Is archaeology being used to make HS2 look good?

[Imperial Dave]

https://www.independent.co.uk/independentpremium/long-reads/hs2-archaeology-news-roman-mola-blackgrounds-b1990727.html

hadnt thought of it but makes sense...

[lionheartrjc]

HS2 is like an archaeological trench through a sizeable part of the countryside.  Like any organisation, HS2 is going to take advantage of any good publicity it can.  Doesn't mean that you couldn't just do the archaeology without digging up the rest of the countryside.

If you are going to have to have HS2, I would rather have the archaeology completed than not.

[Imperial Dave]

yes agreed.

[Jim Webster]

Mind you, do enough people care enough about archaeology for the PR exercise to be worth while?

[Erpingham]

Mind you, do enough people care enough about archaeology for the PR exercise to be worth while?

What other positive PR have they got?  Maybe later they will have some great engineering or some impressive railway architecture but at the moment archaeology presents the most interesting muddy holes they have.

[Imperial Dave]

if the thing is being built then the happy happenstance of these discoveries is all well and good

[Dave Knight]

There is a debate to be had (not on this forum) whether or not HS2 is a good thing.

I have no interest in the motive behind them doing the archaeology -  just that the maximum amount of information is extracted from the construction

[Swampster]

Any construction project is going to have archaeological surveys and one of this scale is bound to keep coming up with things. Crossrail was the same.
I think an interviewee  (Alice Roberts?) on the BBC the other day said that more archaeologists are employed on this kind of thing than by county and museum services.