25th September 2010, 09:19 PM
Callsign Wrote:What I never understand is why developers just see archaeology as something to be gotten rid of, a pollutant that devalues the land. Surely the knowledge of the fact that the land once was (insert interesting piece of archaeology here) should INCREASE the value of the land?
In 99% of cases I can't ever see this happening. Developers aren't building houses to make homes for people, they're doing so to make a profit. If they have to undertake archaeological work the cost of this will reduce their profit margin. People aren't going to pay a premium for a house that happens to be built on a Romano-British salt-working site. Developers can't break the ceiling price of an area just because a house is located on a medieval farmstead.
In blunt terms if I'm looking to buy a house and company A has built on a site with no archaeology and company B has built on a site that needed archaeological work I'm not going to pay a premium to live in company B's house (even if there was some really interesting archaeology there). I'd rather save my money and put it towards some carpets.
That's not to say that there aren't opportunities to add value to the archaeological project and generate positive publicity for the developer, but in most cases this isn't going to change the book value of the houses they're selling.