2,880 new graves for Addolorata cemetery, space for ash urns

The government has presented a planning application for the construction of 2,880 new graves and adjacent charnel houses on a 28,220 square metre site known as Tal-Horr hill, on a parcel of land next to the Addolorata cemetery.

Charnel houses provide vaults in which corpses or bones are piled.

In a clear indication of the government’s policy in favour of cremation as an alternative to traditional burials, the proposal also includes space for the burial of ash urns and a new wall and entrance.

The application involves barren land which does not involve any uprooting of trees or any demolition of rubble walls.

A 2,000 graves extension plan was announced before the last election. In November 2009, then Social Policy Minister John Dalli announced plans for 9,000 new graves through a €33 million extension, paid for through the sale of the graves. The extension was to have been built on the same neo-gothic lines of the cemetery.

The project, however, did not take off.

In a parliamentary question in 2011 former Health Minister Joe Cassar announced that 2,989 new graves are planned to be dug at the Addolorata Cemetery. Their sale price was still to be determined.

The Malta Environment and Planning Authority is presently formulating a policy regulating the extensions of already existing policies. The new policy bans the development of new cemeteries.