SLAITHWAITE Cemetery looks set for a modernising extension.
Plans have been submitted to improve access and burial facilities at the site off Manchester Road.
But it also hoped the new scheme will help accommodate people who don’t want to be buried in a traditional way.
The general aim of the extension project is to provide a public open space with woodland and seating areas.
Woodland would be extended, but at the same time designers hope to remain sensitive to current burial sites and the location’s history.
Should the plans be passed work will begin to:
Retain the present burial areas, but extend and provide more public burial areas.
Create a more flexible environment to cater for different faiths and newer burial practices.
Provide better parking and movement around the cemetery.
Improve disabled access.
Construct vehicle passing places.
Lawn cemeteries, with rows of headstones, will continue at the site.
But the plans also look at incorporating more woodland burials.
These would involve informal, ‘nature-rich’ sites in existing woodland being created.
These areas will not have traditional headstones but individual plots marked by either a slate, hardboard tablet or possibly even a microchip.
In this special area memorabilia would be forbidden, so as not to interfere with the ‘natural approach’.
A Kirklees Council spokesman said: “There are about 30 plots left in the current cemetery. The plan would give another 600 plots, possibly including a new woodland burial section.”
