Around the world: Germany, Australia

Some innovative ideas from our fellow Earth citizens in Germany (a cemetery "pyramid" and Australia (a natural cemetery).

Meanwhile, also in Minnesota, plans for a new vets cemetery

While older, private cemeteries fall into government hands, when no one else can do the job (see my previous post), Minnesota officials are working to put in a new, 60-acre veterans cemetery near a state park south of Duluth.

Cemetery care falls increasingly to cities

Here's a story, originally in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune and reprinted by the Grand Fords Herald in North Dakoka. The reasons are the same as countless other cases: Cemetery boards can't or won't hold to their obligations; money gets tight ... whatever the reasons, the results are the same -- either the cemeteries fall into disrepair or the public (either private citizens or goverment entities) must take over their care.

Running out of room in Utah

A small town in Utah wants to establish a cemetery; currently, folks can be buried in the cemetery in the town next door, but it costs much more than if they could be buried in their own town. Not just any site will do, the mayor notes, because they need a low water table in order to bury their own.
Says Mayor Laurel Brady:

"I don't know why something wasn't acquired sooner. Lately people were
wishing we had. Cemeteries are something that don't come up (in city planning)."

Georgia thinks 'green' burial

Officials in Bibb County, Ga. are considering a plan to create a natural cemetery on a 25-acre site. There is only one other such cemetery in all of Georgia and only a handful total around the country.

From Web Urbanist

This came "across the transom," so to speak. A blurb from Web Urbanist notes that the Mount Hope Cemetery in Rochester, N.Y., is one of the seven great abandoned sites in the country. Just scroll down a bit from the top and you will find it. You also will find another link to the Forsaken Places Web site.

Maine cemetery struggles to stay open

Here's an interesting situation that has arisen out of the change in public sentiment from burial to cremation. A community in Maine is considering whether to take over the operation of two cemeteries, because their operators get so few burial options (as people choose cremation) that they cannot make ends meet. The townsfolk will decide in March whether to take control of the cemeteries.