Demolition work has started on a York city centre eyesore.

The site of the shabby former Co-op store in Micklegate is being transformed into a £6 million, four-storey hotel.

Archaeologists are now waiting to get the go-ahead to move in and excavate the site before building work starts.

David Brinklow, excavations co-ordinator for York Archaeological Trust (YAT), said there was excitement about what could be found under the site.

He said the new development would use the existing foundations as much as possible, but small areas of new ground would be broken.

"In the late 1980s and early 1990s we excavated on the other side of the road at the site of the old Queen's Hotel," he said.

"Beneath that was a major Roman building with two-metre masonry walls, and we would be very surprised if a building of that scale did not extend across the road to the Victoria House site."

Excavation work will begin within the next month and is expected to take several weeks.

The 104-bedroom Ramada Encore Hotel is expected to bring 60 jobs to the city.

The original plans for the site were rejected by city councillors who believed the designs did not fit in with the buildings in the street.

But the amended plan - which will include the frame of the existing Co-op building - finally got the go-ahead last month.

Updated: 11:29 Tuesday, May 22, 2001