What Do Cities Owe to their Dead? Urban Cemeteries In Toronto Are Running Out of Space to Bury the Dead

There is a lack of cemetery land in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA). More broadly, structures of city planning which do exist, do not adequately take account of the racial, religious, cultural, class differences and changing cultural practices of memorialization among the city’s population in urban cemeteries. Municipal city planning in Toronto has yet to address, how to equitably spatially plan for death in Toronto by designating the required zoning for cemetery land use in Official and Secondary Plans. Given the amendments in the Provincial Policy Statement (PPS), as part of the PPS review in 2014, the need to plan for cemeteries was addressed in language but not in full practice. Where, in part of the new PPS, released last year, the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing (MMAH) added the word “cemeteries” to policy 1.1.1 b), the list of institutional uses that should be considered by planning authorities, to better recognize planning for all life stages:

“Healthy, liveable and safe communities are sustained by:
b) accommodating an appropriate range and mix of residential (including second units, affordable housing and housing for older persons), employment (including industrial and commercial), institutional (including places of worship, cemeteries and long-term care homes),recreation, park and open space, and other uses to meet long-term needs”.

However, with recent amendments to the PPS 2014, the City of Toronto has yet to implement planning for cemetery use in community planning or development applications through its Official Plan and Zoning By-Laws, given the diversity of Toronto. At the same time, Council which represent 44 Wards in Toronto do not make recommendations for cemetery land use given the religious and cultural diversity and changing cultural needs of memorialization of communities located in the 44 Wards which make up the City of Toronto. Death it seems is an equity issue which urgently needs to be addressed in planning and policy –with respect to equity, diversity and inclusiveness.

How can we spatially plan for death in the city of Toronto given the changing cultural needs of cemetery land use in the context of urbanization, where the city expands and cemetery space continues to shrink?

Political Economy of Death. Race. Space & Class.

I learned a great deal about unexpected traumatic loss as a funeral celebrant – providing celebration of life ceremonies to bereaved families. This experience offered deep insights into loss, but it also raised many questions about the way that the city planned for the changing needs of death across diverse races and cultures and also about the flows of capital in place-making practices of memorialization.

As an urban and regional planning graduate from the Masters of Environmental Studies Program at York University, my research has revealed that cemeteries in Toronto are running out of space to provide a means of disposition for human remains. It is this principal finding that has called into question the city’s ability to strategically plan for death and its on-going demands, in creating a functional city. Current debates about city planning in Toronto, narrates a particular kind of development which stresses accommodating growth; waterfront development, gentrification, revitalization of specific priority neighbourhoods and extending transportation infrastructure. Yet cemeteries have yet to be a part of the conversation on growth and land use needed to accommodate the dead -given mortality rates and population projections. My research discusses how Toronto can spatially plan for death, through an informed processes of the political economy of death, equity, diversity, race, space, culture and class, raising important land use questions that are culturally appropriate, equitably accessible and demographically accommodating, with limited social and environmental impacts. This contribution is a tool for urban planning processes in the City of Toronto and urbanized cities alike, where re-imaging the ‘Silent City’  serves as a planning function through civic consciousness, public engagement and a planners need to not only realize humanity’s difference in the living city, but humanities difference in the city of the dead: the urban cemetery.

Within this context, we may rightfully ask some principal questions: if my family and I live in the city, how do I know we will be able to die in the city? How will I be able to memorialize the life of my loved one through place-making in the cemetery is there is a lack of space?  Who will get to be remembered in the archaeology of urban memory and performance in the cemetery? If I want to be cremated, what does this mean for me, given the intensification and densification of the urban cemetery? How can my celebration of life practices that were carried out in the funeral home run with my land use needs in the cemetery?  With such a demand for space and limited supply, who will not be able to afford in-ground burial or won’t have access to niche interment in a specific cemetery section due to a lack of space?  Who will not be able to afford the land value associated with interment rights at time of need?

The motivation of my research has been well received by cemetery operators, funeral establishments, a  diverse range of municipal departments, city planners, academic institutions and more importantly the general public. My contribution continues to challenge planners to confront our cultural anxieties surrounding death in order to equitably and effectively plan for the full life-cycle of the city: live, work, play and die. Within my research, I therefore propose a number of ways of approaching equitable planning for death in the GTA, where cemetery spaces can be reimagined and planned for.  It is through consultation with cultural and religious community members, cemetery operators, funeral service providers and stakeholders alike, with planners, where an initial committed can be broached in providing an equitable means for people to die in their city. In addition to this, my research has allowed me to draw on planning tools such as cemetery needs analysis policy frameworks, focus groups and site analysis observations as a means of generating further discussion on planning for changing material and cultural needs of death in the city and in the urban cemetery. It is my hope that this will bridge the gap in planning to live, work, play and die in Toronto.

I continue this conversation through municipal cemetery needs analysis, a series of Jane’s Walks and city planning interventions, to highlighting how urban cemeteries are a part of a city’s story and should be reflected in municipal planning policy which addresses the built urban form and the social development of the city.

…If you want to know what a city is like, look at how a city plans for its cemeteries.

Cemeteries reflect generational lived realities in perpetuity. Cemeteries are the storyteller’s of great cities, narrating how your story gets told, re-told and remembered.