the materials available to researchers and the public, social media outlets, and the
public talks and tours given by the City Archaeologist throughout the region. As the
only staff of the program, and as the only archaeologist employed by the City of
Boston, the program’s recent and past success is only made possible through the
support of the incredible and dedicated volunteers who put up with irregular hours,
and constant laboratory closings, all while managing to keep a positive attitude
when faced with varied duties such as sorting of redware to helping run a hands-on
archaeological ceramic booth on a hot summer’s day on Boston Common.
Fundamentally, the lack of defined jurisdiction and enabling legislation makes
the City Archaeologist position and the program vulnerable. It is this lack of
legislation that allowed for the prolonged vacancies between Pendery and Berkland,
and after Berkland’s departure. For this reason, the need for public outreach and the
resulting public support is clear. The preservation community in Boston benefits
greatly from the general appreciation of Boston’s history. While the Museum of
Fine Arts, the universities, and the various public parks—all tax exempt— are large
tourism draws, it is historical tourism that brings billions of dollars to Boston and
the surrounding area. A distinct advantage for the City Archaeologist of Boston is
never needing to make an argument for why Boston’s history matters, why
archaeological sites are important, or why the community should support historic
preservation. People “get it.”
Public relations are still critical, as the position of City Archaeologist is not a
requirement, and the City Archaeology Program only truly exists in the mind of the
City Archaeologist. A great deal of time is spent giving public talks, providing
historic walking tours of archaeological sites, visiting schools, participating in large
education events and fairs, and providing media interviews. The disadvantage of
many of these is that with a staff of one, all other aspects of archaeological review
and laboratory work cease when doing public outreach or fieldwork. This trade-off
is essential, however, because without public awareness of the archaeological
importance of Boston’s known and potential sites, this position can be eliminated. If
ever threatened, the only thing that will save the position of City Archaeologist and
the program as a whole is the relative low cost of the one person who runs the entire
thing and the overall popularity and visibility of the program among the public. You
cannot cut a budget that does not exist.
The Future
The long-term success of the City Archaeology Program and the role of City
Archaeologist lie in funding. It is clear that the program is growing, but this growth
is resulting in an increase in the awareness of the program in the public, the demand
for public events, and an overall increase in inclusion of archaeology in develop-
ment projects. With a schedule that is often booked at least two months in advance,
it is no longer possible to do more public events, participate in meetings at City
Hall, or spend more time at the laboratory without one aspect of the program
suffering. Unfortunately, that aspect tends to be the laboratory.
The laboratory, relative to other aspects of the work, is the least visible, but the
nearly 2000 boxes currently held in the repository are some of the most significant
historic resources in the country. Nearly all of these collections require resorting
and digital cataloging in order to make these materials accessible to researchers.
Since most of these collections were excavated more than 20 years ago, the need
for this labor-intensive work is less demanding than the need for active review of
new projects and public outreach (Fig. 13.5).
The collections recovered and stored in the laboratory present both a challenge
and an opportunity for the City Archaeology Program. The contents of the labo-
ratory are the source of information in public talks and outreach through social
media. From a collections point of view, it is absolutely critical to demonstrate that
the materials already recovered are significant to the history of Boston; otherwise, it
is impossible to justify digging up even more. Many of these collections remain in
the realm of gray literature through CRM reports that are not allowed to be released
by the SHPO in an attempt to protect sites from looting. However, as many of the
larger projects related to the Big Dig have since been destroyed after archaeological
mitigation, these reports as well as those from other protected or developed prop-
erties will be digitized and placed online with minor redactions. These collections
and reports represent an incredible wealth of data that have yet to be thoroughly
processed or addressed. There is ample material for numerous M.A. and Ph.D. level
projects.
In earlier years, the lack of resources and space in the previous laboratory at the
Tunnel Administration Building meant it was almost impossible for researchers to
274 J. Bagley
Fig. 13.5 Volunteers processing artifacts from the Clough House site. Photograph by J. Bagley
access the collections or find a place to lay out artifacts. These problems have been
addressed with the new location, but this overall lack of access to reports and
digitized data has prevented scholarship based on the laboratories’ collections from
being published in academic journals, theses, or dissertations. As of the writing of
this chapter, since reopening the laboratory in its new location in 2012, two doctoral
dissertations have been completed with contributions using the laboratory’s col-
lections (Hardesty 2014; Keim 2015), one Master’s thesis has been completed on
the Brook Farm site (Savory 2015), two theses are nearing completion on the
Clough House site, and two more are beginning on the Industrial School for Girls
site.
The program is at a critical point as growth is increasingly difficult without
additional time and funding. The City Archaeologist and his volunteers are actively
attempting to address this in four ways: grants, a new laboratory, a new nonprofit
support group, and a book. Applying for private and public grant applications has
become a major priority of the City Archaeologist to support staffing of field and
laboratory activities. If successful, this will allow the City Archaeologist to com-
plete archaeological reports and pursue additional funding opportunities while
volunteers are managed by grant-supported staff. Time to write grants and reports is
currently lacking, but is achieved through laboratory closings and working
off-hours.
Recognizing the success of the program, leadership of the program’s parent
agency, the Environment Department, is pursuing a new home for the City
Archaeology Laboratory. The laboratory’s significant distance from City Hall
severely limits its accessibility for laboratory volunteers and visitors. The existing
facility also lacks sufficient artifact processing and analysis space and display area
for future growth. As City funding for property improvements is easier to access
than funding for additional staff, a new larger location is actively sought closer to
downtown Boston that will be renovated to include larger laboratory facilities, a
larger collections storage facility, and a new public archaeology museum.
A group of long-term volunteers have joined together to independently found the
Friends of Boston Archaeology (FOBA). This group has begun meeting and is
actively pursuing nonprofit status and will assist the City Archaeologist in volunteer
coordination and fund-raising. As the City Archaeologist is limited in his ability to
fund raise, FOBA will be able to pursue greater funding opportunities that will
directly support the program.
Finally, the current City Archaeologist has written his first book titled A History
of Boston in 50 Artifacts (Bagley 2016). As a public employee, he cannot receive
income from publications written about his position or using his position; therefore,
a legal memorandum of agreement has been written formally declaring that all
author proceeds of this and any future books the author releases while City
Archaeologist will be turned over to the City Archaeology Program to be used to
purchase supplies.
Regardless of the current funding and time restraints, the City Archaeology
Program is thriving, it is growing, and most importantly, it is enjoyed by the people
of Boston. Its overall popularity among the public and other archaeologists is
critical to its success and long-term viability. Public talks are regularly filling
venues beyond capacity, venues are actively seeking speaking engagements by the
City Archaeologist, and Archaeology Month talks are requested eleven to twelve
months in advance. While growth is reaching a maximum capacity, positive out-
comes of future funding and staffing efforts will greatly improve the program’s
ability to grow. When compared to cuts in similar programs, however, or even to
the program’s own recent past during the “gap years” between city archaeologists,
Boston’s archaeology program finds itself well positioned for future success.
References
Bagley, J. (2016). A history of Boston in 50 artifacts. Hanover, NH: University Press New
England.
Bagley, J. (2015). Intensive archaeological survey training field/winthrop square park. On file at
the Massachusetts Historical Commission.
276 J. Bagley
Bradley, J., Krim, A., Stott, P., & Zimmerman, S. (1982). Historical and archaeological resources
of the boston area: A framework for preservation decisions. Boston: On file at the
Massachusetts Historical Commission.
City of Boston. (1995). Zoning Code, Article 85, Chapter 665 of the Acts of 1956 as amended.
City of Boston. (2016). About the Boston landmarks commission. http://www.cityofboston.gov/
landmarks/about/. Accessed February 9, 2016.
Claesson, S. (2002). Rainsford Island archaeological reconnaissance and management plan.
Boston: On file at the Massachusetts Historical Commission.
Hardesty, J. R. (2014). Slavery, freedom, and dependence in pre-revolutionary Boston, 1700–
1775. (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/2345/3775
Keim, A. (2015). Boston inside out: A brothel, a boarding house, and the construction of the
19th-century North End’s urban landscape through embodied practices. Available from
ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Database. (UMI No. Not yet issued).
Mrozowski, S. (1985). Boston’s archaeological legacy. On file at the Massachusetts Historical
Commission, Boston: The City’s planning and policy document.
Pendery, S. (1988). Archaeology of the Boston common. Boston: On file at the Massachusetts
Historical Commission.
Preucel, R., & Pendery, S. (2006). Daring experiments: Issues and insights about Utopian
communities. Historical Archaeology, 40(1), 6–19.
Savory, S. A. (2015). Brook farm: A ceramic analysis of a short lived utopia. (Master’s thesis,
Indiana University of Pennsylvania). Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/2069/2358
Chapter 14
Phoenix Rising: The Development
of a Municipal Archaeology Program
in Arizona, USA
Todd W. Bostwick
Introduction
Despite its modern appearance, the City of Phoenix, Arizona, has a deep heritage.
Buried to a depth of up to 10 m underneath the paved and landscaped surfaces of
today are the abundant archaeological materials of ancient and historic people
spanning the last 6000 years. Archaic hunter-gatherers, Hohokam farmers, and
historic pioneers left behind architectural remains and trash deposits that are con-
tinuously being uncovered by archaeologists working on private and government
construction projects. Dozens of these sites are very large, covering hundreds of
hectares and multiple City blocks, and some contain literally millions of artefacts.
The very name of the City—Phoenix—implies a debt to the past. The incredible
pace of development from 1990 to 2008 threatened to obliterate much of that
archaeology. During the early years of this period, private development and even
some City projects did not undergo archaeological review, and sites were some-
times destroyed as a result. The archaeology component of the City’s Historic
Preservation Ordinance was ambiguous and unenforceable. Consequently, it was
necessary for a compliance archaeology program to be developed by the author,
City Archaeologist from 1990 to 2010, to prevent the loss of a considerable amount
of scientific information, preserve hundreds of thousands of artefacts, and assure the
respectful treatment of thousands of human burials.
In addition to establishing a set of policies and procedures relating to archae-
ology requirements, two strategies were pursued that played a significant role in
enhancing the preservation ethic of the City: (1) raising the profile of the city
archaeology position and increasing awareness of archaeological projects under-
taken within the City through public programs, publications, and exhibits; and
T.W. Bostwick (&)

Verde Valley Archaeology Center,
345 S. Main St, Camp Verde, AZ 86322, USA

278 T.W. Bostwick
(2) fostering good relationships with various City departments, the Arizona State
Historic Preservation Office (SHPO), and local Native American communities.
The development of the city archaeology Program from 1990 to 2010 is
described below. The role of the City Archaeologist is discussed, and the short-
comings of the City Historic Preservation Ordinance are outlined. Then early
successful projects are summarized that established the importance of archaeology,
followed by the development of a burial agreement that brought an awareness of the
potential for the destruction of human remains during construction. Other sections
discuss the impact of a new City General Plan, the process of establishing project
reviews within various City departments, cultural resource training for City
employees, the creation of a GIS database system, guidelines for archaeology
projects and standardized treatment plans, difficult federal projects, and the
importance of sharing archaeology with the public.
City Archaeologist
In 1929, the City of Phoenix created the position of City Archaeologist, the first in the
USA, whose purpose was to develop the ancient Hohokam ruins called Pueblo Grande
into a City museum and park (Downum and Bostwick 1993). The main focus of the
City Archaeologist was the ongoing development of the museum and park, and thus,
the position has always been administered by the City’s Parks and Recreation
Department. In 1990, Phoenix created a Museum Director position separate from the
City Archaeologist position, which facilitated the increased involvement of the City
Archaeologist in the planning of the City’s extensive capital improvement programs,
and in developing a citywide archaeology compliance program.
The City of Phoenix has more than 12,000 employees working in three dozen
different departments, many of them engaged in activities which can impact
archaeological sites. But few departments consulted with the City Archaeologist in
1990. One of the first steps of the author was to raise the profile of the City
Archaeologist position through guest speaker programs at various department staff
meetings and in public venues, such as the City libraries and museums. From 1990
to 2009, the City Archaeologist presented more than 300 public programs to more
than 225 different public organizations and City departments, including the
Aviation, Street Transportation, Neighborhood Services, Housing, Planning, and
Water Departments.
City of Phoenix Historic Preservation Ordinance
The City Archaeologist and a Historic Preservation Officer have been authorized to
review proposed developments within Phoenix since 1985 based on the City’s
Zoning Ordinance, which is designed to “aid in the harmonious, orderly, and
14 Phoenix Rising: The Development of a Municipal Archaeology … 279
progressive development of the City” (Chap. 1, Sect. 102). The purpose of the
City’s Zoning Ordinance is to:
establish standards and regulations to govern the use of land and structures in the City and for
review and approval of all proposed development of property in the City, and to provide a
development review process that will be comprehensive, consistent, and efficient in the
implementation of the General Plan and other adopted goals, policies and standards of the City
(Chap. 1, Sect. 102).
Keywords in this declaration when applied to archaeology are “establish stan-

dards” and “review and approval of all proposed development.”
The Zoning Ordinance includes a separate section on Historic Preservation. This
section acknowledges the significance of archaeological resources within the City:
It is hereby declared as a matter of public policy that the protection, enhancement and
preservation of properties and areas of historical, cultural, and archaeological and aesthetic
significance are in the interests of the health, prosperity and welfare of the City of Phoenix
(Chap. 8, Sect. 102).
Archaeological materials include artefacts, architecture, rock art, human graves,

and other ancient and historic features at least 50 years of age.
The City Zoning Ordinance language is ambiguous in regards to the archaeological
evaluation process. For example, the ordinance uses the words “encourage” in ref-
erence to the identification of prehistoric and historic archaeological resources, “where
appropriate” for preserving archaeological materials which are to be recovered “when
applicable.” There is no explanation of appropriateness or applicability, nor are there
criteria for triggering any required action. These procedures had to be established
before a viable, citywide archaeology program could be developed.
Successful City Archaeology Projects
Several high profile archaeological investigations undertaken at the request of the

City Archaeologist were highly successful and created a positive attitude towards
archaeology within City government. These projects also revealed challenges in the
development of a citywide compliance program.
Phoenix Chinatown Project
In 1990, the Phoenix Suns Basketball team negotiated with the City to build a new
arena in the downtown area. This arena was plotted on top of the historic Phoenix
Chinatown. Suns management agreed to allow archaeology to occur before con-
struction, but did not want to be responsible for funding the archaeology. To raise
money for the Chinatown Archaeology Project, the author organized a committee
composed of several prominent members of the Chinese–Asian Community in
Phoenix, which raised more than $22,000 through private donations, including money
280 T.W. Bostwick
from the Desert Jade Women’s Club and the Taiwanese government. A Heritage Fund
Grant of $15,000 was also awarded by the SHPO.
A cultural resource firm was then hired with the donations to conduct excavations,
and more than 350,000 artefacts were recovered. In addition to a technical report on the
project (Rogge et al. 1992), two exhibits were created, one of which travelled to schools
and libraries throughout Arizona, and another exhibit which was located in the eastern
lobby of the basketball arena for 16 years. Because of its community involvement and
scholarly contribution to local Chinese history, the project won a Special Recognition
Award in 1995 from the SHPO and the Arizona Governor, Fife Symington, III.
The Phoenix Historic Chinatown project was, by all accounts, a great success.
However, the need to raise money through donations for archaeological investigations
was not considered a viable long-term preservation strategy. Therefore, it was decided
that each individual project sponsor or land owner, whether private or government,
should be responsible for funding archaeological investigations deemed appropriate by
the City Archaeologist. The next step was to institutionalize a process whereby ar-
chaeology was part of the early planning for development projects. Two other projects
reinforced the importance of conducting archaeology before construction occurred,
and the role of the public in developing an archaeology program.
Pioneer and Military Memorial Cemetery
In 1992, the City proposed a new fence and walkways for the Pioneer and Military
Memorial Cemetery and Park, a contiguous group of seven cemeteries that date
from 1884 to 1912. Archaeological excavations were recommended by the city
archaeology Office, and subsequently funded by the Parks and Recreation
Department, because a review of old maps revealed that the historic cemeteries had
been established in the middle of a large prehistoric Hohokam village called La
Villa, which itself contained ancient cemeteries.
A professional archaeologist was then hired by the City to supervise volunteers
from the Arizona Archaeological Society and the Pioneer Cemetery Association to
undertake the archaeological excavations. More than a dozen Hohokam pit struc-
tures and two human burials dating from the sixth to ninth centuries AD were
discovered (Schroeder 1994). The results of this project had long-term implications
for the city archaeology Program, demonstrating that archaeology can be found in
previously developed properties, and it confirmed the need for a program of sys-
tematic project review by the City Archaeologist.
Heritage Square Project
The early 1990s also saw the City begin redevelopment of the downtown area,
including Heritage Square, the location of several important historic buildings.
Underneath the historic properties was an ancient Hohokam settlement known as

