2023:795 - Ramelton WwTW, Donegal

It is proposed upgrade the existing sewer network in the villages of Ramelton, Millford and Rathmullan in County Donegal under the overall Ramelton Millford Rathmullan (RMR) Sewage Scheme. The 2020 assessment report on the proposed Ramelton works noted that no monuments were recorded from the area of the proposed pumping station and no features of archaeological significance were noted above ground in the walkover survey. However as the scheme would run through the town of Ramelton, which is recorded as Historic Town, the report proposed that all ground disturbance, including any site investigation work, along the route of the proposed rising main be archaeologically monitored.

Monitoring confirmed the cartographic evidence, that the quay walls in the town were two different phases, the earlier section along The Mall, probably built around 1800, with the second phase running eastwards along the Shore Road, built in the latter years of the 19th century. The Shore Road section was constructed firstly by the building of the quay wall and then building up the gound to the rear of it and the construction of the road on this made ground. In contrast, The Mall was constructed on compacted natural glacial till. Apart from numerous services lines, including late 19th-century stone culverts under the Shore Road, nothing of archaeological interest was uncovered in the archaeological monitoring.