Assessment of the hydrogeological regime becomes a fundamental requirement on most ground investigations and has major geotechnical implications for a development. Considerable assessment of the groundwater at the London Docklands Development led to the development of a groundwater model of the Docklands area. This included a multidisciplinary understanding of the regime so that fate, mobility and overall impact of contaminants could be assessed. Work generally involves providing a series of boreholes and laboratory testing to build a preliminary knowledge base of geotechnical aspects so that advise on the geohydrological situation can be provided.