Site Features

Site features

The site of a settlement is the land on which it is built. There are a number of different types of sites which have been used for settlements from earliest times.

Site	Characteristics
Defensive	Difficult to attack e.g. hill-top or island
Hill-foot	Sheltered, with flat land for building and farming
Gap	Lower, more sheltered land between two hills
Wet point	Close to water in a dry area
Dry point	On higher, dry area close to wet land e.g. marshes or flooding rivers
Route centre	Focus of routes (e.g. roads) from surrounding area
Bridging point	Where bridges can be built over a river

Identify the type of site by matching each settlement letter to the appropriate description of its site.

Hill-foot
Gap
Wet-Point
Dry-Point
Route Centre

The importance of individual site features changes through time.

In Early Times (before 1800)

Feature	Reason / example
Good defence	Hard to attack e.g. hill top, island
Close to water	For water and fish supplies
Close to woodland	For fuel, building materials and food
On useful farmland	To provide food
Flat land	Makes building easier
Good communications	By road and river

In Later Times (after 1800), other features became important when considering the site of a settlement

Feature	Reason / example
Close to resources	As raw materials for industry e.g. limestone or coal
Close to ports	To transport raw materials or goods
Faster communication	As industry grew and developed e.g. canals, railways and more recently, motorways and airports.
Pleasant environment	For a) larger number of retired people and b) hi-tech industries which wish to locate in attractive areas

by the BBC