Pueblo Patricio. Using both City and federal funds to hire a cultural resource
management (CRM) firm, an archaeology program was developed by the city
archaeology office which included public involvement. One component of that
program was a series of public lectures and tours at the excavation project called
Ruin Your Day. Another component was a popular archaeology report entitled,
Layers of History: The Archaeology of Heritage Square (Henderson et al. 1995)
(Fig. 14.1). The tour program received good media coverage and was well attended
by various school groups and the public, resulting in the project winning an award
Fig. 14.1 Heritage Square popular report, Layers of History (1995)

282 T.W. Bostwick
from the Governor’s Archaeology Advisory Commission. The success of this

project reinforced the value of sharing the results of archaeology projects with the
public and had a positive influence on City officials.
City of Phoenix General Burial Agreement
The State of Arizona passed a state burial law (Arizona Revised Statutes 41–844 and
865) in 1990 that regulated the removal of human burials from all public and private
property in Arizona. Because archaeological sites in the City often contain burials, the
state law increased the awareness of the potential for human burials to be destroyed
through unregulated construction. Therefore, the City Archaeologist worked with the
Arizona State Museum (ASM) to develop a General Burial Agreement that imple-
mented the terms and conditions of the state’s regulations, and was applicable to both
City funded and private developments. This document outlines a set of policies and
procedures concerning the care and treatment of human burials in Phoenix. The
General Burial Agreement was written after consultation with seven Native American
communities who claim affinity with ancient and historic cultures in Phoenix. These
groups are the Gila River Indian Community, Ak-Chin Indian Community, Salt River
Pima–Maricopa Community, Zuni Pueblo, the Tohono O’odham Nation, the Hopi
Tribe, and the Fort McDowell Yavapai Tribe. The City’s General Agreement identified
the Salt River Pima–Maricopa Community at the lead tribe, and stipulated that all
burials would be blessed by one of their religions specialists before being disinterred
and then reburied on their reservation after the analysis of the burials was completed.
Phoenix General Plan
A major opportunity to strengthen the city’s archaeology compliance program

occurred in 2001 when the City adopted a new General Plan as required by the
state’s Growing Smarter legislation of 1998 and 2000 (Arizona Revised Statutes
Title 9, Article 4, Chap. 6). The City’s General Plan provides comprehensive
directions for the growth, conservation, and redevelopment of the City. The City
Archaeologist was part of the planning team that contributed language to
Conservation, Rehabilitation, and Redevelopment Element of the Plan. Goal 1 of
the Conservation element is to preserve and protect the City’s rich heritage. Policy 4
of Goal 1 states that “development should be compatible with architectural,
archaeological, and historic resources and their setting.” An important recom-
mendation of that goal is for the City to “investigate regulatory and voluntary
methods to identify, assess, and preserve archaeological and historic resources in
both public and private development projects.” These policies and recommenda-
tions provided strong support for an archaeology review and evaluation program for
both public and private development within Phoenix.
Archaeology and City Department Project Review Process
The creation of a comprehensive citywide archaeology program required working with

individual departments to establish or improve their cultural resource review processes
consistent with their internal policies and procedures. City department projects were
the initial focus of this effort, and then private projects regulated through the Zoning
Department were addressed. These two tasks took several years to accomplish, in part
because each department had its own management history that had to be changed and
because the scale of construction was overwhelming, with as many as 100,000 con-
structions permits being issued by the City annually.
Neighborhood Services Department HUD Program
The Neighborhood Services Department (NSD) receives millions of dollars in grants

annually from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to
improve unsightly neighbourhoods. The NSD is required to follow Sect. 106 of the
National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) to determine potential adverse effects on
historic properties, but an audit by HUD in 1994 uncovered inconsistencies in NSD’s
compliance process. A new position was created, Environmental Quality Specialist, to
coordinate and improve their environmental and cultural resource compliance actions.
Working with the City Archaeologist, NSD initiated a project review process which
utilizes a standardized, two-sided evaluation form for all HUD-funded projects. One
side of the assessment form is for historic buildings and structures and the other side is
for archaeology. HUD previously requested a full report for each project review,
which was often redundant and not cost-effective. The City’s two-sided form contains
check boxes and blank spaces to be filled in, and proved to be very effective for
reviewing 4500 HUD projects from 1994 to 2009, approximately 300 a year. Based
on the success of the NSD archaeology evaluation form, a general archaeology
assessment form was created for use by all City departments (Fig. 14.2). Between
2000 and 2009, more than 125 NSD projects involved archaeological monitoring
and/or excavations conducted by consulting firms and funded by HUD.
NSD also negotiated a Programmatic Agreement for Historic Properties in 1995
with HUD and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. This programmatic
agreement, authorized by NHPA Sect. 800.14, allows the NSD Environmental
Quality Specialist to prescreen all NSD HUD-funded projects during the review
process to determine whether there will be no subsurface disturbance (e.g. fixing
roofs or replacing windows), with those projects not requiring a cultural resource
review. Due to the success of this review process, several years later the City signed
a new Programmatic Agreement that took four years of negotiation with the
Advisory Council. Under the 2007 Programmatic Agreement, the City’s Historic
Preservation Officer and the City Archaeologist are given authority to oversee the
entire NHPA Sect. 106 process without review by the SHPO, or the development of
284 T.W. Bostwick
Fig. 14.2 City of Phoenix archaeology assessment request form
Memoranda of Agreement for each project. Rather, an annual report is submitted by

the City to SHPO that summarizes all projects conducted that year under the
Programmatic Agreement, and the public is notified of the availability for review of
this summary report. This Programmatic Agreement cut down on the amount of
time for the review and approval process for each project from up to 12 months to
no more than 4 months.
Street Transportation Department
With more than 7500 km of City-owned streets, there is a high potential for buried
archaeological sites under or adjacent to many City streets. In order to expedite
archaeology requirements for street construction projects, several archaeology
consulting firms were hired on annual services contracts by the Street
Transportation Department (STD). Furthermore, archaeology discovery clauses
were put into all street construction contracts to ensure that contractors reported
archaeological materials encountered during construction. On more than four
occasions contractors have reported finding prehistoric human burials under City
streets or sidewalks, which were then removed within 48 h by the City’s annual
services consultants for eventual reburial on the Salt River Pima–Maricopa Indian
Community Reservation.
Between 2002 and 2006, STD sponsored 66 archaeological projects, including
surveys, testing, data recovery, and monitoring. More than $1.5 million was spent by
the STD on archaeology during that five-year period. Monitoring costs ranged from
about $750 to $3300 per day depending on the logistics of the project and the amount
of archaeological materials that were recorded. Around 45% of the STD projects that
were monitored found archaeological and historical archaeological materials.
Engineering and Architectural Services Department
At the recommendation of the City Archaeologist, the City Engineering and

Architectural Department (EAS) expanded its Environmental Checklist to include
cultural resource inventory responsibilities for all EAS construction projects.
Moreover, beginning in 2003, archaeological assessments were included in the
City’s Environmental Phase I Reviews required for all properties purchased by the
City. From 2003 to 2009, more than 1600 Phase I environmental assessments for
City properties included archaeological reviews by the City Archaeologist. CRM
firms were then hired by the City for those projects requiring archaeological survey,
testing, or data recovery.
Other City Departments
Thousands of archaeology assessments were also done for projects sponsored by

the Aviation, Development Services, Housing, Parks and Recreation, Public Works,
286 T.W. Bostwick
Street Transportation, and Water Services Departments. Some of these projects had
substantial archaeological investigations undertaken because of federal funding,
such as the improvements to three runways at Sky Harbor International Airport
(Aguila 2007; Henderson 2003). Federal funds were used to hire CRM firms to
undertake the archaeology.
Zoning Department
A major effort of the City Archaeologist was to ensure that the Zoning Department
included archaeology as part of their private project reviews, which the department
agreed to do only if the City Archaeologist conducted the reviews and managed all
the subsequent complaints and concerns. Consequently, each private project was
negotiated by the City Archaeologist with the developer and their archaeological
consultant. Not all developers were pleased with having to fund the archaeology for
their projects, but City management consistently supported the City Archaeologist
when developers lodged formal complaints. One of the key issues was to avoid
construction delays, which was accomplished by having archaeology requirements
issued early in the planning process. From 2003 to 2009, more than 1150
archaeological assessments were conducted for City Zoning cases. Excavation
strategies for private development were undertaken in a manner similar to state or
federally funded projects in Arizona, with archaeological excavations conducted in
phases (testing, then data recovery). Some of the private archaeology projects in
Phoenix were very large in scale. For example, archaeology at a warehouse
development in south-west Phoenix in 2007 uncovered nearly 600 archaeological
features in the Hohokam village called Pueblo del Rio, resulting in the recovery of
22,000 artefacts. Archaeological features that were examined included 72 pit-
houses, 81 human cremations and 7 inhumations, 5 hornos (cooking ovens), and an
ancient irrigation canal (Gage and Craig 2009).
Cultural Resource Training for City Departments
Because of several violations of Sect. 404 of the Clean Water Act, in March 1999,
the US Army Corps of Engineers (ACOE) directed the City to develop and
implement a citywide employee education and training program to address the
importance, identification, avoidance and protection of environmental resources
encountered in the course of normal City business activities. The City Manager then
instructed the City Office of Environmental Programs to form a Steering Committee
that would address the concerns of the Corps. The City Steering Committee, which
included the City Archaeologist, evaluated all City departments’ involvement in
environmental and cultural resource compliance and submitted a detailed report
with recommendations for improvements (Office of Environmental Programs
2001). One of those recommendations was to implement a program to train City

supervisors and project managers on environmental and cultural resource permits
and programs.
Seven training courses were developed, including Introduction to Cultural
Resource Management, taught by the City Archaeologist. More than 500 City
employees received cultural resources training 2001 and 2009. Another training
course, called Consultant Informational Workshop, was designed to inform local
environmental and cultural resource consulting firms about the City’s protocol,
procedures and professional resources.
GIS Database System
Ancient ruins in the Phoenix area have been mapped and dug for more than
125 years, creating a large quantity of data. To better manage and access these data,
a GIS database system was created by a private consultant for the city archaeology
Office at Pueblo Grande Museum. The City GIS archaeological database has proved
to be a valuable asset to many archaeologists working in Phoenix. Within minutes,
any property in the City can be located to determine whether it is within a known
archaeological site, or if it needs to be surveyed to locate any potential sites.
Boundaries of known archaeological sites can be displayed on top of detailed street
maps, updated aerial photographs, or county property records, and then printed in
color. These electronic maps are linked to lists of all archaeological reports written
on each site, and site summaries that note if human remains have been found at the
site. The database is updated daily to ensure its completeness at all times. In
addition, hard copies of the vast majority of the archaeology reports listed in the
database are kept on file at the museum for those researchers who need to gather
additional information.
Guidelines for Archaeology
In 2004, the City Archaeologist created a set of written guidelines for conducting
archaeology in the City of Phoenix to ensure consistency in the various investi-
gations being conducted by as many as 15 different consulting firms and to provide
a resource for developers and consultants who have not previously worked in
Phoenix. These guidelines were revised two years later and posted on the City’s
Web site (Bostwick 2006). Included in the 45-page guidelines are statements
regarding the role of the City Archaeologist, archaeology project management
issues, report content and format requirements, report submittal procedures, site
records management, and fieldwork protocol. For example, one of the fieldwork
288 T.W. Bostwick
requirements states that whenever human burials are found, archaeologists must
excavate an area of 10 m in diameter around the burial to ensure that there are no
other burials nearby. This policy has proved to be very effective in ensuring that all
human burials within a project area have been found.
Also included in the guidelines are statements about the collection policies and
procedures at Pueblo Grande Museum (Young 2004), a City-owned repository
accredited by the American Association of Museums. The materials recovered and
information generated for all city archaeology projects are curated at Pueblo Grande
Museum, and private projects undertaken within the City also were accepted for
curation at the museum. From 2000 through 2009, more than 250 projects were
curated at the museum.
General Archaeology Treatment Plans
All archaeology monitoring, testing and data recovery projects undertaken in

Phoenix by municipal departments and private developers are required to have a
written scope of work and research design. Over the years, similar research designs
were being prepared over and over again. In an effort to increase cost-effectiveness
and reduce redundancy of information, three different general archaeology treat-
ment plans were prepared between 2004 and 2008 by consultants at the request of
the City Archaeologist. These general archaeology plans were funded by the Street
Transportation Department since many of their construction projects and mainte-
nance activities trigger small-scale archaeological investigations.
The City’s general archaeology plans summarize previous research, describe the
environmental and cultural settings, and outline general field methods and labora-
tory procedures. One of them is a general monitoring and discovery plan (Walsh
2004), another one is a plan for recording and excavating prehistoric canals
(Stubing and Turner 2007), and the third general plan is for exploratory (testing)
excavations in prehistoric and historic sites (Montero et al. 2008). Each plan is used
in conjunction with a project specific supplemental letter that describes the char-
acteristics of that project, identifies specific regulatory responsibilities for the
project, and addresses other relevant research issues beyond those in the general
plan.
Difficult Federal Projects
Some federally funded archaeology projects in the City had unique challenges. Two
of those included the Federal Courthouse Project and the Valley Metro Light Rail
Project.
Federal Courthouse Project
In 1994, a two-City block federal courthouse building was proposed for a location
within the Original Phoenix Townsite, established in 1870. However, the project
administrators at General Administration Services (GSA) did not consider historical
archaeological deposits in Phoenix to have national significance, and in their
opinion, did not warrant federal funding. The SHPO and City Archaeologist dis-
agreed with that position, but the GSA still refused to sponsor the archaeology.
Learning that the GSA was purchasing City-owned land to build their court-
house, the City Archaeologist worked with the City Law Department to write an
archaeology requirement into the land transfer provisions, forcing the GSA to
sponsor the archaeology if they wanted the land. The GSA subsequently agreed and
as a result a significant amount of information and artefacts were recovered.
Excavations even revealed the remains of the blacksmith shop and boarding house
of Frank B. Moss, Mayor of Phoenix, from 1905 to 1906. Mayor Moss died of a
heart attack at City Hall after riding his bicycle there from his shop (Thiel 1998).
Valley Metro Light Rail Project
One of the largest archaeological investigations undertaken in the Phoenix region

was the federally funded Valley Metro Light Rail project, a new rail line 19.6 miles
in length designed in 1994 to traverse through three Cities—Phoenix, Tempe, and
Mesa. Management of the archaeology was a challenge at first because Phoenix was
the only City of the three to have an archaeology staff. It was decided that the
Phoenix City Archaeologist would oversee the work done by an archaeology
consulting firm hired by federal government for the entire project. Excavations were
then conducted in several Hohokam villages and canals. The analysis of more than
11,150 archaeological features and 300,000 artefacts were reported in four volumes
(Schilz 2011), at a cost of nearly $3 million. A popular report was also written for
the public (Stuart 2011).
Sharing Archaeology with the Public
An important role of many government archaeology programs, since they are

publicly funded, is to find ways to distil the results of research into accessible and
informative stories that can be shared with the public. Publications and exhibits are
a common means to do so and Pueblo Grande Museum is an ideal setting for both.
290 T.W. Bostwick
Museum Publication Series
In 1993, the author initiated three museum publication series for archaeological and
historical studies on Phoenix and the Southwest. Anthropological Papers present
recent studies with significant results, mostly archaeological investigations in
Phoenix. Occasional Papers include historical and archaeological studies of interest
to scholars and the educated public. Technical Reports summarize the results of
archaeological studies that are less likely to be of interest to the public. Both of the
first two publications series are registered with the US Library of Congress and, to
ensure the reports never go out of print, are reprinted with money from their sales
deposited into a special publication fund. From 1993 to 2009, more than 35 reports
were published in these series, with each report paid for by the project sponsor.
The results of the larger archaeological projects also continued to include pop-
ular reports written for the public. For example, based on data contained in three
technical reports on Pueblo Grande National Historic Landmark, a popular report
was prepared (Andrews and Bostwick 2000) which has gone through multiple
printings (Fig. 14.3).
Public Exhibits on City Archaeology
Pueblo Grande Museum first began presenting exhibits and public programs on
local archaeology projects in the early 1930s (Bostwick et al. 2004). This tradition
has continued to the present. In 1995, five years of work on the Pueblo Grande
archival project, a comprehensive examination and publication of the last 120 years
of investigations at Pueblo Grande, was exhibited as Southwest Culture: The
Pueblo Grande Renaissance.
In the early 1990s, the City Archaeologist began a long-term reconnaissance of
the rock art in the South Mountains, enlisting the aid of a professional photogra-
pher. The preliminary results of that study were displayed as fine art photographs in
a 1995 Pueblo Grande Museum exhibit, Set in Stone: Rock Art Photography of
South Mountain Park by Peter Krocek. This study and exhibit resulted in a book on
South Mountains rock art published by the University of Arizona Press (Bostwick
and Krocek 2002).
During the 1980s and 1990s, downtown Phoenix underwent a major redevel-
opment program sponsored by the City and by private development. Archaeological
excavations subsequently revealed large quantities of buried materials from the
past. Downtown is the location of a prehistoric settlement called Pueblo Patricio,
which covers five City blocks. Here native people farmed the rich soils along the
Salt River, building numerous pit structures for shelter from the sun. On top of the
buried remains of those ancient houses are building foundations, privies, wells, and
artefacts from historic pioneers who settled or operated businesses in the original
Phoenix Townsite, first established in 1870. Materials from that era were displayed
Fig. 14.3 Popular archaeology report on Pueblo Grande, Desert Farmers at the River’s Edge:
The Hohokam and Pueblo Grande (2000)
in a 2001 exhibit at Pueblo Grande Museum and titled, Hidden History:

