Examination of Witnesses (Questions 3100
- 3119)
3100. MR WHEELER: Yes. I have provided
the Committee with 16 copies of the document. I will refer to
those as I go through the text, if I may.
3101. CHAIRMAN: You are not going to
go through every paragraph of this Petition?
3102. MR WHEELER: No, I am not.
3103. CHAIRMAN: You have divided up the
workload, have you not?
3104. MR WHEELER: Yes, we have. It is
a big subject and we have divided it up to avoid repetition.
3105. CHAIRMAN: Very much appreciated
it is too, I can tell you!
3106. MR WHEELER: I am just concentrating
on settlement today. I have a few questions that the petitioners
I represent have asked me to ask. I imagine I would ask those
of the Promoter.
3107. CHAIRMAN: It is no use asking us!
3108. MR WHEELER: I imagine I ask them
of the Promoter.
3109. MR MOULD: Yes, I suspect that Mr
Berryman may be able to help on a number of them. If there are
any which require Professor Mair's input, that will be tomorrow.
If that presents difficulties for Mr Wheeler perhaps I can have
a word with him at an appropriate moment to see how we can deal
with that.
3110. CHAIRMAN: Would you do that because
I want you to have the opportunity of asking questions such as
you need to. Professor Mair cannot be here all the time.
3111. MR WHEELER: They are not that technical.
I realise Professor Mair is a very distinguished scientist tunnelling
engineer, but my questions are not that technical.
3112. CHAIRMAN: Yes, he is.
3113. MR WHEELER: On 13 June 2006 we
presented evidence to the Committee that demonstrated in our view
the Promoter had not carried out sufficiently detailed investigations
into the condition of the listed buildings within the lines of
deviation along the base route. The Commons' Select Committee
we believe took our points on board and asked the Promoter at
the time to come back to the Committee (and this is their quote)
in the autumn and demonstrate clearly that an individual assessment
had been made of each listed and historic building in the area
and that the appropriate mitigation had been put in place.
3114. We had previously pressed the Promoter
to make a proper assessment of historic buildings and, in response
to their statement that they had actually completed their Phase
3 investigations and did not intend to carry out any further investigations,
we challenged them (I suppose is the way to put it) to review
a small selection of buildings so that we could demonstrate the
inadequacy of their Phase 3 assessments.
3115. We invited the Promoter to visit three
buildings and inspect internally. We had chosen the three on the
basis that they were all open to the public and were therefore
reasonably accessible, and that they demonstrated a reasonable
cross-section of the construction issues typical in the area.
We pressed the Promoter to visit these buildings because it seemed
clear to us that the scope of their settlement assessment report
did not adequately reveal their condition and the risks of damage
from settlement.
3116. CHAIRMAN: Are they in here?
3117. MR WHEELER: Yes, if we could have the
first illustration, please.[7]
You will be familiar with that. The first was Christchurch, for
which actually no assessment had previously been made. It is outside
the lines of deviation, but it is inside the line if there were
such a line, and it is not shown on any of the Promoter's information
that demonstrates the extent of settlement. A line of deviation
is defined by the ten millimetre degree of settlement. The degree
of settlement on Christchurch is not that great, but it is within
an area of settlement. The local people were very keen that some
assessment be made of it.
3118. The other properties we asked them to
look at were 84 Commercial Street, The Ten Bells public house
next to the station and, lastly, we asked them to look at 19 Princelet
Street, which is the Museum of Immigration, a very well known
old synagogue and really quite a remarkable remnant from the area's
history.[8]
That is the main hall, and there is another shot of the interior
there showing the cast iron columns. These are the properties
we took them around.
3119. The conclusion of these visits was that,
in the case of The Ten Bells at least, they confirmed they were
happy with their original assessments; but that the other two
properties would now require further consideration.
7 Committee Ref: A19, Christ Church Spitalfields (TOWHLB-20_05-001) Back
8
Committee Ref: A19, Various view of properties in Spitalfields
(TOWHLB-20_05-002 to -005) Back
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