Camp Hill Cemetery reopening date ‘has not yet been determined’
Posted Sep 18, 2019 08:22:55 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
People hoping to visit Camp Hill Cemetery in Halifax won't have access to it anytime soon.
A city hall spokesperson said Wednesday the municipally-owned site remains temporarily closed due to the effects of hurricane-force winds from post-tropical storm Dorian.
Erin DiCarlo said cleanup work is ongoing, and “a reopening date has not yet been determined.”
The storm slammed into Nova Scotia on Sept. 7.
DiCarlo said about eight big trees and “a few large shrubs” inside the graveyard have been uprooted. The cemetery's roads, which pedestrians use as walking paths, “are in fair condition,” she told HalifaxToday.ca.
The municipality doesn't have a storm-related damage estimate yet.
Camp Hill Cemetery is a leafy place bordered by Robie Street, Veterans Memorial Lane, Summer Street and a tiny part of Carlton Street. It's the last home for such notable Nova Scotians as Joseph Howe, Alexander Keith, Viola Desmond, Robert Stanfield and Abraham Gesner, who invented kerosene in the 1840s.
It's also a spot visited by tourists and used by walkers, joggers and cyclists.
Storm damage inside the fenced property can be seen from adjacent sidewalks: inaccessible burial spots, toppled tombstones, roadways blocked by big branches and large, torn-from-the-earth trees.
Much tree debris has to be collected and removed from the site, which is just west of the Public Gardens. And at least two gaps in the burial ground's permanent fence have been filled with temporary chain-link fencing.
It's likely not all headstones that fell over at Camp Hill Cemetery were knocked by Dorian. Many had already been in a state of disrepair.
DiCarlo said the municipality doesn't have a total for the number of toppled gravestones.
Asked about available grave plots, she said about 20 cremation lots are for sale. The cost is $2,070, including tax and a maintenance fee, DiCarlo said in an email.
There were no fatalities in this province because of Dorian. Dozens of people were killed in the storm-ravaged Bahamas, and media reports say 2,500 Bahamians have been registered as missing.
At the storm's peak here, about 400,000 Nova Scotia Power customers were without service. Cellphone networks were also hurt by the big blow, and many Nova Scotians had no landline service either.
Michael Lightstone is a freelance reporter living in Dartmouth