Archaeology of Territorial Phoenix.
Another exhibit on downtown archaeology was constructed inside the east lobby
and south concourse of the new Phoenix Convention Center. This mosaic of historic
and modern photographs, interspersed with videos, takes up five large wall spaces and
is affectionately called “The Archaeology Wall” (Fig. 14.4). Designed as a permanent
292 T.W. Bostwick
Fig. 14.4 Archaeology popular report on Phoenix sky harbor international airport, Beneath the
Runways (2008)
exhibit, it is based on the 2007–2008 excavations of a two-block area within Pueblo

Patricio and the Original Phoenix Townsite where the old Convention Center was
located. Forty pit structures were excavated, some dating back to AD 200. Historic
materials from the Territorial period were also found, including the remnants of the first
ice factory in Phoenix, built in 1879. The Archaeology Wall provides a unique
opportunity for out-of-state visitors attending events at the Convention Center to learn
about the prehistory and early history of Phoenix.
Fig. 14.5 Archaeology wall exhibit in the lobby of the Phoenix Convention Center. (Photograph
by T.W. Bostwick)
Two other major exhibits were put on display at Pueblo Grande Museum based
on current archaeological projects in Phoenix. A 2005 exhibit, Flight Over Phoenix:
1930 Aerial Canal Survey, resulted from enthusiastic interest from the public in the
acquisition by Pueblo Grande Museum of more than 700 aerial photographs of
Hohokam sites and canals taken by the Army Air Corps in 1930. These pho-
tographs show the Phoenix region before explosive growth obscured much of its
natural landscape.
Finally, nearly 25 years of archaeological digging at Sky Harbor Airport was
summarized in a 2008 exhibit titled Beneath the Runways: Uncovering the Past at
Sky Harbor Airport. This exhibit covered almost 1000 years of occupation at two
different Hohokam settlements located in the midst of one of the busiest airports in
the nation. Excavations in these two settlements—Dutch Canal Ruin and Pueblo
Salado—revealed changes in use of the prehistoric landscape over time, reflecting
fluctuations in the flow patterns of the Salt River. A popular report was written to
accommodate the exhibit (Bostwick 2008) (Fig. 14.5).
South Mountains Rock Art Project
Towering high above the southern edge of Phoenix, South Mountain Preserve is
one of the largest municipal parks in the world, covering more than 15,000 acres of
rugged mountains strewn with public trails. The South Mountains contain a
294 T.W. Bostwick
considerable amount of archaeological materials, especially rock art, but they have
not been systematically surveyed (Bostwick and Krocek 2002; Snyder 1965).
Vandalism, especially graffiti and theft of artefacts, is a problem in some parts of the
Preserve (Golio and Snyder 1993; Bostwick 1998). Challenges to the management
of rock art in the South Mountains were discussed by the author in the 1994
Museum of Northern Arizona video, Marks of the Ancestors: Ancient Indian Rock
Art of Arizona.
A comprehensive survey and inventory of the South Mountain Preserve is
needed, but the cost of such an effort is substantial and has not been a high priority
for the Parks and Recreation Department with its public demands to build new ball
fields, swimming pools, and recreation centres. Consequently, the City
Archaeologist partnered with the School of Human Evolution and Social Change at
Arizona State University (ASU) on a grant proposal called Preserving the
Petroglyphs at South Mountain Park. In 2005, this proposal was awarded a
three-year Heritage Fund grant for nearly $100,000 from the SHPO. Arleyn Simon
of Archaeological Research Institute at ASU and the City Archaeologist were
Co-Principal Investigators of the South Mountain Rock Art Project (SMRAP).
Other organizations involved in the project include the Arizona Archaeological
Society, Mesa Community College, Northern Arizona University (NAU), and
Washington State University (Bostwick 2009).
The SMRAP consists of three main components: Research, Management, and
Education. A detailed recording manual with several sets of forms was created,
based on a four-stage approach to recording, each more intensive (Swanson and
Bostwick 2007).
Field consultations were conducted with Barnaby Lewis, Tribal Historic
Preservation Officer for the Gila River Indian Community, who identified shrines
and sacred trails and sang O’odham songs about the South Mountains to the
research team and students.
Educational components of the project focused on graduate student research.
A Master’s degree student at NAU conducted a comparative survey of two canyons
and tested the SMRAP project recording forms (Carpenter 2007). In addition, the
Center for Desert Archaeology sponsored a four-year Preservation Fellowship for a
Ph.D. student from Washington State University to write his dissertation on the
South Mountains, the first one on Hohokam rock art (Wright 2014).
Saving Our Heritage Piece by Piece
Archaeologists working in Phoenix over the past two decades have obtained var-
ious kinds of data from more than 35 Hohokam sites, generating 228 reports. All of
those reports were reviewed and approved by the City Archaeologist and his two
staff members. More than half of the prehistoric sites investigated contained human
remains, which resulted in the respectful disinterment and repatriation of more than
2200 human burials to the Salt River Pima–Maricopa Indian Community. Careful
Table 14.1 Archaeology projects coordinated by City of Phoenix archaeology office from 2000
through 2009
Calendar No of new Survey Monitoring Monitoring/testing Testing/data
year projects* recovery
2000 45 10 14 14
2001 58 9 36 11
2002 66 14 36 20
2003 41 7 25 11
2004 52 13 24 12
2005 113 34 44 35
2006 137 43 23 27 45
2007 130 30 43 27 24
2008 105 21 40 34 10
2009 56 10 21 13 5
Total 792 191 306 101 187
*Does not include ongoing projects from previous years
analysis of those burials has yielded a wealth of information on Hohokam health,

diet, and social status. The human remains themselves, and their associated grave
items, have been reburied on the Salt River Pima–Maricopa Indian Community so
they can again rest in peace.
Overall, no more than 10% of the reviewed projects in any one year by the city
archaeology Office require further archaeological actions, but those projects represent a
considerable amount of archaeological investigations over time (Table 14.1).
Archaeology projects ranged from survey to monitoring, testing, and data recovery.
Carefully written contracts and tight management by the City Archaeologist Office
ensured that archaeology projects did not linger for years. More than $12 million was
spent on archaeology in Phoenix from 2000 to 2009; some of the archaeology projects
at Sky Harbor International Airport and in the downtown area cost as much as
$1 million to excavate a large site and prepare a report.
Excavations in Phoenix have revealed that some sites are larger than originally
mapped, and that important differences between sites are related to the sites’
location within the Hohokam’s extensive canal systems that delivered water to their
ancient farmland (Howard and Huckleberry 1991). Hundreds of cross sections have
now been exposed by archaeologists in many of these canals, as a result of
investigations required by the city archaeology Office, providing detailed data on
Hohokam engineering skills and hydrological knowledge.
Summary and Conclusions
An astounding amount of development has occurred in Phoenix over the last two
decades. During that time, a set of project review procedures and archaeology
standards were established by the City Archaeologist that saved many
296 T.W. Bostwick
archaeological sites and human burials from complete destruction. Increased public
awareness of the importance of archaeology was accomplished by a steady stream
of lectures, popular reports, exhibits, videos, and news stories. In addition, training
was provided to hundreds of City employees, using successful archaeology projects
as examples. Phoenix’s heritage has been well served by a formal process of
systematic review. Archaeology is now a major component in the recently adopted
Historic Preservation Plan for Phoenix (City of Phoenix 2015). Developers, plan-
ners, archaeologists, Phoenix citizens, and Native Americans are all contributing as
a unified community in the protection and promotion of the amazing heritage of the
City of Phoenix.
Acknowledgments Many people contributed to the development of the city archaeology pro-
gram. Special recognition is given to Lonnie Thacker, Andre Best, April Carroll, Roger Lidman,
Stephen Savage, and Barbara Stockland. Since 2011 Laurene Montero has continued the
archaeology program as developed by the author.
References
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Andrews, J. P., & Bostwick, T. W. (2000). Desert farmers at the river’s edge: The hohokam of
pueblo grande. Phoenix, AZ: Pueblo Grande Museum.
Bostwick, T. W. (1998). Managing rock art sites in an Urban setting: The challenges of south
mountain park. In S. M. Freers (Ed.), American Indian Rock Art 23 (pp. 119–130). Tucson,
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Bostwick, T. W. (2006). City of Phoenix guidelines for archaeology (Revised Edition). Phoenix,
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Bostwick, T. W. (2008). Beneath the runways: Archaeology of sky harbor international airport.
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Howard, J. B., & Huckleberry, G. (1991). The operation and evolution of an irrigation system:
The East Papago Canal study. Phoenix, AZ: Soil Systems Publications in Archaeology 18.
Montero, L., Stubing, M., & Turner, K. (2008). General historic properties treatment plan for
archaeological sites within the boundaries of the City of Phoenix, Arizona (pp. 2007–2026).
Phoenix, AZ: Carter & Burgess Project Report.
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Phoenix, AZ: Pueblo Grande Museum.
Chapter 15
Municipal Archaeology Policies
as a Vector in Public Outreach
Programs: Digging Up Dirt for the Masses
in St. Augustine, Florida
Carl D. Halbirt and Sarah E. Miller
Archaeology. At the municipal level, the word conjures spasms among contractors
and thoughts of dread for property owners. A tacit assumption is that archaeology
will disrupt plans, scheduling, and most importantly augment costs related to
commercial or residential dreams. Another concern is whether construction will
stop if anything important is discovered, which in turn would raise the question of
who owns the artifacts. These are just some of the most obvious issues that have
been expressed by those affected at the municipal level. Yet it is at this level that
most unregulated archaeological impacts happen, as the majority of municipalities
in the USA do not even consider a community’s archaeological heritage in their
planning policies or permitting procedures. The question is begged: Can archae-
ology be incorporated into a community’s mind-set so that the buried heritage of
that city or county is preserved without placing limitations on growth and devel-
opment? Concordantly, can costs be restricted and scheduling be planned such that
attempts at regulating construction activities at the municipal level are not shot
down in flames?
Municipal archaeology is not a new term. Its antecedents lie in cultural resource
management as well as public archaeology policies and programs. What is
becoming evident is that municipal archaeology as a concept is emerging in aca-
demic circles and being recognized for its own unique merits toward: (1) fostering
community preservation efforts and assets, (2) encouraging public involvement and
empowerment as stakeholders—be it active or supportive, (3) shaping local gov-
ernment regulatory processes, and (4) rescuing those deposits threatened by con-
struction projects—be they large scale or small scale—for the public trust. In
C.D. Halbirt (&)

Planning and Building Department, City Archaeologist,
PO Box 210, St. Augustine, FL 32085, USA
S.E. Miller
Florida Public Archaeology Network, Flagler College,
74 King Street, St. Augustine, FL 32084, USA

300 C.D. Halbirt and S.E. Miller
defining “what is municipal archaeology,” Douglas Appler (2012) examined vari-

ous nuances of the concept. One in particular sets this field apart within the realm of
cultural resource management and public archaeology:
[M]unicipal archaeology programs benefit from their position within local government for
the simple reason that local government possesses certain powers and legal tools that can be
extremely beneficial when used for the protection of archaeological resources (Appler
2012, p. 42).
In other words, local government has more oversight in regulating development,

especially as it relates to private property and municipal infrastructure improve-
ments that are not under the purview of federal and state oversight. This is par-
ticularly relevant in those communities where the demographics are more transient,
with descendant groups in the minority, and stakeholder interest in protecting a
municipality’s buried heritage taking a backseat to project costs and scheduling.
In this chapter, we examine the practice of municipal archaeology in the City of
St. Augustine (COSA), a city of approximately 13,500 residents on the northeast
coast of Florida. The program’s primary goals are to protect and preserve the city’s
archaeological heritage through documentation and engaging the public. The city’s
heritage is complex spanning 450 years of European occupation that postdates a
prehistoric occupation encompassing 4000 years. Four time periods are distin-
guished during the historical era, with each representing particular administrative
agendas and ethnic groupings that defined the urban landscape. The most well
known is the First Spanish Period (1565–1763) when St. Augustine served as a
garrison presidio (Chatelaine 1941; Deagan 1983; Halbirt 2004a). During the
subsequent British occupation (1763–1783), St. Augustine became the staging area
for entrepreneurial endeavors focusing on the development of plantations in
northeast Florida (Griffin 1999) and later for Revolutionary War activities along the
Southern Frontier (Smith 2011). In the nineteeth century, the city hosted various
enterprises, such as railway systems and tourism industries, which helped shape the
development of Florida after becoming a state in 1845 (Graham 1978, 2014).
St. Augustine’s municipal archaeology program is a direct result of the city’s
implementation of the Archaeological Preservation Ordinance (APO) that passed in
1986 (COSA 2017; Piatek et al. 1989). The ordinance mandates that an archaeo-
logical review of all building and right-of-way permits involving ground-
penetrating construction activities—private or public—be evaluated for potential
impacts to cultural resources. The city Board of Commissioners tweaked the APO
over the years, making it more inclusive in terms of adverse impacts, financial
viability, scheduling, and addressing aspects of curation and ownership. The APO
can be accessed through http:\\www.citystaug.com/archaeology/index.php.
The processes by which the ordinance came into existence is the culmination of
decades of developing policies to protect and preserve St. Augustine’s unique
cultural heritage, which are expressed in the Historic Preservation Element of the
Comprehensive Plan (COSA 1986) and discussed in detail by Appler (2011, 2013)
and Piatek et al. (1989). Reasons for the ordinance’s adoption can be readily
equated with “a perfect storm” of events and players coming together in 1985 and
15 Municipal Archaeology Policies as a Vector in Public Outreach … 301
1986 to create a policy statement protecting the city’s archaeological heritage.

