CITY residents are set to benefit from a new cemetery as soon as autumn this year.

Salisbury city council has submitted a planning application to Wiltshire Council for a new cemetery on land off The Avenue, joining Wilton and Devizes Road.

It will include roughly 2,500 burial plots, as well as space for burial of ashes, a children’s burial area, a Muslim burial area and a woodland burial area.

There will also be a memorial garden for mourners or visitors.

City council leader Matthew Dean told the Journal the city’s existing cemeteries, on London Road and Devizes Road are almost at full capacity.

The council are hopeful the new cemetery will last more than 100 years before reaching capacity, as currently more people are being cremated rather than buried.

The works are expected to cost just under £500,000, using money from council tax as part of the council’s capital investment programme.

Costs will be recouped through interment charges, which are currently £430 for city residents or £860 for other parishes, over the next 20 to 25 years.

It is hoped that the cemetery will be open for burials from August or September, although works will continue to plant trees.

But Cllr Dean said it would not be “a building site”, adding: “From day one we want a very attractive cemetery, that reflects the situation that people find themselves in.”

He said the search for a new cemetery site started in the 1980s, but potential plots were flagged for housing or other developments. “It’s very difficult to create cemeteries, because they have to be accessible by public transport, they cannot be too near shops as retailers do not like them and they cannot be too close to housing,” Cllr Dean said.

The council acquired the site, previously owned by Wilton Estate as farmland, as part of a development deal with Persimmon Homes, who have fenced the area and created a makeshift entrance ready for works to begin.

And he said demand was growing, with some people “putting their names down” for plots already.

“We are being pro-active, we are not required to do it, we are doing it because we want to and we think it is going to be something that is a beautiful piece of open land,”Cllr Dean said,

View the plans at wiltshire.gov.uk, planning number 18/00239/FUL.