Service Diversion VDP, Victoria Dock Road, Seagull Lane (Crossrail XSX11)

Abstract

• Archaeological watching briefs carried out by the Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) on the Crossrail Victoria Dock Portal worksite, which consisted of utilities diversions centred around Victoria Dock Road and Seagull Road. Generally, trenches were excavated to a depth of 2.0m. Natural terrace gravels were overlain by thick peat deposits sealed by a horizon of alluvial clay. All deposits were archaeologically sterile. The sequence was sealed by modern made ground and the concrete and tarmac of the current road and pavement surfaces. Three trial trenches and a targeted watching brief afforded the opportunity to record and sample the sequence above the Pleistocene Thames gravels (from 3.3m below OD). The sequence consisted of potentially early Holocene river meandering to tidal creek formation at the base to prehistoric wood peats before rising sea level created the later, probably historic, estuarine floodplain. Of interest is the evidence for a fluvial or extreme weather, event at the eastern end of the site. No artefacts or structures were recovered.