Planning permission granted for new Remembrance Park in Shrewsbury

The site to be known as Mytton Oak Remembrance Park, will provide burial services to the people of Shropshire for the next 100 years, once Emstrey cemetery in Shrewsbury closes to new burials in around two years’ time.

The Remembrance Park will also provide an opportunity for woodland burials, which are becoming more popular, and include areas for quiet reflection.

Shropshire Council say they will appoint a build contractor following a competitive tender process, and construction work will begin in spring 2013 once work has been carried out to protect great crested newts at the site. Work will also be carried out to remove and trim back hedges at the site, before the nesting season begins.

Mike Owen, Shropshire Council’s Cabinet member responsible for bereavement services, said:

“I’m really pleased that planning permission has now been granted for the new Remembrance Park. This means that we can now make a start on preparing the site, and then carry out the necessary construction and development work, ready for the park to open in spring 2014.”

The site for the Mytton Oak Remembrance Park is currently a greenfield site close to Mytton Oak Road and near to the Bowbrook allotments.

The choice of name for the new Remembrance Park recognises the location of the new Pprk just off Mytton Oak Road, which in turn took its name, in 1934, from the fact that land in the area once belonged to the Mytton family.

To recognise the origins of the Remembrance Park’s chosen name, Shropshire Council plans to plant at the site an oak tree which descends from the Shelton Oak – a tree which for more than 600 years stood close to the remembrance park site on the land once owned by the Mytton family – and from which the name Mytton Oak is thought to originate.

It is estimated that developing the new site would cost £1.1million, which is included within Shropshire Council’s capital programme.