2025:297 - Robswalls, Dublin

Planning permission was requested to demolish the existing dormer bungalow and garage, construct two detached two-storey houses, one three-storey detached house, communal car parking area, and all associated site works at The Bungalow, Coast Road, Robswalls, Malahide, Co. Dublin.

In a letter from Fingal County Council requesting further information, the council noted that the proposed development site is partly within the zone of archaeological notification of a Recorded Monument, Robswall Castle (DU012-036—-) and which cartographic evidence suggested was located within an 18th-century walled kitchen garden. The applicant was requested to submit an Archaeological Impact Assessment (AIA) to include archaeological test-trenching, documentary research and an archaeological impact statement.

The AIA recommended that a phase of archaeological testing take place to cover the footprint of the development, via 5 machine-dug test trenches, all 1m wide. The works were carried out on 14 January 2025.

In 4 of the 5 test trenches examined, topsoil was removed down onto a hard, compacted gritty loam clay, with nothing of archaeological interest recorded. The only exception was at the west end of the trench located in the south-west area of the site, where a rectangular lime mortar-lined rectangular pit was exposed, its shape a form suggesting it to be part of an 18th-century holding pond for fish or eels for the table.

Due to the possibility that further garden features might survive elsewhere across the site, it was recommended, subject to discussions with and the approval of the relevant heritage authorities, that should planning permission be granted, a phase of post-house demolition archaeological monitoring of on site topsoil stripping be undertaken.