Plans for city cemetery expansion approved by councillors

PLANS for a significant expansion to a city graveyard – which, when complete, will cater to a range of different burial preferences – have been approved.

At a meeting of Cork City Council on Monday, councillors approved the proposed extension of St Catherine's Cemetery in Kilcully.

The expansion of the cemetery will see the footprint of the existing burial ground increased to provide 2,199 new standard grave burial plots, 880 cremation burial plots and 312 natural burial plots.

St Catherine's currently has approximately 5,200 standard burial plots, with only a limited number of new burial plots remaining.

Cork City Council, in its Part 8 planning report, said the proposed extension “will cater for future demand for the next few decades”.

“The proposed cemetery extension site is situated to the west of the existing cemetery in an agricultural grassland field and will connect the existing St Catherine's Cemetery with the Kilcully Old Church and its small surrounding graveyard,” the report stated.

In relation to the natural burials, the local authority said such burials “are intended to be with environmentally friendly robust coffins such as good quality wicker materials” with a “simple small stone marking of the grave plot”.

“The planting of [a] small sized native Irish tree selected from an approved list of suitable trees will be facilitated as [an] additional marker of the plot.

“No headstones or multiple coffin burials in each plot are proposed,” the council’s report continued.

Also among the planned works is an expansion of the car park to create 53 additional car parking spaces, inclusive of six disabled car parking spaces.

The provision of a bike shelter to accommodate a minimum of five bicycles is also proposed.

A report issued to councillors at Monday’s council meeting stated that two submissions were received when the scheme went to public consultation late last year.

Speaking at the meeting, Green Party councillor Oliver Moran lauded the proposed expansion, particularly the option for natural burials, as “extraordinarily imaginative”.

The natural burial ground, he said, will be the first publicly owned natural burial ground in Ireland.