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The Modern Antiquarian Forum » Silbury Hill » PLEASE SIGN PETITION, only takes 1 min |
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wyntersylph 3 posts |
May 21, 2004, 18:57
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hi all, Silbury hill is collapsing in the middle as most of you know, well english heritage decided to do a temporary repair job on it, using POLYSTYRENE to fill the middle of the hill ! they have done nothing since and it has been four yrs, they are basically leaving it to rot. please sign so they might take some respectful responsibility for what they have done and attempt to make a decent repair job on it http://www.petitiononline.com/Silbury1/petition.html it takes less than 1 minute to sign the petition please !!!
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Pete G 3506 posts |
May 21, 2004, 19:08
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Hi wyntersylph, welcome to TMA. I think everyone here has already signed the petition as it sort of originated here when Heritage Action was formed. Will you be at the demo next saturday? Hope to see you there, PeteG
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nigelswift 8112 posts |
May 21, 2004, 19:30
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Hi Wintersylph. Thanks for promoting it. If everyone was like you, and passed it on to a couple of people, we'll be well sorted
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Littlestone 5386 posts |
May 21, 2004, 23:01
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Hang on a mo... this might make me very, very unpopular but does anyone actually know WHY English Heritage chose polystyrene to support Silbury's vertical shaft? Polystyrene sounds like a ghastly and unsympathetic material to use at a site so important to so many of us but it's actually kinda intersting stuff. A sheet about an inch thick and some 4x8 feet in size can be balanced on the tip of your finger (in other words a material that can be easily airlifted to the top of Silbury). Sandwiched between two sheets of acid-free board polystyrene is still incredibly light and so rigid you can't bend it. This polystyrene/acid-free sandwich used to go under the name of Gatafoam and was/is used by conservators in some of our major museums and art galleries as a mounting material for two-dimensional art. Could be that the polystyrene fill at Silbury is the most appropriate solution in the short term. Once Silbury is stabilized and a more sympathetic fill decided upon the polystyrene is going to be a hell of a lot easier to remove than X tonnes of some other material. Think about it - a few years back someone would have authorized reinforced concrete (and try getting that big baby out of the centre of Silbury).
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Hob 4033 posts |
May 21, 2004, 23:15
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"does anyone actually know WHY English Heritage chose polystyrene" I know I don't. But that sounds like a possible explanation. My first thought is of the irritating shite that gets used as postal packaging, though the pics of Silbury looked like big chunks, I think. The reason the cynic in me suggests is that they used polystyrene because it was relatively cheap to get up there by heccylopter. But it doesn't sound like a long term solution, so if it's appropriate for the current state of the hill, surely that implies there's a longer term problem in the eyes of the hill's custodians. Part of the problem the petition is trying to address is that EH don't seem to be all that willing to tell people what the score is, nor exactly what they think needs to be done. And if asking pertinent questions makes you unpopular dude, then that's not right, things that matter to as many paople as this, should be open for discussion.
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nigelswift 8112 posts |
May 21, 2004, 23:52
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The polystyrene is not the central part of the campaign. It is not the first time it has been used in these sorts of contexts, although it does give rise to some possible worries which, as with so much else, have been neither shared nor discussed with the public. It was placed there to shore up the sides and prevent further shearing away, particularly as a result of vibration during the making of boreholes. This prompts the question: if vibration was a problem, how did the voids to the side and under it fare during vibration? They had no packing and the boreholes actually penetrated into them. Will we ever know? There has been silence since 2001 about if there have been further collapses. One could ask: since polystyrene is virtually impervious to water, are the sides of the shaft next to it waterlogged? And will that have weakened them? And will it be very hazardous to remove the polysytrene? One could wonder whether open shoring might have been better, so there was ventilation, and control of the water table and a means to visually monitor. These difficulties should also be seen in context: below the polystyrene is the collapse material. And it's weight is presumably bearing down on the unsupported voids below and to the sides. You might think that all sounds a bit hazardous. You might think the centre will need grouting urgently before there's an attempt to move the polystyrene filling. Grouting seemed to me the right thing to do from the start. But EH rejected grouting totally at the start. They still had no intention to do it last September. This year, following our letter, their Chief Executive wrote to us and said grouting was now one of the options to be considered. "Could be that the polystyrene fill at Silbury is the most appropriate solution in the short term." That remains to be seen, in view of the above unanswered worries. But maybe we'll never know, as the short term has become the long term and I'm doubtful that there's any data on it's performance in such a context after this amount of time. It certainly wasn't put in there with a view to leaving it for this long.
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Littlestone 5386 posts |
May 22, 2004, 00:52
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Yeah... it's all worrying stuff (the possible waterlogging round the polystyrene fill; the gut aesthetic/religious aversion to the thought of a polystyrene core at the centre of Silbury; the lack of info from English Heritage). Guess what I'm saying though is that new materials might seem inappropriate but sometimes they're not as bad as they first seem (expandable polystyrene for example has been a godsend to archaeologists when lifting delicate objects from the ground). I'm not trying to defend EH here but maybe the conservators responsibe for Silbury are just not sure what to do next and are erring on the side of caution. Silbury is big, very big, very old and very important. So far the conservators responsible for it seem to be following the golden rule of conservation... 'Do nothing that is not reversible'.
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Pete G 3506 posts |
May 22, 2004, 01:09
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How was your visit to Silbaby last week? Wotcha fink about it? PeteG
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nigelswift 8112 posts |
May 22, 2004, 01:54
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"So far the conservators responsible for it seem to be following the golden rule of conservation... 'Do nothing that is not reversible'. I absolutely don't hold that view, for one and a half reasons. The half reason is that delay in stabilisation of unstable voids is a one way path to further destabilisation. I think it likely, though no-one is saying either way, and probably never will, that 4 years has resulted in further collapses and irreversible loss. I'd put quite a bit of money on it having happened. The full reason is this: Last September the Commission were presented with just two options on the way forward (the minutes are on line) : a.) To do nothing and let all the collapses happen and migrate upwards (!!!) b.) To research the viability of re-excavating and reprofiling the tunnels and then fill or support them (you'll appreciate what the word reprofiling implies). Two options only. Both involving loss. They chose b.) In March, Heritage Action wrote saying that such an approach was unacceptable since it involved destroying archaeology, compounding the destruction of the original tunnellers by means reminiscent of theirs. We said they should research other modern methods and that reprofiling should be the method of LAST resort not first and that all other options should be researched first. Three weeks later they wrote back to us and changed their website: they told us and have announced that they're now researching ALL methods. So the record shows that actually until HA made a fuss the conservators responsible for it have NOT been following the golden rule of conservation and have been intending to do EVERYTHING that is not reversible" I don't suppose HA will get the credit for this complete change of course, and am quite content for it to be presented as a monumental coincidence.
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Littlestone 5386 posts |
May 22, 2004, 09:58
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Sorry Pete, it was my mother's funeral last week and I just wasn't in the right frame of mine to take a look at Little Sil. Back down again next month though and will spend a couple of days time checking it out.
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