2003:1920 - PORTLAW: The Square, Waterford

Planning permission was granted for the construction of sixteen houses and a commercial retail unit at The Square, Portlaw, Co. Waterford. A condition of planning required that testing be carried out. A warehouse, built in the 1950s, occupied the northern section of the site, while the Mayfield Schoolhouse lies c. 10m to the south-west of the site.

Nine trenches were excavated by machine. The seven trenches opened in the area of the warehouse and yard comprised a concrete surface on top of a compact gravel deposit. This averaged 0.5m in depth and overlay the natural subsoil, which was a yellowish-brown sandy boulder clay. The stratigraphy in the two trenches opened to the north and east of the schoolhouse consisted of the topsoil layer, which comprised a loose, mid-brown silty clay measuring 0.4m in depth, overlying the natural subsoil. No archaeological finds or features were noted on the site.