Site Event/Activity record ECH4202 - Archaeological Excavation at the Former Tramway Bus Station, Chester, 2005

Notwithstanding the limitations imposed on the evaluation, the results from the test trenches allow the broad characterisation of the surviving archaeology within the application site. No archaeological remains or deposits of great merit were encountered. However, in most trenches a buried soil layer was noted directly above the underlying drift geology. This soil layer represents the undisturbed agricultural ground prior to the establishment of the site as an industrial complex. Brick and clay tobacco-pipe fragments found stratified within this layer suggest a late post-medieval date. The survival of this underlying soil layer will mean that any pre-existing archaeological remains, prior to the development of the area during the nineteenth century, may lay relatively undisturbed at the level of the natural clay subsoil; it is prudent to note that these may include early field boundaries, agricultural structures, outlying kilns, etc. However, no residual finds to suggest the presence of nearby archaeological features were retrieved during the trial excavation.