The modern visitor to Carrickfergus will experience a town that is very different to the one that existed for most of its long history. The essential and symbiotic relationship that existed for centuries between the town and the castle was severed by the construction of a major road in the late 1960's, now known as Causeway Coastal Route. As a result, the altered townscape can sometimes be difficult to understand.

Carrickfergus is one of the most excavated towns in Ulster and the day-to-day lives of its people over many centuries can be reconstructed by archaeologists from the objects discovered and the buildings in which they lived.