THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Friday, January 10, 1997              TAG: 9701100557
SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B3   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: BY NANCY LEWIS, STAFF WRITER 
DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:   48 lines

NORFOLK PLANNERS DISLIKE CEMETERY PLAN IT WOULD ALLOW BURIALS IN ROADWAYS TO MAKE MORE ROOM AS SPACE DECLINES.

A plan to close roadways in city cemeteries to make room for more bodies got a cool reception from city planners on Thursday.

Planning commissioners heard details of the $32,000 consultant's report and said they'd pass their comments along to the City Council, which will receive it next month. None of the reactions was favorable. The commission did not vote on the plan.

Commissioner Anthony Paige was outspoken in his opposition, telling cemetery managers to ``deal with reality'' when it comes to death and buy more land if they're worried about running out of room.

Members of the new Friends of Norfolk's Historical Cemeteries worry that the plan may survive.

``We had hoped that they'd say no to aisle closure,'' Tim Bonney, co-chair of the 100-odd-member group, said after Thursday's meeting.

The problem, Bonney said, is that the space-saving study will go to City Council next month, at the same time as the group's request to seek historic preservation status for three of the cemeteries. And, he said, it's hard to see how the council could approve both.

Bonney's group believes that using roadways for burials would make Elmwood, Cedar Grove and West Point ineligible for inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places.

Those charged with managing the city's burial grounds are in a bind when it comes to planning for the future, because, at the present rate and without an increase in mausoleum use, the city will run out of plots in about 15 years, said Stanley Stein, director of recreation, parks and general services.

And land suitable for interment is at a premium in flat, wet Norfolk. About 10,000 burial sites are left.

Stein said running the cemeteries is ``a business'' that uses money from an endowment care fund to provide for their upkeep. But the city must also kick in about $100,000 a year to round out the $1.5 million cemetery budget, said Robert Kirby, superintendent of Norfolk cemeteries.

Commissioner Paige urged exercising a ``sense of conscience'' so that vehicles don't have to drive over graves.

Other recommendations in the consultants' plan include more space for mausoleums. The study was done by Sloane Consulting Group of Delmar, N.Y., and Harley Ellington Design of Southfield, Mich., and did not consider eligibility for historic designation.

KEYWORDS: CEMETERIES NORFOLK PLANNING COMMISSION NORFOLK CITY

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