Environmental and legislative aspects concerning existing and new cemetery planning

摘要

This study was carried out in order to revise the law in force in Italy (Decree no. 285 of 1990) in the field of cemeteries, funeral services and all that concerns disposal of human remains. Countries which have space limitation for existing cemeteries or difficulty finding new suitable areas for cemetery planning have to re-examine all the systems of disposal of human remains (cremation, burial by ground and by walled-graves) and all the parameters involved in the process of the bodies decomposition. In this paper, on the basis of data collected from some municipal cemeteries in Italy, the reasons that have led to current insufficient areas for burial are analyzed. It is a very difficult question to single out possible solutions because they involve technical parameters as well asa new way of considering the burial. In this paper some possible solutions to the problem of recovering burial sites are analyzed and some guidelines for the planning of municipal plan-cemeteries are outlined. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. [References: 4]