Involved were as follows: (1) a newly established avocational group known as the
St. Augustine Archaeological Association (SAAA) who not only provided a labor
pool for field investigations but formed a corpus of community activists who
attended countless city commission and citizen board meetings advocating for the
ordinance passage; (2) a large development within that part of the colonial
downtown district dating from 1572 onward that focused attention on the city’s
fragile and non-renewable archaeological record; (3) intergovernmental cooperation
between staffs at the city and a local state agency known as the Historic St.
Augustine Preservation Board (HSAPB); and (4) a descendant Menorcan com-
munity led by Mayor Kenneth Beeson that could trace its ancestry in Florida to the
late 1760s and, therefore, was motivated to protect the city’s buried heritage
(Rogers 2003; Howard 1986).
Since 1987, more than 800 archaeological responses to new ground-penetrating
construction projects have occurred within the city limits under the APO. Without
the ordinance, these resources would have been destroyed or covered by devel-
opment. The vast majority of these projects occurred after the city created an
Archaeology Division within the Planning and Building Department in 1990.
Initially, the HSAPB was contracted by the city (Piatek et al. 1989) to undertake
daily operations; however, the partnership was dissolved within two years due to
administrative concerns and differences of opinion centered around funding allo-
cations, staffing levels, and authority issues that ultimately resulted in enmity
between city and HSAPB administrative personnel overseeing the execution of the
ordinance (Appler 2011).
Since April 1990, the city’s Archaeology Division has consisted of a staff of one
(the City Archaeologist), with part-time assistants or consultants hired as funding
becomes available. This staffing void is offset by a dedicated corps of volunteers
who have assisted the city’s archaeology program in various capacities. Many
volunteers are members of the St. Augustine Archaeological Association (SAAA)
—a chapter of the Florida Anthropological Society—who graciously donate
thousands of hours each year to facilitate fieldwork, laboratory analysis, curation
issues, photography, and reports. Furthermore, most volunteers are retirees who
commit between 8 and 12 years with the program, although some have been with
city’s Archaeology Division for almost as long as the program has existed
(Extraordinary volunteer service recognized 2014). Recently, the Advisory Council
on Historic Preservation (ACHP) acknowledged this partnership through its
Preserve America Stewards—a “designation program that recognizes programs that
have demonstrated a successful use of volunteer time and commitment in order to
help care for our historic heritage (Preserve America 2015).”
Volunteers engage in almost all field projects from new additions and pools
associated with existing single-family residences to large-scale commercial pro-
jects. One commercial project that occurred over the course of three years (2000–
2003), with intermittent breaks to work on other projects, was the Hilton Inn on the
Bayfront, a development that adversely impacted 1½ historic blocks within the
colonial downtown district (Halbirt 2004b; Guinta 2001). Over the course of three
years, more than 25 volunteers and a part-time consultant were involved at different
times in data recovery, as well as artifact processing and identification.
A small-scale project that lasted only two weeks was the discovery of a
200-year-old horse burial found prior to the installation of grease traps for a new
restaurant (Rare horse unearthed in colonial St. Augustine 2015). Four volunteers
participated in field investigations and two in curating the skeletal remains.
Cooperation between the Archaeology Division and other city departments
engaged in field activities (e.g., public works, police, and fire) also is an important
component in the recovery and protection of archaeological deposits. These
municipal agencies provide necessary equipment and expertise in dealing with
urban issues in a coastal environment and provide another level of oversight as
impromptu monitors of construction activities.
Mechanics of the Ordinance
More than four centuries of continuous development and growth have left St.
Augustine with a staggering quantity and diversity of archaeological deposits
within a 12.7 square mile (33 km2) area of which 26% is tidal and subject to daily
water inundation. As the city continues to evolve, avoidance of archaeological
deposits is impossible due to centuries of urbanization and the shallow depth of
archaeological deposits. Most archaeological deposits extend from the ground
surface to a depth of approximately four feet, which is near the existing water table.
A zone map created from the Historic Preservation Element of the Comprehensive
Plan (COSA 1986) assists in identifying and managing areas containing significant
archaeological resources (Fig. 15.1).
Three basic zones are recognized based on the probability of exposing archae-
ological deposits and on the significance those deposits represent in interpreting St.
Augustine’s past (Halbirt and Carver 1992). These zones are further divided into a
series of subzones that delimit certain temporal associations or cultural affiliations
(Table 15.1). Zones are based on historical maps, archaeological surveys from the
1970s and 1980s, and a multitude of excavations dating from the 1930s to 1980s
(COSA 1986).
The city commission vetted the ordinance with the goal of preservation through
documentation. While excavation is a destructive process in any investigation, by
understanding and documenting the various nuances associated with a property’s
archaeological record (i.e., soil stratigraphy, artifact provenience, and context) one
is preserving the past, thus meeting the challenge of protecting St. Augustine’s
buried heritage from the continual onslaught of urban development.
With the exclusion of one project where human remains were found, no con-
struction plans have ever been modified in St. Augustine based on archaeological
criteria. The exception was the discovery of an eighteenth-century mission church
and cemetery of Nuestra Señora del Rosario de la Punta (Halbirt 2005), which was
set aside as a conservation zone easement—never to be developed (Appler 2011;
Fig. 15.1 Archaeological zones of St. Augustine, Florida. Source the City of St. Augustine
Archaeology Program
Table 15.1 Designated archaeological zones in St. Augustine, Florida (adapted from Halbirt and
Carver 1992)
Zone I—High archaeological significance and sensitivity
Subzones
IA Since the early seventeenth century in the colonial downtown district
IB Since the mid-sixteenth century in the colonial downtown district
IC Since the late sixteenth century in the colonial downtown district, as well as the
eighteenth-century Native American mission community of Nuestra Señora de Rosario de la
Punta
ID The original 1565 Menendez encampment, late sixteenth- to eighteenth-century Native
American mission community of Nombre de Dios, and prehistoric Native American occupations
dating from circa 4000 B.P. to the historical era
IE The eighteenth-century African American military site of Fort Mose
Zone II—Moderate archaeological significance and sensitivity
Subzones
IIA Prehistoric and historical occupations along hospital creek or the intercoastal waterway
IIB The nineteenth-century dump site along the banks of Maria Sanchez Creek dating from the
late eighteenth century to the late nineteenth century
IIC The eighteenth-century Yamassee mission community of Nuestra Señora de la Concepción
de Pocotalaca, as well as nineteenth-century plantations and the African American community of
Lincolnville
IID The eighteenth-century Timucua mission community of Nuestra Señora de la Assunción, de
Palica
IIE The eighteenth-century Guale mission community of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de
Tolomato
IIF The late eighteenth- to late nineteenth-century Catholic cemetery of Tolomato including the
church/cemetery of Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe de Tolomato
IIG The nineteenth-century Fairbanks plantation site and portions of the defensive line, known as
the Mose Line, associated with Fort Mose
IIH Colonial-era campsites and roads leading from the coquina stone quarries on Anastasia
Island to ferries, as well as prehistoric Native American sites dating from circa 4000 B.P. to 1000
B.P.
Zone III—Low archaeological significance and sensitivity
Subzones
IIIA Post-civil war African American community of Lincolnville also contains portions of
eighteenth-century mission communities and nineteenth-century urban plantations/farms
IIIB Anastasia Island historic area, which includes colonial and territorial era coquina stone
quarries
IIIC Oyster Creek archaeological area containing prehistoric and colonial-era deposits
IIID San Sebastian River archaeological area containing prehistoric deposits and Flagler era
industries
Note significance and sensitivity refers to the probability of adversely impacting archaeological
deposits and the relative value placed on those resources toward interpreting the city’s cultural
heritage
SAAA to oversee conservation easement at La Punta Church and Cemetery Site

2005). Toward this goal, administration of the easement involves partnership
between the City of St. Augustine, the SAAA, and the homeowner association as
the property is a gated Planned Unit Development (PUD). The policy enacted
represents a unique tool available to municipal governments in limiting develop-
ment at archaeological sites.
Execution of the ordinance is through the city’s permitting process, which is

under the auspices of the Planning and Building Department. Established guidelines
are applied to all new construction projects—building, utility, or rights-of-way—
and each is evaluated for potential impacts to archaeological deposits. Three basic
questions determine whether a project trips the ordinance. If the answer to all three
is “yes,” then an archaeological response is necessary.
(1) Does construction involve ground-penetrating activities?
(2) Does project occur in an archaeological zone?
(3) Does project area exceed the ordinance size and depth specifications for sig-
nificant impacts (i.e., more than 100 square feet in area and more than three
inches in depth)?
This initial evaluation is the responsibility of the city’s Permit Coordinator in con-
sultation with the City Archaeologist. The actual sequence of criteria specified by the
ordinance to determine whether a project trips the ordinance is illustrated for a new
single-family residence, the primary construction activity triggering the APO (Fig. 15.2).
Subsequent to this initial review, the property owner or contractor will be
informed as to whether an investigation is needed. A City Archaeological Permit
Application (A-14) must then be completed (COSA 2015), with an accompanying
proposed site development plan. A fee is assessed the owner or contractor before
any archaeological efforts occur. The fee is based on estimated construction costs
and the archaeological zone in which the project is located (Table 15.1). In no
instance has the fee exceeded $25,000—the maximum specified in the APO—
whether it be a multi-million dollar commercial endeavor or single-family resi-
dence, although the ordinance does allow for additional costs to be levied with
proper documentation (APO, Sect. 6-8: Fees). Over the past 28 years, the archae-
ological permit fee assessed commercial and residential property owners has
averaged $1550, with the median fee at $600. While the fee structure was increased
in the APO, the funds collected do not cover the total costs for maintaining an
Fig. 15.2 Archaeological disturbance matrix (Halbirt 1993)

in-house archaeology program, nor are any fees assessed for city infrastructure
improvements. To offset this discrepancy, the program is funded through the city’s
General Fund—a revenue stream supported by taxes. Permit fees recovered go into
the General Fund to help administer and support the program.
The ordinance does enable property owners to hire outside consultants for either
big or small development projects. The caveat is that an archaeological permit is
still necessary, as it is part of the overall building permit system, and corresponding
fees are still assessed (see APO, Sect. 6-8c). For nonprofits “engaged in the
preservation of historical and archaeological resources of St. Augustine,” the cost is
50% of the actual permit fee. For all others, the cost is the total permit fee.
Ordinance in Action
The Ordinance defines the time frame allotted for an archaeological response based
on two criteria (Table 15.2): (1) whether the project disturbance is identified as
being major or minor and (2) the archaeological zone in which the project occurs.
Table 15.2 Archaeological field efforts and time schedules according to city response categories
(Halbirt 1993)
Archaeological response categories
Zone Fees Major disturbance Minor
disturbance
I 1½% of the cost of 4 weeks minimum 4 weeks
construction ($50 minimum) maximum
Additional fee of up to 50% of +up to 4 additional 2-week periods with
the initial fee as approved by written approval from property owner
City Manager as approved by City Manager
+unlimited additional 2-week periods
with written approval from property
owner as approved by City Manager
II 1¼% of the cost of 4 weeks minimum 3 weeks
construction ($50 minimum) maximum
Additional fee of up to 50% of +up to 2 additional 2-week periods
the initial fee as approved by approved by City Manager
City Manager
+unlimited additional 2-week periods
III 1% of the cost of construction 2 weeks minimum 2 weeks
($50 minimum) maximum
Additional fee of up to 50% of +up to 2 additional 1-week periods as
the initial fee as approved by approved by City Manager
City Manager
+ unlimited additional 1-week periods
Major impacts are associated with commercial projects and utility right-of-ways
that exceed 250 square feet in area. Minor impacts refer to all other construction
activities, which include all single-family residences. The time allotted to investi-
gate a property can vary from two weeks in Zone 3 for a single-family residence to
12 weeks for a commercial structure in Zone 1, with extensions approved by the
City Manager and property owner.
Different types of data recovery strategies are used to investigate a property
depending on the archaeological zone, extent of impact, scheduling concerns, and
whether previous investigations have occurred on the property (Halbirt and Carver
1992). It is not uncommon for multiple permits to be issued for a single property in
response to different periods of development. For example, the city issued eight
separate permits for one property—the Cathedral Parish School—from 1992 to
2014 in response to different construction projects. For each permit, archaeological
efforts are limited to the general area of impact.
The intent of any investigation is to address two basic questions. First, what
types of archaeological deposits are present in the impact area? Second, will those
deposits be impacted by construction? The database created by the ordinance has
created unique opportunities to address a myriad of research questions related to St.
Augustine’s growth and development, changes in European and Native American
material culture, subsistence strategies, and land-use patterns, none of which are
mutually exclusive. Also examined are sites and areas outside of the city’s primary
heritage tourism designations (such as the eighteenth-century colonial downtown
district) that had been overlooked by academics. These include late eighteenth-
century British military sites (Guinta 2002), eighteenth-century Native American
refugee mission communities (Halbirt 2014), and late eighteenth- to early
nineteenth-century urban plantation sites occupied by laborers of African descent
(Guinta 2005; Beck 2006). The APO encompasses those peripheral sites and areas.
While most city investigations deal with historical deposits dating after 1565,
prehistoric sites also fall under the auspices of the APO. Most of the prehistoric
sites documented precede European colonization by a few hundred years, which is
known as the St. Johns cultural period (Deagan and Halbirt, in press). A few,
however, date back to ca. 3000–4000 B.P. Archaeological efforts at prehistoric sites
are afforded the same level of inquiry as historical sites.
Program Outcomes
The primary purpose of the city’s Archaeology Division is to administer the

policies set forth in the APO (COSA 2015). As such, municipal archaeology as
applied in St. Augustine is responsive to construction and thus field driven. An 8- to
10-month field season is not uncommon, especially during periods of economic
prosperity (Fig. 15.3). Since 1987, thousands of features and hundreds of thousands
Fig. 15.3 Comparison of archaeological permits issued and Dow Jones industrial average since
1987
of artifacts have been unearthed through systematic procedures showcasing the

city’s prehistory and history.
The archaeological information uncovered through the APO provides a new and
exciting layer of “historical authenticity” for a community that prides itself on being
“America’s Oldest City” (Waterbury 1983; Adams 2009). At the end of St.
Augustine’s colonial period in 1821, when Spain ceded Florida to the USA, the city
consisted of 300 structures (Griffin 1977). Structures were arranged according to the
cedulas or decrees set forth for Spanish town planning in the New World during the
sixteenth century (Couch et al. 1982). Conflagrations and modernization since the
late 1800s have destroyed the majority of these structures leaving only 32 buildings
that still maintain some evidence of their colonial past including the Castillo de San
Marcos, as well as the town plan. The latter is represented by the street layout that
has been in existence since the eighteenth century, though some streets have been
archaeologically dated to the late sixteenth/early seventeenth century (Halbirt
2011). It is the city’s archaeological resources that represent the tangible physical
link to the past, whose 450th anniversary took place on September 8, 2015. An
example of archaeology’s contribution to “historical authenticity” is described in
detail in the section on archaeology and public outreach (see below).
Investigations conducted under the aegis of the APO provide the city with a
unique promotional tool (Appler 2011; Pope 2008). This is especially warranted
given St. Augustine’s “heritage-based economy” according to the City Manager,
who views the ordinance as “protecting and promoting city’s assets (J. Regan 2013,
personal communication).” According to the Assistant City Manager, “the infor-
mation unearthed adds to our identity and is a consideration in zoning issues and
preservation agendas (T. Burchfield 2013, personal communication).” The ability of

the City’s Archaeology Division to function effectively, however, would not be
feasible without a strong public outreach policy.
Public Outreach
Archaeologists share information gained by collecting data with the public in a

variety of ways. Broadly, this is referred to under the umbrella of public archae-
ology, arguably best defined by Gabriel Moshenska as “the study of archaeology in
context. This includes social, political, economic and intellectual contexts…
Archaeology is produced and consumed: by studying these processes in all their
dimensions public archaeologists are the conscience of the discipline (Sanchez
2012).” Recently, archaeologists have put a name to these varying types of outreach
with 21 distinct types of outreach on a continuum, most of which have been applied
in St. Augustine to engage the public in archaeology (Bollwerk et al. 2015).
Archaeology as a science depends on public funding; therefore, outreach is a
requirement of professionals working in the field. In addition to ethical require-
ments, most archaeologists believe in producing a benefit for the public as con-
tributing to the greater good (Little 2002). In broad strokes, public archaeology
outreach requires three components: a public to engage with, a willing professional,
and authentic data from which to draw content for public programs or products.
While the main objective of city archaeology projects is one of compliance, the
city’s Archaeology Division operates beyond its regulatory requirements to advance
public archaeology practice and engage in collaborative archaeology. Due to the
structure of the Ordinance and the program that developed over the years, public
engagement is how the city carries out its program: (1) by collaborating with
multiple landowners who triggered the ordinance since its inception; (2) by sus-
tained volunteers who help carry out and conduct field excavation and laboratory
process and analysis; (3) public outreach in the form of lectures, displays, and
online resources provided and updated on an annual basis; and (4) collaborative
partnerships with other heritage organizations including, but not limited to, the St.
Augustine Archaeological Association, Flagler College, Florida Public
Archaeology Network, St. Augustine Lighthouse & Maritime Museum, St.
Augustine Historical Society, St. Augustine Art Association, University of Florida,
and the Florida Museum of Natural History. This complicates the discussion of
collaborative archaeology outcomes as professional and non-professional partici-
pants represent a full array of heritage partners.
Rosenblatt’s (2010) engagement pyramid as applied by Little and Shackel
(2014) is used to further organize the discussion of community engagement by the
city’s Archaeology Division. The pyramid starts with the broad level of observing
at the base of the pyramid and then continues in ascending order of following,
endorsing, contributing, and owning, ultimately capped off with leading. The
lowest level is observing, which includes any passive or engaged visitor that pauses
to stop at ongoing digs, panels highlighting significant archaeological sites dis-
played around the city, or exhibits showcasing archaeological discoveries. It is not
possible to track the number of people who stop and visit one of these locations as
engagement is sporadic. More than six million tourists annually visit St. Augustine,
with the estimated economic impact of 1.5 billion dollars (Wilson 2015). Some
may seek out digs or displays, but most just happen upon them while walking by on
their way to somewhere else. City projects also are regularly featured in media
outlets, and visitors may happen upon an article or photograph through print or
social media.
In following, the public may make a repeat visit to the dig encouraged by SAAA
or one of the heritage programs that feature the city archaeological efforts, or visit
the City of St. Augustine’s Web site. Social media sources that regularly feature city
archaeological projects and discoveries are FPAN Northeast platforms (Facebook,
Twitter, Tumbler, and Going Public blog), Jessica Clark from First Coast News,
and The St. Augustine Record Facebook page.
Endorsements to the city archaeology program most often happen in the form of
membership paid to the SAAA. The organization publishes a newsletter and
administers a closed group page on Facebook. Currently, SAAA has more than 200
members, with many joining or renewing their membership as a way to contribute
to the city’s archaeology program. Endorsements also come via newspaper and
magazine articles, published letters to the local newspaper the St. Augustine Record,
and comments on the online articles. Voters may also endorse political candidates
that include historic preservation in their platform.
Contributing to the city’s archaeology program is the next step in engagement.
The public may volunteer on a dig or serve on the SAAA board (Fig. 15.4). Some
volunteers show up with great regularity, and others are seasonal or sporadic as
their schedules allow. And not all volunteers help out in the field; some choose to
volunteer in the laboratory, helping process material from sites and doing analysis.
A landmark of contributing is performing multi-step assignments. For example, the
SAAA board forms committees to help with developing historical markers, hosting
conferences, donating equipment, and attending a series of meetings in conjunction
with a city archaeology event. By attending monthly meetings of SAAA or the
bimonthly board meetings, members of the public demonstrate a habitual contri-
bution to the city’s program. SAAA and other volunteers have donated more than
4000 person hours per year for over 25 years and contribute funds to the city’s
archaeology program, many times over the budget allotted by the City for staff and
supplies.
Owning is the fifth level of engagement and often involves collaborative actions
between the city and other heritage organizations and professionals. This level can
include property owners who apply for an archaeological permit, such as the St.
Augustine Art Association described in greater detail below. In brief, the Art
Association puts a substantial amount of time and investment into developing a
mission-relevant exhibit of the work done by the city at the property. This example
Fig. 15.4 Author Sarah Miller and volunteer Nick McAuliffe mapping a typical sized
archaeological test unit in St. Augustine. Source the City of St. Augustine Archaeology Program
embodies the characteristic that contributions by those engaged produce creative

