2020:070 - Bridgefoot Street, Dublin 8, Dublin

Archaeological monitoring was carried out at the site during groundworks associated with service installation within the area of a proposed public park at Bridgefoot Street, Dublin 8. The site is bounded by Bridgefoot Street on the east, Island Street on the north, Bonham Street on the west and Robert Emmet Walk on the southern side. The work consisted of monitoring all groundworks associated with the installation of services within the site. It included the excavation of 40 trenches and 15 manholes. Each trench measured on average 0.6m in width, each manhole was 2.5m by 2.5m. The groundworks depth did not exceed 1.2m.

In the south-western part of the site part of a brick structure was partially exposed and preserved in situ. This feature likely represents the north-west corner of the Corporation Depot building which previously stood on the site. Within the northern part of the site, in a trench running parallel to Island Street, an organic dark reddish-brown silty clay deposit with animal bones, pottery sherds, oyster shells, glass and clay pipes was exposed. This likely represents a former garden soil or deposit of cess/waste of possible 18th/19th-century date. Within the southern part of the site a Belgian block cobble surface was exposed following the removal of a tarmac and rubble layer, and likely represents the 19th/20th-century road surface of the former Bonham Street. Within the eastern part of the site, just under a layer of topsoil and sod, a red brick and mortar rubble layer was exposed, likely representing the demolished remains of 19th-century houses situated along Bridgefoot Street and depicted on the OS maps.

This investigation exposed no features of archaeological significance.

Unit 21 Boyne Business Park, Greenhills, Drogheda, County Louth