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The remains of a Roman villa and a nesting pigeon posed a challenge for engineers laying new cables on a Norfolk deer farm.

A new building at Park Farm, Snettisham meant UK Power Networks had to dismantle a 33,000-volt overhead line and replace it with an underground cable.

Project manager Ian Robinson said:” The first challenge was working out how to keep the underground line far enough away from the buried remains of an ancient Roman villa.  We submitted plans to the county council and agreed a new route for the cable. Instead of completely removing the old wooden poles that held the old lines we cut them down to the ground so that the Roman remains would not be disturbed.”

Historic England describes the Roman villa as ‘one of six villa sites to either side of the line of the Icknield Way in north west Norfolk. Limited excavation in 1931 and the geophysical survey in 1995 have confirmed that extensive remains of structures and other features associated with iron working survive around the site of the house. Most of the pottery found on the site during excavations is dated to the 3rd and 4th centuries AD.’

The team also paused work for a month towards the end of the project when a wood pigeon built a nest overnight and workers left it alone for four weeks until the birds had flown.

UK Power Networks safely and reliably delivers electricity to 18 million people through local substations and power lines, and invests around £600 million each year in the network.

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