expressions of passion (Rosenblatt 2010). Original artwork contributed substan-
tially in the design and meaning of the exhibit. Flagler College’s Public History
program also invested several semesters of students’ time into creating projects that
highlight and support the city’s archaeology program, from blog posts to walking
tours. Intensified volunteer involvement is key at the owning level.
The cap of the pyramid, therefore the smallest by number of participants but
largest in terms of investment, is leading. Here, the talents brought by many of
those choosing to retire in St. Augustine are revived as they become sustain-
ing board members, executive officers, and trusted volunteers for the city’s
archaeology program. Many choose to mentor new volunteers in archaeological
field and laboratory methods, or some take on major projects and help to organize
events that focus on disseminating information relevant to the city’s buried past.
Little and Shackel (2014: 92–93) note:
While the pyramid may provide the perception that there is a natural progression up the
pyramid, the engagement process also needs to be thought of as nonlinear… people do not
necessarily climb the ladder, nor is it necessarily a natural phenomenon that they all start as
observers.
In St. Augustine this holds true as the public’s interest and investment flows in
all directions. And while community engagement serves the city, the volunteers and
collaborators also gain from the experience. To borrow from Nicholas (2008: 293
as cited in Little and Shackel 2014: 75), they gain personal satisfaction, contribute
to something of value to the larger community, interact with the archaeologists, and
contribute to the long-term reciprocal relationship between the city and community
toward preserving St. Augustine’s heritage.
Archaeology and Public Outreach in St. Augustine
Public outreach is embedded in the city’s municipal archaeology program. As

alluded to above, this concept is not just about professional archaeologists but also
organizations providing interactive and educational opportunities. There are other
aspects inherent in municipal archaeology programs that are especially relevant to
public outreach and those are public empowerment and ownership. Here, the public
is taking an active role and ownership toward implementing the creation, design,
and fabrication of community assets including educational programs rather than a
strictly participatory approach, with professional archaeologists or associations
providing assistance and support as needed.
Over the past 25 years, St. Augustine’s municipal archaeological program has
provided various opportunities for local organizations to use documented archaeo-
logical deposits in creative ways to showcase various discoveries and increase public
awareness and appreciation of St. Augustine’s cultural heritage. Capstone owning and
leading examples include the following: (1) funding and developing signage for an
eighteenth-century mission church and cemetery, (2) funding the restoration of the
nineteenth-century plaza well, and (3) developing an exhibit showcasing archaeo-
logical material associated with the 1586 raid on St. Augustine by Francis Drake. In
2004, the city discovered and documented the mission church and cemetery of
Nuestra Señora del Rosario de la Punta (Halbirt 2005), with signage created and
erected in 2008 by SAAA. The plaza well was discovered in 1995 (Halbirt 1996) and
restored by the city in 1998, with funds provided from the HP1 Association—a
neighborhood organization. Although each has its own merits toward enhancing the
visitor experience when exploring the city’s historical ambience, the Drake exhibit
created by the St. Augustine Art Association is a prime example of the creative
synergism possible between archaeology and public initiative.
Showcasing a Pivotal Event in St. Augustine’s History
In 1998, two new wing additions were constructed at the headquarters and gallery
of the St. Augustine Art Association, a nonprofit organization dedicated to pro-
moting excellence in art for both amateurs and professionals alike since 1924. The
property is located in that part of the colonial downtown district that was first settled
in 1572. As the proposed project exceeded the size specifications for adverse
impacts established by the APO, an archaeological investigation by the city was
required. The result of this activity was the discovery of two stratified
sixteenth-century deposits, a carbonaceous lens with associated de facto refuse
situated atop a large trash pit. A layer of sand representing a possible seal zone
separated the two deposits. The carbonaceous lens was posited to represent the
remains of a burnt board and thatched structure. A short distance from the car-
bonaceous lens was a concentration of burnt daub that may represent the remnants
of a collapsed wall. Although only a portion of these deposits remained intact—a
result of subsequent activities dating to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries—
what had been unearthed was unique as it represented one of the best assemblages
of sixteenth-century pottery ever found in the southeastern US (Barrera 2005), as
well as its potential association with a pivotal historical event in the city’s history.
Ceramic types recovered from the carbonaceous lens and trash deposit date
during the initial 15 years (1572–1587) of what was then a nine-block nascent
settlement. This represented the colony’s third settlement since 1565. The initial
settlement situated at what is now the Fountain of Youth Archaeological Park
(Deagan 2009) lasted only nine months before it was abandoned in favor of an, as
yet, undiscovered location on the coastal side of a barrier island known today as
Anastasia Island (Lyon 1997). In 1572, the colony moved back to the mainland.
This third settlement was positioned along the largest elevated land mass on the St.
Augustine peninsula (Halbirt 2005) identified as a strip of land sandwiched between
two tidal systems, Matanzas Bay and Mary Sanchez Creek.
The proposed 15-year bracket is based on similarities between the ceramic
inventory found at the Art Association and those recovered at Santa Elena (South
and DePratter 1996; South et al. 1988)—a companion sixteenth-century Spanish
settlement located near Beaufort, South Carolina, that was occupied from 1566 to
1587 when it was intentionally abandoned. Many of the occupants moved to St.
Augustine (Paar 1999). Also of consideration is that ceramic types associated with
post-1587 Spanish occupations differ substantially from pre-1587 occupations.
Decorated European ceramic types recovered from city investigations at pre-1587
contexts are primarily Iberian (Old World) in origin, whereas ceramics from
post-1587 contexts are a mixture of Iberian and Nueva España types.
Pottery types recovered from sixteenth-century contexts at the Art Association
were Columbia Plain platos and escudillas or bowls, Yayal Blue-on-White escudos,
Santo Domingo platos and pitchers, Isabella Polychrome platos, Sevilla
Blue-on-Blue vessels, Ligurian platos, Melado vessels, various course earthenware
vessels including early Olive Jar types, and Ming Porcelain vessels. Also recovered
were a canvasing needle, aglets or lacing tips, a few Native American ceramics, and
numerous animal bone fragments.
What precipitated the burning event is open to speculation; however, the
sequence of deposits within this 15-year window (1572–1587) suggests the event
dates to the later years, possibly in association with Francis Drake’s Raid on the
fledgling settlement in June 1586. After a brief engagement, Drake’s armada of 23
vessels and 2000 men overwhelmed the small Spanish garrison, who along with the
town’s residents, fled into the woods leaving the town defenseless (Chatelaine
1941). Rebuilding ensued shortly thereafter, with the town essentially doubling in
size (Halbirt and Johns 2012, 2015).
The discovery of archaeological deposits potentially associated with this three-day
event, which changed Spanish administrative policies in La Florida, initially garnered
both public and media attention (Pope 1998). It was not until 12 years later, with the
approach of St. Augustine’s 450th anniversary of its founding in 2015, that the City
Archaeologist pitched an idea to the Art Association Board of Directors to exhibit the
only archaeological signature in St. Augustine of a pivotal event in the city’s history
colloquially known as “Drake’s Raid.” The goal was to create a legacy project cel-
ebrating the city’s founding utilizing the talents of volunteers from the city’s
Archaeology Division and the membership of the Art Association. Volunteers sorted
and cross-mended hundreds of potsherds from the burnt structure, some of which were
partially reconstructed (Fig. 15.5). Members of the Art Association designed the
Fig. 15.5 Volunteer Lin Masely reconstructs a sixteenth-century Native American ceramic vessel
supervised by author Carl Halbirt. Source the City of St. Augustine Archaeology Program
Fig. 15.6 Unveiling of “Art y Facts of Drake’s Raid” Exhibit at the St. Augustine Art
Association. Source the St. Augustine Art Association
exhibit in consultation with Sarah Miller of FPAN and created original artwork, which
included an original portrait drawing of Drake using charcoal from the burnt layer, and
a handmade quilt illustrating the site’s soil stratigraphy. Recovered artifacts found in
context were sewn into the tapestry, which is used as an educational tool for visually
impaired children. The exhibit not only showcased items whose context was a product
of a notorious sixteenth-century privateer, but the Art Association was “empowered to
apply artistic elements that represent the “Cycle of Creativity,” an underlying theme
that honors artisans of the past and inspires artists of today” (Elyse Brady, Executive
Director, personnel communication, 2014). The exhibit was finalized in 2012 and
placed directly over the location of the discovery (Fig. 15.6). In 2014, the St.
Augustine Art Association was presented the Outstanding Achievement in
Archaeology Award by the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation for “Art y Facts of
Drake’s Raid, The Attack—1586” (Bates 2014).
In 2014, the city’s Archaeology Division once again resumed archaeological
investigations at the Art Association, this time in response to the proposed devel-
opment of Touch St. Augustine Art Garden, a space that will enhance accessibility
to the visual arts to the physically disabled and have multisensory appeal. Various
sixteenth-century features were unearthed (e.g., trash pits, a daub pit, and postholes)
suggesting that this portion of the property functioned in a different capacity than
the area investigated 16 years earlier and pointing out spatial differences in how
colonial-era lots were arranged (Halbirt 2014; Manucy 1997). The exhibit will
eventually be expanded to include these new items and their relevance toward
understanding sixteenth-century lifeways in the section of the colonial downtown
district occupied since 1572.
Summary and Conclusion
As no two municipalities are similar in terms of the quantity, diversity, distribution,

and extent of archaeological resources within their jurisdiction or the regulatory
process and available funding for managing those resources, each entity needs to
devise an operational response in the form of its own policy directive for preserving
and interpreting its heritage, even though federal and state regulations and guide-
lines exist. This point has been illustrated by Appler (2011). In essence, the ability
of municipalities to allocate resources (e.g., staffing, facility availability, and
infrastructure arrangements) is contingent on the annual revenue stream. In St.
Augustine, archaeological fees from permit applications are collected, but they do
not cover operational costs. Funding for the program comes from the city’s General
Fund, which has as one of its primarily revenue sources ad valorem taxes, thus
lessening the financial burden for property owners.
Municipal archaeology in St. Augustine is foremost responsive to the APO and,
as such, is compliance driven—being geared toward data recovery in reaction to
ground-penetrating construction activities on both private and public lands. In order
for the APO to be effective, it is integrated into city’s permitting process, which
oversees and administers most new construction in accordance with state and local
regulations and ordinances. The exception is utility right-of-way projects that are
under the purview of the Public Works Department. Here, interdepartmental
cooperation and communication is essential. The result of these policies is that all
new construction is evaluated for potential impacts to both prehistoric and historical
archaeological deposits.
When triggered, the APO requires a response by the city’s Archaeology
Division. As St. Augustine is an urban landscape, most investigations involve some
type of testing (be it posthole, test units, or block excavations) followed by mon-
itoring construction associated with groundbreaking activities. As most construc-
tion is related to the development of single-family lots and family-owned
businesses, the majority of projects are confined to small parcels generally mea-
suring less than 10,000 square feet in area of which only the actual blueprint of the
structure is evaluated. A few commercial projects have entailed larger tracts, some
incorporating an entire historic colonial block, such as the development of the
Hilton Inn at the Bayfront (Halbirt 2004b). More than 2500 lots are represented in
established archaeological zones. The myriad of small projects that have occurred
has resulted in a kaleidoscope of information related to human occupation within
the city limits over the past 4000 years, information that would have been otherwise
been destroyed or buried under tons of concrete, fill, and buried utilities.
Public outreach facilitates the city’s endeavor to preserve its archaeological

heritage through documentation. Compliance archaeology dovetails with public
participation and interest in St. Augustine, thus producing a broad spectrum of
engagement opportunities that draw from authentic community assets that then
reinforce the city’s heritage-based economy. We have examined the multiple ways
the public can be involved, from observer to leader on an “engagement pyramid,”
with public empowerment and ownership being at the pinnacle. Municipal ar-
chaeology in St. Augustine, then, is an example of hyper-collaboration involving
government policy and public involvement.
Acknowledgements We want to thank the archaeology community in St. Augustine and all who
have been involved in some capacity with the City of St. Augustine’s archaeology program since
1990. We had also like to thank Douglas Appler for his continued commitment to promoting
municipal archaeology programs across the county and the reviewers for their constructive
comments.
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Chapter 16
Like No Other Place: Albuquerque’s
Archaeological Odyssey
Matthew Schmader
Introduction
This chapter describes a process to develop and adopt an archaeological ordinance

in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Ordinance adoption took 25 years—from 1982 until
2007—and the ordinance has now been in place for 9 years. This chapter will
describe the archaeological and historical background of Albuquerque, which has
one of the longest records of human occupation found in any major city in the USA.
This record is relevant to demonstrate why heritage laws are needed in urban areas
with so much to protect. This chapter describes the context of decades of scholarly
research that occurred throughout the twentieth century, and how that research
helped in early preservation efforts. The preservation framework changed in the
mid-1970s as planning initiatives attempted to keep pace with the city’s rapid
growth. Those planning efforts produced a preservation context that worked in lieu
of an archaeological ordinance for several decades. Several case studies are pre-
sented from that time period to illustrate successes that occurred while an ordinance
was being formulated. The quarter-century long process of adopting the ordinance
is described, including several studies and events that led to a final adoption. With
the passage of its archaeological ordinance in 2007, Albuquerque was able to
implement more standardized treatment of land parcels as they move through the
planning process. The mechanics of the ordinance, considerations that went into
implementing it, and the pros and cons of different approaches are presented along
with data about the numbers of cases reviewed, acreage, and sites evaluated.
A critical analysis is presented, and usefulness of the ordinance’s implementation is
also discussed.
M. Schmader (&)
Department of Anthropology, University of New Mexico,
Albuquerque, NM 87131, USA

322 M. Schmader
A Brief History of Albuquerque
Albuquerque, New Mexico, has one of the longest continuous records of human
occupation of any major urban area in the USA (City of Albuquerque 1986, 1995;
Schmader 2011a). Situated at the southern end of the Rocky Mountains and the far
west edge of the Great Plains, at an elevation of over 5000 ft, Albuquerque has a
great diversity of habitats and life zones surrounding it. The city is high desert with
mountainous terrain on one side and with the fourth longest river on the continent—
the Rio Grande—flowing through its center (Fig. 16.1). On its western horizon are
small volcanoes and lava flows dating back over 150,000 years in age.
This extraordinary setting has attracted people for millennia. Beginning with the
Clovis era of the PaleoIndian period, about 12,000 years ago, sites from every
cultural time period are found within and surrounding the city limits (City of
Albuquerque 1995; Cordell 1979). Later PaleoIndian sites from the Folsom and
Eden periods (10,000–7000 years ago) were followed by early and middle Archaic
sites from the Jay, Bajada, and San Jose phases (7000–4000 years ago). The late
Archaic period saw an increase in sites from 4000 to 2000 years ago during the
Armijo and Trujillo phases, leading up to the adoption of the first cultigens by
around the start of the Christian era. Settled villages built by agriculturalists, with
well-constructed dwellings and early ceramics, characterize the ancestral Pueblo
Fig. 16.1 Aerial map of Albuquerque, New Mexico showing major locations discussed in text
(Author map)
16 Like No Other Place: Albuquerque’s Archaeological Odyssey 323
period from AD 500 to 900 (Cordell 1979). By the end of the pre-European period,
AD 1300–1540, populations grew rapidly and multi-storied adobe villages were
built along the banks of the Rio Grande. Population estimates just before the arrival
of the first Europeans are about 20,000 (Barrett 2002). In 1540, Francisco Vázquez
de Coronado led the first major exploration from Mexico into the present-day USA,
spending more time in the Albuquerque area than anywhere else along his nearly
4000-mile-long route (Schmader 2011b).
Albuquerque was established as a formal Spanish villa in 1706, and by that time,
numerous family-based land grants were recognized by the colonial administration.
The interaction between colonists, land grants, settled ranchos, and the surrounding
missionized Pueblo peoples set the stage for today’s multicultural heritage in New
Mexico. Following the United States’ war with Mexico in 1846, all of New Mexico
along with vast areas of California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, and Texas
were annexed into the USA. The railroad arrived in Albuquerque in 1881, spurring
an instantaneous new town along the tracks. During the early 1900s, Albuquerque
and other southwestern towns attained some notoriety as places to recover from
tuberculosis, leading to both a new health industry and an influx of residents. Like
many cities in the western USA, Albuquerque did not experience significant
urbanization and modernization until after World War I. Outlying areas settled
around ranchos and their related family-centered plazas began to fill, especially
along historic roadways, to create the first real suburbs. Since Albuquerque has
always been a place at the crossroads of great routes—whether the Camino Real or
Route 66, or the Transcontinental Highway and the Pan-American Highway—
cultures themselves have tended to intersect there (Schmader 2011a).
Early Preservation Activity
Archaeology
The 1920s witnessed the first interest in scientific recordation of archaeological sites
in the Albuquerque area (Fisher 1931). Attempts to locate important sites from the
1540s Coronado expedition focused research on major villages along the Rio
Grande (Meacham 1926; Vivian 1932). The prominence of these sixteenth-century
sites attracted the attention of more scholars, who documented other large pueblo
sites (Mera 1933). The noted southwestern scholar Edgar Hewett, whose efforts led
to the passage of the Antiquity Act in 1906, established the anthropology depart-
ment at the University of New Mexico (UNM) in 1927. Shortly after, the university
engaged in a series of excavations at large pueblo sites in the greater metropolitan
area (Dutton 1963; Tichy 1939). These were conducted as UNM field schools
beginning in the 1930s, primarily focused on the late pre-European contact period
(AD 1300–AD 1540). Research on PaleoIndian occupation of the area involved
controversial finds at Sandia Cave by UNM’s Frank Hibben (1941). By the 1950s,
324 M. Schmader
UNM had built one of the nation’s best southwestern archaeology programs, noted
for the prominence of pioneering women in the field such as Marjorie Tichy
Lambert, Bertha Dutton, Florence Hawley Ellis, and, later, Linda Cordell (Cordell
and McBrinn 2012). Cordell directed excavations at Tijeras pueblo, in the
Albuquerque suburbs (Cordell 1980).
Despite the richness of its resources and its academic history, early preservation
efforts in the Albuquerque area were spotty. One early success was Coronado
Historic Site, authorized in 1940 in time for the 400th anniversary of the Coronado
expedition. The site, also known by its native name Kuaua (“evergreen” in the local
Tiwa language), contains the remains of a 1000 room adobe pueblo village occu-
pied for about 250 years prior to the arrival of the Coronado expedition in AD
1540. The UNM field school excavations were funded by the university and were
done in hopes of finding evidence of the expedition before the 1940 anniversary
celebrations. No real evidence was found, however.
Buildings
The city of Albuquerque established a Landmarks and Urban Conservation

