diff --git a/mps/code/mpmst.h b/mps/code/mpmst.h
index 6f23fab8052..5c21c60a6a0 100644
--- a/mps/code/mpmst.h
+++ b/mps/code/mpmst.h
@@ -474,7 +474,6 @@ typedef struct TraceStruct {
   TraceId ti;                   /* index into TraceSets */
   Arena arena;                  /* owning arena */
   int why;                      /* why the trace began */
-  Align whiteMinAlign;          /* minimum alignment of references in white set */
   ZoneSet white;                /* zones in the white set */
   ZoneSet mayMove;              /* zones containing possibly moving objs */
   TraceState state;             /* current state of trace */
diff --git a/mps/code/trace.c b/mps/code/trace.c
index ffe800e151e..bb4d4f1cd99 100644
--- a/mps/code/trace.c
+++ b/mps/code/trace.c
@@ -155,7 +155,6 @@ Bool TraceCheck(Trace trace)
   CHECKL(TraceIdCheck(trace->ti));
   CHECKL(trace == &trace->arena->trace[trace->ti]);
   CHECKL(TraceSetIsMember(trace->arena->busyTraces, trace));
-  CHECKL(AlignCheck(trace->whiteMinAlign));
   CHECKL(ZoneSetSub(trace->mayMove, trace->white));
   /* Use trace->state to check more invariants. */
   switch(trace->state) {
@@ -369,10 +368,6 @@ Res TraceAddWhite(Trace trace, Seg seg)
       trace->mayMove = ZoneSetUnion(trace->mayMove,
                                     ZoneSetOfSeg(trace->arena, seg));
     }
-    /* This is used to eliminate unaligned references in TraceScanAreaTagged */
-    if(pool->alignment < trace->whiteMinAlign) {
-      trace->whiteMinAlign = pool->alignment;
-    }
   }
 
   return ResOK;
@@ -694,7 +689,6 @@ found:
 
   trace->arena = arena;
   trace->why = why;
-  trace->whiteMinAlign = (Align)1 << (MPS_WORD_WIDTH - 1);
   trace->white = ZoneSetEMPTY;
   trace->mayMove = ZoneSetEMPTY;
   trace->ti = ti;
@@ -1494,36 +1488,26 @@ Res TraceScanArea(ScanState ss, Addr *base, Addr *limit)
 
 /* TraceScanAreaTagged -- scan contiguous area of tagged references
  *
- * This is as TraceScanArea except words are only fixed they are tagged
- * as zero according to the minimum alignment of the condemned set.
- */
+ * .tagging: This is as TraceScanArea except words are only fixed they are
+ * tagged as zero according to the alignment of a Word.
+ *
+ * See also PoolSingleAccess <code/poolabs.c#.tagging>.
+ *
+ * TODO: Generalise the handling of tags so that pools can decide how
+ * their objects are tagged. This may use the user defined format
+ * to describe how tags are done */
 Res TraceScanAreaTagged(ScanState ss, Addr *base, Addr *limit)
 {
-  TraceSet ts;
-  TraceId ti;
-  Trace trace;
-  Arena arena;
   Word mask;
   
-  AVERT(ScanState, ss);
-
-  /* This calculation of the mask could be moved to ScanStateInit
-   * but there is little point as we probably only do a couple of ambiguous
-   * scan per thread per flip. */
   /* NOTE: An optimisation that maybe worth considering is setting some of the
    * top bits in the mask as an early catch of addresses outside the arena.
    * This might help slightly on 64-bit windows. However these are picked up
    * soon afterwards by later checks.  The bottom bits are more important
    * to check as we ignore them in AMCFix, so the non-reference could
    * otherwise end up pinning an object. */
-  mask = (Word)-1;
-  ts = ss->traces;
-  arena = ss->arena;
-  TRACE_SET_ITER(ti, trace, ts, arena)
-    AVER(WordIsP2(trace->whiteMinAlign));
-    mask = mask & (trace->whiteMinAlign - 1);
-  TRACE_SET_ITER_END(ti, trace, ts, arena);
-
+  mask = sizeof(Word) - 1;
+  AVER(WordIsP2(mask + 1));
   return TraceScanAreaMasked(ss, base, limit, mask);
 }