City of Calgary set to open first new cemetery in 80 years

For the first time in 80 years, the City of Calgary plans to open a new cemetery in 2020.

The Prairie Sky Cemetery, approved by city council this week, is slated for an 18-hectare site just east of Ralph Klein Park in the city's deep southeast.

It will be Calgary's first new municipal cemetery since Queen's Park Cemetery, which opened in 1940 inthe city's northwest.

At that time, the city's population was less than 100,000. Today, it's more than 1.2 million.

Coun. Shane Keating believes the name of the new cemetery suits the location.

"It's somewhat isolated, as far as access, because you have a little difficulty getting to it, so Ithink it just meant that: 'Here we are in the open areas of the City of Calgary,'" he said.

The city says Prairie Sky Cemetery will help meet Calgary's burial needs for the next couple of decades.