Commission in 1977, which now administers a list of 20 landmarked properties and
several historic districts with preservation guidelines. Some epic battles were
waged, won, and lost, to preserve the city’s historic buildings, two of which were
the fight for the Alvarado Hotel and the Sunshine Building.
The Alvarado Hotel, one of the finest in the Fred Harvey line of railroad-oriented
establishments, was built in 1902 on the tracks of the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa
Fe. For over 65 years, the Alvarado was a flagship of culture and grandeur, one of
the only places many visitors to Albuquerque would ever see. The rich and famous
who stopped at its doorstep included Teddy Roosevelt, Charles Lindbergh, and
Buster Keaton. The hotel finally fell onto economic hardship and disrepair, and in
February 1970, despite heroic efforts by the preservation community, the building
was levelled. It remained a parking lot for decades until redevelopment of the
downtown ironically built a replica of the hotel on the same spot to serve as a bus
and train depot. Many people in the community never forgot those events and used
memories of the demolition as a rallying cry for ensuing preservation efforts.
One of these efforts involved the Sunshine Building, which was just a couple of
blocks west of the Alvarado Hotel. Built in 1924 as a multi-purpose office building
and 920-seat movie theater, the Sunshine also fell into disrepair and economic hard
times. The building was slated for the wrecking ball in the early 1980s, but
preservationists, determined not to allow it to go the way of the Alvarado Hotel,
succeeded in getting funding to back its National Register listing. In 1978, the city
initiated a survey of all pre-1945 buildings, and by the mid-1980s, a comprehensive
preservation plan was drafted (City of Albuquerque 1987a). While these efforts
involved the city’s historic buildings and related pockets of architectural interest,
the very long archaeological record in Albuquerque took a different pathway in the
absence of a formal structure such as the Landmarks Commission.
Comprehensive Plan and Open Space
Albuquerque, and its county of Bernalillo, have had master planning guidelines in
place for 40 years. The first city-county Comprehensive Plan, published in 1975,
may be one of the few urban plans in the country at that time to explicitly recognize
the value of cultural resources. For example, the Comprehensive Plan stated that
“presently uninhabited archaeological or historic sites should be identified and
protected,” and that “selected buildings and areas which explain our past and which
give Albuquerque identity, individuality and cultural richness shall be preserved”
(City of Albuquerque 1975). In the 1988 revision of the Comprehensive Plan, the
value of open space areas for shaping the land use of the city and county was
recognized. Specifically, one of the stated purposes for the open space system was
the “conservation of archaeological resources” (City of Albuquerque 1988: 43),
which included major portions of the surrounding cultural landscapes such as the
volcanoes, lava flows, and riverine areas. The Comprehensive Plan provided good
stopgap measures for averting losses of major sites and resources by identifying
lands to be acquired and controlling adjacent land uses. However, the policy
statements only provided a planning framework and not the needed regulations for
site-specific studies and preservation.
Open space land acquisition throughout the 1970s and 1980s was based on
Comprehensive Plan goals and focused on preserving the major landforms of the
metropolitan area, principally the volcanoes, lava flows, and escarpments of the
West Mesa (Fig. 16.2) and areas at the base of the Sandia Mountains. While not the
specific intent of this effort, large-scale areas containing important sites and asso-
ciated cultural landscapes were also preserved in the open space system through
city acquisition. This outcome helped ensure that entire suites of sites were pro-
tected in relation to their contexts. The present-day Open space system in
Albuquerque is over 29,000 acres and contains an estimated 750 archaeological
sites (Schmader 2011a).
Pre-ordinance Case Studies
Several case studies are presented to illustrate the importance of the planning
context for preservation efforts prior to the adoption of the Albuquerque archaeo-
logical ordinance in 2007. They are used to show that archaeological research can
326 M. Schmader
Fig. 16.2 View of cultural landscape including mesa top, escarpment, and volcanoes in
Petroglyph National Monument area (Photograph by M. Schmader)
sometimes be accomplished even if no formal ordinances require it programmati-

cally, and to illustrate some preservation success stories that emerged from using
the existing pre-ordinance tools and planning framework throughout the 1980s and
1990s.
Petroglyph National Monument
Few large cities in the world are as closely associated with petroglyph sites as
Albuquerque—perhaps only Sydney, Australia, is comparable. Vast areas along the
city’s western boundary are adorned with thousands of ancient images (Fig. 16.3)
pecked into the basalt cliffs formed by 150,000-year-old lava flows. Amateur
archaeologists recorded many hundred of images in the 1960s, working with Frank
Hibben, an Anthropology Professor at the University of New Mexico (Schmader and
Hays 1985). When new development progressed to the west side of town, a landowner
dedicated 73 acres for a park site which contained numerous petroglyphs. This was
done to meet park dedication regulations, which at the time required setting aside land
based on a formula depending on the number of houses in a subdivision. The area was
developed into Indian Petroglyph State Park in 1973—one of the first municipal parks
of its kind, set aside to interpret petroglyphs, in the country. The park was also a
forerunner in providing for trail accessibility. Yet, for its advanced efforts in setting
side archaeological areas as a city park, there were pitfalls. Hibben saw to it that some
Fig. 16.3 Rock image (dated circa AD 1300–1600) in Petroglyph National Monument (Photograph
by M. Schmader)
petroglyph boulders were moved into the park from nearby areas, destroying their
original context in the process (Schmader 2011a).
By the early 1980s, Albuquerque was in another of its periodic growth spurts.
Some land purchases helped preserve the cultural landscape of the lava flows and
associated volcanoes, known locally as the West Mesa (see Fig. 16.1 for location).
In particular, a development proposal to allow 5-acre “ranchettes” across the
Albuquerque volcanoes was countered by successful citizen efforts to find city
funding for land acquisition (Schmader 2011a). But development pressure and
related resource impacts outstripped the city’s ability to buy its way into a
preservation outcome for the vast West Mesa, which encompasses thousands of
acres. In 1985, the city commissioned a study to determine the extent and impor-
tance of the West Mesa’s cliff edge, or escarpment, where the petroglyphs are
found. That study covered 1100 acres and documented over 10,500 petroglyphs
(Schmader and Hays 1985). Those results concluded that the area had regional and
national significance, and it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places
(NRHP) as the “Las Imagines” district in early 1986. The NRHP nomination
offered recognition to the area, but trash dumping, off-road activity, vandalism, and
unregulated adjacent land development were still threats to the resource.
328 M. Schmader
Shortly thereafter, the city engaged in a comprehensive planning effort culmi-

nating in the Northwest Mesa Escarpment Plan (City of Albuquerque 1987b). The
Escarpment Plan devised a system of overlay zones for over 10,000 acres of the
West Mesa. The overlay zones—called conservation area, impact area, and view
area—each had different levels of protection through design restrictions. The
conservation area included the face of the escarpment itself and a setback of varying
widths. No development was to be allowed on the escarpment face, and the con-
servation area was designated as suitable or desirable for Open space acquisition.
Resource protection, trails, and access were the permissive uses. The impact area
was a strip generally 350 ft wide to either side of the conservation area. Building
heights were limited to 15 ft with some exceptions for needed fill, exterior building
colors were restricted to natural hues, and site plans and view analyses were
required. An archaeological survey was a requirement of the site plan submittal.
Landscaping, lighting, and reflective surfaces were also regulated. Any
construction-related disturbances were required to be mitigated. The view area
extended for thousands of feet in many directions from the escarpment. Within the
view area, specific neutral structure colors and building heights were regulated to a
maximum of 40 ft.
Importantly, the Escarpment Plan had very specifically worded discussions of
archaeology. For example, “The unique… archaeological and historical qualities…
of the escarpment are to be conserved” and the “archaeological/historical resources
are recognized as inexorably linked to their setting. The resources and the setting
must always be considered in relationship to each other as well as to other influ-
ences” (City of Albuquerque 1987b: 41). This latter statement is an early example
of cultural landscape orientation, which came into use by the National Park Service
in the early to mid-1980s (Page et al. 1998). The Escarpment Plan continued:
Conservation of the escarpment rock art and related archaeological sites allows for further
research and discoveries of the people who inhabited the Middle Rio Grande Valley. The
art is not only an artistic expression of prehistoric peoples, but it is a record of their
history…The escarpment’s archaeological/historical resources are recognized as important
to the world as well as the local community. The benefit of having the resource in our
community carries with it a corresponding responsibility to the larger world community.
(City of Albuquerque 1987b: 42)
The Escarpment Plan turned out to be a very necessary stopgap measure for the
immediate threats to the West Mesa, but was not intended to be a full-blown
preservation plan. Citizen support for protections emerged when Friends of the
Albuquerque Petroglyphs (FOTAP) was formed in 1986. With FOTAP’s support,
other groups such as the Sierra Club and the League of Women Voters rallied to a
new cause: to establish a national monument on the city’s west side. On June 27,
1990, President George Bush signed the monument into law. It had taken just five
years from the first comprehensive study to creating Petroglyph National
Monument (Schmader 2011a).
Piedras Marcadas Pueblo
In 1986, the owners of a huge site in northwest Albuquerque (see Fig. 16.1 for
location) decided to file development plans. The site is an ancestral village of
today’s central Rio Grande pueblo communities, called Piedras Marcadas pueblo
(“village of the marked stones”). The land had been owned by one family, the
Manns, since the early 1950s and, with increasing property values, the time seemed
right for a condominium-style development. The long-time property owners deci-
ded to develop their property. As it turned out, Piedras Marcadas pueblo had also
been known to the archaeological community since 1929 and was widely regarded
as the largest of all the Rio Grande pueblos for many miles up and down the river
(Fisher 1931; Mera 1933). When the development proposal came before the city’s
Environmental Planning Commission, several independent archaeologists testified
that the site was of irreplaceable local and national significance. Allowing it to be
built over in this way, or any way, would result in major loss for the city, the state,
and the region.
The Planning Commission did not have an ordinance to back their decision, but
it used other criteria such as density and appropriateness of the project to the
surrounding neighborhoods. In a resounding decision, the Commission denied the
proposed condominium development. In the hallway after the decision, the land-
owner was truly angry. “I suppose you’re proud of yourselves,” he told a group of
archaeologists attending the Planning Commission meeting, “but what I am sup-
posed to do now? My land is practically useless. If you all think that site is so
important, why don’t you buy it, then?” Realizing that it was only a matter of time
before a new fight would come about, archaeologists worked with the city’s open
space program and elected officials. City funds were identified, and Piedras
Marcadas pueblo was acquired in June of 1988 (Schmader 2011a).
Soon after the site was acquired, and during the planning to establish Petroglyph
National Monument, its importance was recognized by including it as an outlying
unit of the monument. Ensuing tribal consultations in the early 1990s (Evans et al.
1993) produced some unexpected results. Tribes expressed concerns over past
archaeological work that had effectively excavated entire villages of their ancestral
patrimony (Schmader 2016). They pleaded instead that research work at Piedras
Marcadas emphasize noninvasive or very low-impact techniques such as remote
sensing, surface mapping, and limited testing only (Fig. 16.4). Unexpectedly, the
Pueblos’ request for noninvasive work turned up evidence of major fighting in the
sixteenth century. As research has taken place from 2005 to 2015 using appropriate
noninvasive techniques, architectural details have become apparent and evidence of
the Francisco Vázquez de Coronado expedition has been found. Sixteenth-century
metal artifacts, such as lead musket balls and copper crossbow bolt points, found by
metal detector surveys have revealed the remains of a major battle between the
expedition forces and the pueblo’s defenders (Schmader 2011b, 2014).
330 M. Schmader
Fig. 16.4 General site setting and appearance of Piedras Marcadas pueblo during field work
(Photograph by M. Schmader)
“Hell’s Half-Acre”
In the absence of a local archaeological ordinance, Albuquerque’s compliance with

federal regulations such as the 1966 National Historic Preservation Act was spotty.
For example, federal funds for urban renewal or affordable housing did not always
consider if archaeological resources might be affected. One particular project,
“Hell’s Half-Acre,” demonstrates this. A redevelopment project in the downtown
area (see Fig. 16.1 for location) in the late 1980s had received federal funding from
the Urban Development Action Grant program. Since the downtown had been built
over for decades, not much thought was given to the archaeological potential for a
one-block area just southeast of city hall. A new high-rise hotel and office buildings
were planned. The block had been the site of the city’s first major department store,
called Fedway, which was operated from the early 1950s until 1969. The Fedway
store had rooftop parking and was built on huge pilasters sunk into the ground; site
disturbance was so extensive, there was no presumed chance of finding anything
intact at the site. Almost as an afterthought, the city contracted a cursory check of
the construction work (Schmader 1989). Almost immediately, the areas between the
pilasters turned up earlier building foundations and layers of turn-of-the-century
construction and trash pits. When it was reported that the site seemed very rich and
laden with resource potential, the response was that the work “had to be done in the
next two weekends” or else the project would be held up.
The obvious lack of planning was the real problem: earlier resource consider-
ation would have recovered much more evidence given adequate time. Competing
with bottle-collecting backhoe operators and huge rumbling bulldozers, a small
excavation team documented building foundations and other features such as trash
pits. Several test trenches were excavated to expose foundations or features.
Recovered materials were tied to known or fixed points on the block so that
proveniences could be referenced to older maps of building locations.
The block, as it turned out, was the heart of the city’s red-light district from
about 1890 until 1920 (Schmader 1989). The red-light district was so notorious, in
fact, that it earned the name “Hell’s Half-Acre.” Ladies of the night, or “soiled
doves,” as they were called, were packed into tiny compartments or “cribs” along
the east side of the block. Remarkably, Sanborn Insurance Company maps from
1891 through 1913 (Schmader 1989: 26–40) showed these cribs as “F.B.” which
stood for female boarding; city directories listed new residents of the cribs each year
with the discreet prefix “Miss” (e.g., Miss Blanche DuPont; Miss Lillie Fox).
Whether to outlaw prostitution, or to confine it to a known area of town to control it,
became a campaign issue in the hotly contested Albuquerque mayoral race of 1914.
D.K. Sellers, the incumbent Democrat mayor, urged confining the activities while
his Republican challenger, David Boatright, campaigned to outlaw the red-light
district. Boatright won the election (Schmader 1989). Businesses came and went,
from early Chinese laundries and livery stables, to butcher shops, shoemakers, auto
repair, and a fine stone edifice at the southeast corner of the block. Known as the
Montezuma Hotel, this beautiful building was built in 1909 by Italian stone masons
(Schmader 1989). The long-time owners of the building were the Domenici family;
Pete V. Domenici was New Mexico’s longest-serving US senator (1973–2009).
The overriding story of this one downtown block, then, turned to the whole saga
of late 1800s Italian immigration from Sicily to New Mexico, and how those
immigrants completely changed local history. To be sure, the red-light district was
more salacious, and in the end, a high-end restaurant in the new hotel was named
McGrath’s in honor of the famous madame of the time period, Lizzie McGrath
(1862–1922). But for a few twists of fate and some determination, none of this story
might have come to light.
Early Groundwork for a Local Ordinance
In August 1982, Kit Sargeant, a well-known Albuquerque area archaeologist, got a

