Two hundred years of engineering geology

Abstract

On 31 March 2007, a meeting entitled ‘Engineering Geology Through the Centuries’ was held at Keyworth in Nottingham. The meeting was convened jointly by the Engineering Group of the Geological Society of London (GSL) and the Yorkshire Geological Society, and formed part of the celebration of the bicentenary of the GSL. The meeting focused on the lives and achievements of a number of British engineering geologists who have made outstanding contributions to their profession and to science. The meeting formed part of the Society's ‘Local Heroes’ initiative for the bicentenary. The set of papers in this issue of the Quaternary Journal of Engineering Geology and Hydrogeology celebrates the contribution over the last 200 years by scientists and practitioners who have influenced the development of engineering geology or whose work has been particularly important to related aspects of human history. In addition to papers on the individuals discussed at the meeting, papers are included that discuss the development of engineering geology, historically and in the context of education and training. Engineering geology has been an important scientific sub-discipline for as long as people have sought to build and construct their living environment. If nothing else, people soon learnt where buildings could be built safely and where poor foundation conditions or the presence of geohazards meant that unacceptable risks were present. However, engineering geology came to greater prominence with the flowering of geology as a major science in the early 19th century, a time that saw the founding of the GSL in 1807. Of course, there have been many other influential engineering geologists in addition to those discussed in this collection of papers and the paper by Turner addresses some of these, as do accounts such as that on North America by Kiersch (1991). For the Keyworth meeting, the editors set out …