phone call about some bones that had been exposed in a waterline trench. Kit
owned a house that sat on top of an ancient pueblo village and had been working on
her own excavation there since 1979. She and the author went a few miles up the
road and found that, indeed, the waterline had gone through an unmarked burial
ground of a late 1800s church. The remnants of several burials were scattered about
332 M. Schmader
and the workers and project managers were trying to figure out what to do next.
Predictably, the media showed up and it was not long before a television reporter
was asking, “Aren’t there laws that protect such places?” The long answer was,
under certain circumstances such as burial grounds, there were state laws. But to the
follow-up question of “What about all the rest of sites?” there was only the less
complicated answer: “No, there aren’t any ordinances on the books.” This one
watershed event helped to galvanize a movement aimed at passing a local cultural
preservation ordinance. But it would take 25 years to come to fruition.
In the mid-1980s, the city’s planning department put together an officially
sanctioned body called the Archaeological Resource Protection Advisory
Committee (or ARPAC). The committee was made up of planners, archaeologists,
developers, and members of the general public. The ARPAC published it results
(City of Albuquerque 1986), which opened with an overview of history and pre-
history for Albuquerque and the metropolitan area of Bernalillo county and a
review of known and projected numbers and types of sites based on geographic
information and surveys. It then examined how archaeology could fit into existing
planning processes and reviewed the kinds of projects the city and county had with
state and federal agencies. Recommended pilot programs to collect site information
and geographic data were offered, and a review of archaeological programs in other
states was presented. At the time, there were few municipal ordinances from which
to draw. Examples reviewed by ARPAC included Philadelphia, Greenwich
Connecticut, and Larkspur California. Other prominent ordinances developed at the
time included those from New York City and Baltimore. Based on these examples,
the committee drafted a plan. Recommended program objectives were developed by
the committee including public education and participation; site evaluation and
preservation methods; data base management; and incorporation into planning
processes. The committee then laid out how a proposed program under a
city/county archaeologist would be organized, including qualifications, staffing,
duties, costs, and funding. Lastly, it called for an independent body—an oversight
committee—to assist and review the program.
Efforts to carry the ARPAC’s recommendations forward foundered continually
for the next 20 years for a variety of reasons. The late 1980s were dominated by
numerous preservation fights, principally the passage of the Northwest Mesa
Escarpment Plan and the establishment of Petroglyph National Monument. Those
two issues, while resulting in overall preservation victories, caused deep rifts and
suspicion within the development community. Passage of an ordinance would have
been unpopular at the time. In the early 1990s, economic downturns also hit the
development community hard and there was no appetite for more regulation at a
time when business was slow. By the mid-1990s, the city council makeup was
generally favorable to the new ordinance, but the mayor was not. By the time a new
mayor favorable to the ordinance was elected, the makeup of the city council had
reversed. The next mayor battled with the state of New Mexico over roadway
construction affecting Petroglyph National Monument, and the situation once again
was not pro-preservation. And so it went for two decades: neither economics nor
politics could not align in the right way to produce an ordinance-friendly

environment.
In 1995, the city of Albuquerque commissioned a study funded by a grant from
the New Mexico Historic Preservation Division under the Certified Local
Government Program. The study was intended to provide a baseline for planning
and land management. The Archaeological Context for Albuquerque, as it was
called, compiled archaeological and historic information in a literature review, map
site locations and areal extent of surveys, and summarized site types by time period
and landform (City of Albuquerque 1995). Information was compiled about more
than 1800 sites recorded in the Albuquerque area up to that time. Areas of relative
site density were identified, numbers of sites were projected, and a research
framework was presented. The site density model was one that could have been
used to establish zones to be used for future ordinance development, but that
ultimately did not happen.
When a proposed archaeological ordinance was revisited in draft form in the
early 2000s, much discussion revolved around process and implementation. Two
models emerged—one based on a sensitive area concept and the other on a zoning
process concept. The sensitive area concept would have required drawing up dif-
ferent zones with different compliance procedures and would have been based on
knowledge of the resource base at the time. For example, areas of the city with high
potential for cultural sites (such as the West Mesa or the downtown) would require
studies to be done at a lower threshold (smaller lot size or lesser zoning actions)
than in areas with lower potential. The City of Santa Fe (1987) utilizes this kind of
approach.
The zoning process model would have the same requirements for all areas, and
the major hurdle was to establish a minimum project size that would require studies.
In the end, the zoning process method was chosen because it was easier to
understand and implement for the development community, and it was felt to be
less arbitrary than the sensitive area model. In other words, disputes could arise
over how the boundaries were drawn, or equity issues could be raised about some
landowners being required and others not. Developers in particular seemed to favor
uniform standards that applied across the board instead of leaving subjective
judgements to city staffers or consultants. In addition, many of the city’s more
sensitive areas had already been surveyed, and so it was not necessary to conduct
baseline surveys to determine various zones with different compliance require-
ments. It was also thought that, in theory, sites could be found nearly anywhere, and
so a uniform approach was chosen. A primary reason for the ordinance was that it
serve as a check for infill projects and to avoid the loss of newly discovered sites,
and not necessarily as a mechanism to conduct baseline inventory.
Albuquerque’s approach contrasted with nearby Santa Fe, which started an
ordinance process later but enacted its ordinance much faster than Albuquerque
(City of Santa Fe 1987). This was due in part to the favorable political and
development climate that existed in Santa Fe at the time (two important factors in
determining when any local ordinance gets enacted). Santa Fe established three
zones, each with different requirements for investigation and survey, and set up a
334 M. Schmader
review committee made up of city staffers, professionals, and informed citizens.

That review committee has authority to approve reports and development proposals,
which are passed on to the planning department.
In early 2007, a single event effectively ended years of inactivity and lack of
progress toward passing an ordinance for Albuquerque. In January, utility crews
installing gas and water lines for a new high school on the northern part of the West
Mesa had gone through parts of a well-known PaleoIndian site called the Boca
Negra Wash (Holliday et al. 2006). These utility lines severed the site into two parts
and, while not going through the most important area, called into question the
information sharing and coordination efforts needed for utility companies, the
school system, planners, and construction oversight. Future Congressman and later
US Senator Martin Heinrich, then on the Albuquerque city council, introduced a
new ordinance aimed at finally closing these loopholes. Heinrich’s direct
involvement had at last finished off a quarter-century long effort.
An Ordinance Is Born
The Albuquerque Archaeological Ordinance (AAO), known as O-07-72, was

enacted by unanimous vote of the city council on September 19, 2007. A good deal
of discussion went into the minimum project size threshold. As originally drafted,
projects of two acres or more would have required review, but as a concession to
bring along holdouts in the development community, the five-acre limit was
adopted. All development proposals of five acres or more, including lot splits and
divisions of parcels, are required to have an archaeological review prior to issuance
of a building permit. Privately funded developments pay for their own studies, if
required, and these are done by local consulting cultural resource management
companies. Projects sponsored by or carried out by local governments similarly use
cultural resource management firms. An important difference in compliance by
local governments is that the state of New Mexico considers all such projects
occurring on public land to be a subdivision of the state and subject to state
regulations. In such cases, for example, a project occurring on school district land,
the compliance is submitted to the state historic preservation division (HPD), and
the Albuquerque city archaeologist serves in an advisory capacity only.
The Albuquerque archaeological ordinance created a new position of city
archaeologist, to work within the planning department. The city archaeologist was
to maintain and consult data bases, determine local significance of resources,
inspect areas of ground disturbance, coordinate with other city departments, and
maintain lists of qualified archaeological contractors. The ordinance applies
whenever an applicant/landowner submits a subdivision plat for an area of five
acres or more, and includes a wide variety of zoning categories. Any plat or
subdivision plan would require an approval from the city archaeologist in the form
of a certificate. A “Certificate of No Effect” is issued when a development proposal
has been previously developed, heavily disturbed, or does not contain any
significant sites. Determinations of local significance are delegated to the city

archaeologist, as are decisions about the degree of prior land disturbance. Typically,
the applicant presents information such as land-use history, an environmental study,
or aerial photographs to demonstrate the amount of prior disturbance to the site. The
city archaeologist may perform some of this background work when requested by
the applicant, or conduct site visits as needed. Most clearances are issued for zone
changes or lot splits on totally developed properties, or on land parcels that have
been completely disturbed. Testing is not required in these cases, as other docu-
mentation is generally sufficient.
If any significant sites are found in a proposed subdivision, the project proponent is
required to submit a treatment plan to test, recover data, or preserve the site in-place.
Treatment plans are almost always drawn up by private cultural resource contractors
working for the applicant. Treatment plans consider various options such as preser-
vation in-place, protection through dedication of easements, or site investigation.
Recommendations for further testing, sampling, data recovery, and analysis are
required in the plan, along with a timeline and a cost estimate. Usually, landowners
and developers choose to investigate the site and obtain clearance to fully develop the
property. There have been very few instances of site avoidance or preservation
in-place, due to the high value of land. Although there have been some opportunities
for archaeological interpretation in some private developments, most on-site inter-
pretation is only done on public projects such as park development.
Once conditions of the treatment plan have been met, then a “Certificate of
Approval” is issued. The ordinance also requires that site treatment be bonded or that
sites preserved in-place be placed on infrastructure lists, and further provides for
penalties and revocation of permits in cases of non-compliance. Discoveries of
archaeological resources are required to be reported for any cases where a Certificate
of No Effect has been issued. It also requires the city to conform with the ordinance for
its own capital projects over five acres in size and sets forth an appeal process.
As discussed, the AAO called for the planning department to create a new
position of Albuquerque city archaeologist, whose duties would include not only
development review and maintenance of records, but also a wide variety of other
duties. As Appler (2012: 41) notes, “municipal archaeologists are concerned pri-
marily with understanding the human events and activities that transpired within
their city’s modern political boundaries. Municipal archaeologists must become
authorities on the entire history of one city, from prehistoric times through the
present.” A hiring search started in June 2007 as soon as the job description was
finalized, and the list of candidates narrowed after a state-wide pool of applicants
was screened. Just as the selection had been made and the job about to be offered to
the top candidate, the process was dealt another blow. The national recession and
economic crisis had impacted all levels of government, and cost-savings measures
were being implemented in the face of looming deficits. Albuquerque had no choice
at the time except to eliminate all vacant job positions, which included the new city
archaeologist. The offer was never sent.
By October 2007, the planning department faced a problem because the ordi-
nance was due to become official, but there was nobody to enforce it. The planning
336 M. Schmader
department had a historic preservation planner who oversaw regulations for historic
districts and served as staff to the landmarks commission, but did not meet the
qualifications needed for administering the archaeological ordinance. The planning
department then asked the author to consider administering the new ordinance,
since I already worked for the city and was a qualified archaeologist. I assumed the
role of city archaeologist, taking on added duties besides those I already had as a
full-time employee in the parks department. In this capacity, I was and have been
“on loan” to the planning department. A case file system was needed to track the
applications as they came in. The whole Albuquerque metropolitan area is laid out
in a grid of one-mile squares called the zone atlas. All development review ties into
this zone atlas grid, so the overall organization was not hard to choose.
A compliance form was devised which has served well for eight years with very
little need for refinement (Fig. 16.5).
The Ordinance in Practice
In the past eight years, 242 cases have been reviewed by the city archaeologist
under the ordinance (Table 16.1). The total area covered by all cases is almost 6500
acres. This acreage includes all studies done since the adoption of the ordinance, but
also includes some studies done prior to the ordinance which were submitted to
comply with it. The density of sites found, about one per 110 acres, is less than
one-third the average site density known for more heavily settled areas of the
metropolitan area (City of Albuquerque 1986, 1995). This low site density for the
aggregate number of cases reviewed is due in part to the high number of rede-
velopment cases, which are cleared due to previous land disturbance. Areas with
high site density, such as the West Mesa, had been studied and preserved long
before the archaeological ordinance was passed. In addition, studies of large
remaining areas with higher potential site density have tended to be reviewed as
state or federal undertakings not subject to the city ordinance.
The large majority of the cases—about 75%—have resulted in negative surveys.
Most of these, in excess of 80%, were done for private development clearances paid
for by the landowners. Less than 20% have been done by government agencies such
as the city, public schools, and flood control agencies. Nearly half of the cases were
issued Certificates of No Effect because the subject case was on land that had been
highly disturbed by previous development. A typical example might be a parcel
split in a shopping center. An interim review category, in which a provisional
certificate is given, occurs in about 10% of the cases. These are instances were the
applicant has come in early in the process and is given an affirmative review to
allow for planning to continue. Since the ordinance only requires a final certificate
of no effect before building permit, provisional certificates will enable platting to
occur (for example) but will state that a survey or study is required at a later point in
time to be provided for and paid by the landowner. About 20% of cases reviewed
were negative surveys, where a study was required and no sites were identified.
Fig. 16.5 Form for certificate of no effect or approval used in compliance with Albuquerque
archaeological ordinance
338 M. Schmader
Table 16.1 Summary of case review activity in Albuquerque, 2008 through 2014
Fiscal Fiscal Fiscal Fiscal Fiscal Fiscal Fiscal Fiscal Total
year year year year year year year year
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Cases 56 37 22 26 23 32 23 23 242
reviewed
Acres 1802.9 767.0 395.7 856.7 427.1 1330.0 530.8 387.13 6497.3
cleared
Previously 17 21 16 12 15 15 10 16 122
disturbed
Provisional 3 3 3 4 4 5 2 4 28
certificate
Negative 10 8 1 6 2 7 5 2 41
surveys
Sites 15 5 3 3 3 25 2 2 59
recorded
Eligible 10 2 0 0 2 11 0 0 25
sites
Treatment 3 3 1 1 1 4 5 0 18
plans
About 10% of the cases were positive surveys, resulting in 57 newly recorded sites.
Less than half of those have been determined as being significant or potentially
eligible for any register listings. Eighteen site treatment plans have been reviewed
for those potentially eligible sites.
Procedurally, each case is first evaluated for applicability of the ordinance.
Applicants not familiar with the process often contact the city archaeologist for
early determinations about the applicability of the ordinance to their project. Site
development proposals under five acres are excluded. Occasionally, applicants with
cases less than five acres in size will voluntarily ask for a certificate of no effect
depending on the nature of their submittal. Any activity that involves federal
funding or permits, or any state action, is referred to the New Mexico historic
preservation division (HPD). Local projects with state or federal involvement
(usually National Historic Preservation Act Section 106 compliance) are done with
HPD as the lead consulting agency. While sign-off for ultimate compliance is done
by HPD, that office will sometimes ask for local review from the city archaeologist
on technical issues such as adequacy of data recovery plans or project-specific
details. In this way, both local ordinance compliance and state or federal projects
are well integrated so that review processes cover all types of proposals and
coordination occurs between the city and the state. There is no current formal
Memorandum of Understanding between HPD and the city, however.
The dual review by the state HPD and the city archaeologist on certain projects
has had pros and cons. State guidelines for using mechanical equipment, for
example, are more rigorous than local ones. The amount of detail required for a data
recovery plan, and the formal approval of these plans by state review committees, is
also more rigorous. Input by the city archaeologist allows for more local expertise
to be used, and review times can be much shorter at the local level. The volume of
case review at the state level, and the state’s review committee meeting schedule
(which is bimonthly), can sometimes be seen as a drawback by project proponents.
City contact for technical advice, timeliness of response and comments, and
knowledge of local planning processes are seen as benefits to having projects
administered at the local level. Each municipality will have its own relationship
with the state’s HPD, and knowing what the strengths of each agency’s involve-
ments are can be an advantage so long as dual review procedures do not add to the
length of time and effort in getting projects approved and implemented.
Most of the large projects carried out since the AAO was adopted have been
under the dual party state and city review process. In one major example, several
school sites and a large sports complex are planned on lands owned by the
Albuquerque public school district. Lead compliance for this project falls to the
HPD because the land is owned by a political subdivision of the state. But technical
review of survey reports, testing plans, data recovery plans, and final reports was
provided by the city archaeologist. The project covered 688 acres, with 31 sites
slated for testing or data recovery; work occurred over a one-year period ending
November 2012 (Goar 2015). Sites dated from the middle Archaic period (circa
3300 BC), the late Archaic (circa 1200 BC–200 BC), and the early-to-middle
ancestral Pueblo periods (circa AD 600–1200). Residential sites, campsites, and
resource procurement sites demonstrated a long continuum of occupation. In
another case, data recovery for 23-acre mixed commercial and private residential
development on the west side of the city was conducted after the author spotted
exposed ash stains (Goar and Hamel 2015). Compliance was similar to the public
school project because the HPD had review authority over development along a
state road. Late Archaic features and three early Puebloan structures dating circa
AD 700–900 were documented.
One of the larger data recovery projects conducted entirely under the AAO was
part of a multi-phase housing subdivision located along the boundary of Petroglyph
National Monument (Railey 2013). After initial surveys and site identification, the
city archaeologist made determinations of eligibility and recommended testing on
several sites. The data recovery plan was drawn up by consultants for the landowner
and approved by the city archaeologist. The most significant site contained the
remains of a small dwelling with hundreds of chipped stone and fire-cracked arti-
facts. The structure, measuring three meters by four meters, yielded radiocarbon
dates to the end of the middle Archaic period (2110 BC–1900 BC).
Retrospective
More than eight years after its passage, the Albuquerque archaeological ordinance
has served its purposes well. Routine case review is carried out smoothly and
promptly. Staff at the planning department’s application counter is practiced in
340 M. Schmader
referring first-time applicants to the city archaeologist for guidance in complying

with the ordinance. Most private planning consultant firms are also practiced in the
process and contact the city archaeologist directly for compliance on new case
submittals. Little is lost due to the appropriate scale of the ordinance’s applicability
and staff response time. Applying the ordinance is often more administrative than
preservation science (i.e., requiring routine paperwork and not necessarily archae-
ological know-how). Case review can demand flexibility in interpreting the appli-
cant’s needs and the planning process; on occasion, reviews are done with rapid
turnaround, even on the same day. Having a city staff person familiar with the
planning process and with specific areas of the town is a distinct advantage, and one
reason why the archaeologist role has not been contracted out. There have been no
controversies and no appeals with respect to how the ordinance has been admin-
istered since its passage.
The position of Albuquerque city archaeologist has been filled by a paid staff
person since the ordinance passed in 2007. It was created with the intent of being a
full-time and fully funded position in the planning department, but due to budget
cuts the position was eliminated. The current city archaeologist works in the parks
department as an open space land administrator but, because of qualifications and
expertise, also fulfills the nominal duties of the city archaeologist. These include
plan review, issuance of certificates, offering technical assistance to the develop-
ment community, and providing compliance assistance to the planning department
and other city departments. While the basics of administering the ordinance have
worked well, there are initiatives that have not moved forward. Plans for public
outreach, educational programming, and fuller integration with public and private
projects have not begun. As originally conceived, the city archaeologist was to have
spent a fair bit of time ensuring that ground-disturbing activities did not accidentally
encounter unknown resources.
Albuquerque’s experience has some lessons learned and suggested applicability
for other municipalities. First, the threshold size of five acres is likely too large for
projects occurring in parts of the city with known higher site density. More likely, a
hybrid model with a five-acre minimum for the whole city and a smaller threshold
(of say, two acres) in sensitive zones would be a more effective approach. Second,
on-the-ground inspection of all municipal construction projects should still be done
as a routine monitoring effort. This function has not been done consistently and
remains a gap in needed oversight. Lastly, despite the cost-savings attitude toward
managing the archaeological ordinance, a city of Albuquerque’s size and with its
resources really should have a full-time staff person devoted to the task. As a
start-up solution during difficult financial times, the “fill it with what we have”
approach was logical. But eight years later and with financial stability, the part-time
approach has become one of convenience as local government priorities have
moved on to other issues. Perhaps administering the ordinance has worked a too
well for its own good.
Cities considering enacting ordinances need to consider several factors. How
large is the city relative to the known or expected historic resource base? Large
cities with spread out resources should approach their ordinance development
differently than compact cites with concentrated resources, for example. The nature
of the development community and is relationship to the elected officials is also
crucial. If there is not a common goal on both ends of that spectrum, then do not
expect results in a short period of time. Lastly, the administrative capability of any
city, and its ability to merge results of historic preservation efforts, is a sort of
bottom-line “reality check” for the ideals of desiring an ordinance. Any regulatory
framework is only as good as the responsible use of an ordinance as a tool. The
outcomes of that tool use needs to be public, accessible, and beneficial to the
community.
Albuquerque may be unique on several fronts when considering its archaeo-
logical context and its ordinance. It has a very deep and varied historical record. It
has a long history of public involvement with archaeology, and yet efforts to adopt
an archaeological ordinance were exceedingly slow. During the 25 years it took to
complete the ordinance process from 1982 until 2007, several municipalities have
enacted local laws (see Appler 2012: 45). The nearby City of Santa Fe (1987)
started later but finished well ahead of Albuquerque. To bridge this gap,
Albuquerque relied creatively on the planning process to devise procedures that
ensured archaeological resources were considered in certain key areas of the city,
such as the future Petroglyph National Monument. With the adoption of
Albuquerque’s ordinance and its implementation for eight years, protective
mechanisms are well-established and new information has emerged. As a result, the
ordinance has helped to protect and enhance the cultural fabric that makes
Albuquerque a place like no other.
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Index
A Bishop’s block, 85
Aboriginal, 70, 71, 73, 75, 77, 79, 84, 94, 96, Boston, 257–259, 261–265, 266–268,
105, 130, 139, 141, 142, 148, 152 270–272, 275
African Burial Ground, 242, 243, 245, 248, Bristol, 7, 8, 56–59, 62–66
251
Albuquerque, 7, 9, 10, 196, 227, 321–335, C
339–341 Cannon, 173–177
Alexandria, Virginia, 203 Chinatown, 280
Alexandria Archaeology, 204, 207, 210–213, City Archaeologist, 277–280, 282, 283,
215, 221 285–287, 289, 290, 294, 295
Anne Arundel County, 189, 191, 192, 196, 198 City Archaeology, 266
Archaeological protection code, 208, 212 City Archaeology Program, 228–231, 234,
Archaeological review, 196 236, 238–242, 245, 310
Archaeological trigger, 196 “City as site”, 186, 187
Archaeological zones, 195, 197 City Design Group
Archaeology, 2–12, 17, 18, 20–24, 27–32, Colonial Archaeology
38–40, 42, 43, 45, 49, 50, 53, 56, 62, 66, City code, 195, 197, 198
69, 70, 76, 82, 85, 87, 91–95, 98, 101, Colonial, 139, 158
102, 104–106, 108–110, 116–120, 123, Commemoration, 248
129, 137–143, 145, 146, 148–150, Community, 46, 47, 49, 50, 56, 59, 62, 64–66,
152–158, 161–171, 174–176, 183–198, 69, 73, 74, 79, 83, 88, 91, 96, 98,
203–205, 208, 210–216, 222, 227, 229, 103–106, 108–110, 122, 124, 130, 137,
233, 236, 240, 246–248, 250–252, 257, 145, 156, 183, 185–194, 198, 204, 205,
259, 260, 263, 266, 267, 270, 271, 273, 207–210, 213–216, 219, 220, 237, 239,
275, 278–282, 285–288, 290, 291, 295, 240, 243, 245, 251, 262, 264, 266, 268,
296, 299, 301, 302, 306–309, 311, 312, 271, 272, 279, 280, 282, 285, 294–296,
315–317, 323, 324, 328, 341 299, 301, 308, 309, 312, 324, 328, 329,
Archaeology ordinance, 193, 196, 197, 199, 332–334, 340, 341
300, 306, 309 Community activism, 248
Archaic period, 322, 339 Community archaeology, 203, 204, 221
Archives, 23, 28, 29, 57–59, 61, 62, 64, 216 Connect Lucknow
Area of Archaeological Importance (AAI), 41 Conservation, 138, 140, 143, 150, 152, 156,
Arup, 36, 44–48, 50 157
Australia, 137, 138, 141, 145, 150, 152, 158 Contrabands and Freedmen Cemetery,
Avocational archeology, 301 216–218, 222
Crowdsourcing, 8, 60–62, 65
B Cultural Heritage Act, 117–119, 123,
Big Data, 57 130–132
Big Dig, 257, 259–261–264, 270, 273, 275 Cultural heritage landscapes, 73, 74

and Local Planning, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-55490-7
344 Index
Curation, 83, 84, 87, 105, 210, 259, 288, 300, K

301 Kingston, Canada, 91
Kingston (Ontario, Canada), 91
D
Deposit modelling, 45 L
Development, 137, 140, 141, 143, 145, 146, Landmarks, 257–259, 261, 263, 265, 268
148–150, 153–157 Landmarks Preservation Commission, 229,
Development regulations, 190 230, 242, 250
Land-use planning, 72, 92, 110, 120, 140
E Localism, 66
Ellen Berkland, 262–264 Local priorities, 188
Environmental review, 228, 229, 237, 242, London, 2, 4, 7, 17–24, 27–32, 83, 93, 191,
245, 246–248, 252 236
European Convention on the Protection of the London Archaeological Archive and Research
Archaeological Heritage, 118 Centre (LAARC), 19, 28, 29
Evaluation, 43, 45–49, 50, 71, 73, 93, 119, Lucknow, 161, 163, 166–169, 171, 172,
206, 227, 228, 231, 239, 246, 279, 282, 174–177
283, 305, 332 Lucknow development authority, 169, 176,
Excavation permits, 147, 156 177
Exhibits, 231, 234, 236, 237, 239, 242, 252 Lucknow Municipal Corporation, 176
F M
Federal, 278, 281, 283, 286, 288, 289 Mapping, 45, 53–56, 58, 59, 78, 79, 81, 104,
Florida, 300, 301, 308, 309, 315 105, 156, 207, 329
Florida Public Archaeology Network Massachusetts, 258–260, 263, 264, 266, 267
Fort Ward Park, 216, 219, 222 Municipal planning, 103
G N
GIS, 20, 56, 58, 78, 130, 151, 211, 278, 287 National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF),
Government of North-Western Provinces and 8, 20, 28, 53
Oudh, 164, 166–168 Native American, 278, 282, 296
New Mexico, 321
H archaeological ordinance, 321, 330, 334,
Hazratganj, 171–177 339, 340
Hazratganj Traders Association, 171 city archaeologist, 334, 335, 340
Heritage Act, 82, 139–143, 146, 149, 156, 157 Northwest mesa escarpment plan, 328
Heritage planning, 102, 105, 110, 143 New Mexico historic preservation division, 333
Heritage square, 280, 281 New South Wales, 137, 138, 140, 142, 143,
Historical archaeology, 219, 220, 222, 302, 146
306, 316 New York City, 227–231, 233, 234, 236, 237,
Historic environment, 18, 20, 28, 45, 50, 60, 65 240–243, 245, 247, 248, 251
Historic Environment Record (HER), 53, 57
Huron-Wendat, 83 O
Official plan, 74, 75, 82, 101, 102, 104
I Ordinance, 277–279
India, 161–164, 166–170, 175
INRAP, 117, 120 P
Interpretation, 3, 8, 10, 66, 69, 85–87, 110, Petroglyph national monument, 326, 327, 332,
123, 126, 130, 144, 145, 147–149, 341
152–156, 176, 189, 198, 205, 209, 222, Petroglyphs, 326–328
228, 245, 335 Phoenix, 279
Piedras marcadas pueblo, 329, 330
J Placemaking, 120, 126
Joseph Bagley, 265
Index 345
Planning, 5, 8, 10, 17, 18, 20–24, 26–28, 31, 236, 239, 245, 260, 261, 264, 288, 289,
40–43, 45, 47, 49, 50, 53, 54, 56, 57, 59, 294, 307, 321, 323, 325, 329, 333
61, 62, 64, 65, 69–76, 81, 83–85, 87, 88, Researching, 176
91–94, 101–103, 105–108, 110, 118, Ronson ship, 235, 236, 240, 251
119, 123, 137–141, 152, 155, 156, 169, Rose Theatre, 24–26
171, 175, 189, 196, 197, 204, 219, 220,
222, 229, 237, 238, 242, 250, 261, 262, S
278, 280, 282, 286, 299, 301, 308, 321, Section 106, 183, 184
325, 328, 329, 331–336, 339–341 Site development, 130, 132, 196
Policy, 37, 42, 46, 47, 49, 50, 72–74, 76, 84, Spanish colonial, 308
93, 102, 106, 108, 116, 131, 139, 140, St. Augustine, 303, 304
157, 169, 187, 188, 197, 198, 204, 259, Stephen Mrozowski, 260
268, 269, 288, 301, 309, 316, 317, 325 Steven Pendery, 261, 271
Polluters pay principle, 42 Sydney, 137–140, 143–145, 148–150, 152,
Popular report, 289, 290, 292, 293 155
Potential modeling, 81
PPG16, 27, 47 T
Preservation, 205, 211, 279, 283 Training, 278, 286, 287
Preservation in situ, 20, 24, 27, 45, 46
Preventive archaeology, 120, 130 U
Public, 277–279, 281, 282, 284, 285, 289, 290, UNESCO World Heritage, 74, 115, 128, 139
294, 296 Université Laval, 122, 123, 129
Public archaeology, 213, 299, 300, 309 Urban Archaeology, 2–7, 23, 118, 169, 227,
Public engagement, 5, 23, 24, 105 230, 234, 251, 258, 259, 261, 262, 265,
Public archaeology network, 309 268, 269, 271, 272, 275
Public outcomes, 146, 148, 157 Urban conservation, 171, 176
Public outreach, 228, 231, 234, 235, 239, 247
V
Q Vázquez de Coronado, Francisco, 329
Quebec City, 1, 3, 7, 8, 115, 116, 120, 122, Vichy government, 8, 118
130, 131 Volunteers, 263, 268–272, 274, 275
R Y
Relics, 138, 141, 142, 146, 147, 149, 155 York, 2, 4, 7, 8, 18, 35–47, 49, 50, 76, 78, 84,
Rescue, 22, 23, 39, 92, 101, 119, 123, 205, 249 236
Research, 3–5, 10, 30, 37, 39, 42, 45–47, 49, York Archaeological Trust (YAT), 36
50, 57, 59, 62, 65, 76, 78, 83, 101, 116,
118, 119, 122–124, 126, 128–131, 143, Z
147, 152, 157, 162, 169, 175, 186–190, Zoning, 189, 192, 194–198
193, 195, 198, 204, 205, 207, 210–212,
215, 216, 218, 219, 221, 231, 233, 234,

Appler, Douglas R._ Baugher, Sherene_ Moss, William - Urban archaeology, municipal government and local planning _ preserving heritage within the Commonwealth of Nations and the United States-Springer

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Appler, Douglas R._ Baugher, Sherene_ Moss, William - Urban archaeology, municipal government and local planning _ preserving heritage within the Commonwealth of Nations and the United States-Springer

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Sherene Baugher

ISBN 978-3-319-55488-4 ISBN 978-3-319-55490-7 (eBook)

© Springer International Publishing AG 2017

Printed on acid-free paper

This Springer imprint is published by Springer Nature

1 Introduction: Thinking Globally and Acting Locally—

Part I The Challenges and Accomplishments of Local Government

8 Archaeology Down Under: Management and Outcomes

Part II The Challenges and Accomplishments of Local

About the Editors

Douglas R. Appler, Ph.D., AICP is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Historic

Sherene Baugher, Douglas R. Appler and William Moss

© Springer International Publishing AG 2017 1

Urban Archaeology Versus Municipal Archaeology

Urban archaeology is both an archaeology of a city and in a city. Many North

Urban archaeologists study the material culture—the artifacts, the building

of this book may contribute to a number of discussions currently underway within

The Focus of This Book

The Case Studies in the Book

potential archaeological sites within cities. The city of Lucknow is an example of

Collaboration with the many different stakeholder groups present within a

Hana Morel, Joseph Flatman and Kim Stabler

© Springer International Publishing AG 2017 17

A Brief Introduction to Greater London

Archaeology and Planning

The vast majority of archaeological work in London and throughout the UK is

planning process (Aitchison 2009). Archaeology, or more accurately the impact to

The Background of London’s Archaeology

Part I: An Issue of Access and Funding

The current high level of urbanisation and increasing agglomeration of economies

Part II: The Rescue Movement and the Setting

Lambeth Archaeological Excavation Committee (1973); the South West London

Part III: A Change in the Organisational Landscape

London’s Archaeology Today

Having an archaeological archive is undoubtedly one of the greatest accomplish-

purposes, whether by professionals, enthusiasts, students or other researchers. The

Roles, Partnerships and Communities

Concluding Discussion: Why It Works, or Does It?

including more ‘intangible’ elements of heritage such as historic street patterns,

Aitchison, K. (2009). Feature editorial. British Archaeology, (Issue 107).

© Springer International Publishing AG 2017 35

proposed ring road presented a signiﬁcant series of threats to archaeological

unintended consequence. It made the local authority less inclined to consider

Fig. 3.5 Hungate, York, aerial view. © Getmapping plc (2007)

to developments in the rural hinterland of York. The cost of these archaeological

© Springer International Publishing AG 2017 53

the OS extended to the suggested route of a Roman Road, or former site of a

The Past in the Landscape

These paper records have now been converted to computer-based geographic

1990s. It was further funded by English Heritage to create an Urban Archaeological

The Heritage Information Cycle

Getting to Know Your Place

In addition to uploading many of the city’s archives to various map layers, a

Crowdsourcing the Story of Place

Towards a Shared Understanding

Failure to properly value information is a recurrent theme at all levels of heritage

Sourcing the Crowd

important consideration. However, the beneﬁts of a coordinated approach where

Ronald F. Williamson, David A. Robertson and Susan Hughes

R.F. Williamson (&) D.A. Robertson

© Springer International Publishing AG 2017 69

In Canada, there is no overarching federal legislation concerning archaeological

collaboratively by the Ministry and cultural resource management industry,

archaeological surveys are undertaken in advance of all new road construction in